Project Entry 2014 for North America

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    A view from a neighboring building shows the open air atrium and the garden spaces provided.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    The site is seen in red along the coast of San Francisco. The concept of an elevated street allows for a dense, mixed footprint. In yellow are important contextual landmarks. The program diagram shows the approximate size and composition of each “program block” inserted along the parking ramp. Their composition is based on logical immediate adjacencies in the vertical direction, and an even distribution of program along the ramp: thus creating the street without forgoing functional efficiency.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    A day lighting study provided the rules for removing a central portion of each floor plate, utilizing the most efficient sun angles throughout the day. An open air atrium is created serving to develop an experiential quality that does not seek to hide the former infrastructure, but instead glorify its natural aesthetics. The folded plate music hall is then visually connected both outside and in: sitting in the unavoidable shadow lines of adjacent buildings.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    Public gardens are located on the upper levels to alleviate the hardscaped urban environment.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    Wind currents off the water are used in stack ventilation. The program blocks are seen in elevation.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    The entry lobby to the music hall shows the use of existing structure as architectural detail.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    New openings throughout the structure connect programs like the art gallery and restaurant seen here.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    Vertical adjacencies create immediate connections while distributing programs along a continuous path.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    The back of house stacks vertically, connecting green room, backstage and more via private elevator.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    The music hall takes advantage of the existing floor levels to create balcony seating.

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    Project entry 2014 North America – Evolutionary Infrastructure: Adaptive reuse of a parking structure for cultural activities, San Francisco, CA, USA

    Mark Turibius Jongman-Sereno, Mira Irawan, and David O’Brien.

Last updated: March 31, 2014 San Francisco, CA, USA

This project by a team of young designers explores the concept and potential of adaptive post-occupation of unused infrastructure in San Francisco, USA. Using a parking garage to create a scenario, the scheme proposes to convert the “found” structure – an “objet trouvé” in the city, so to speak – into a public building hosting a range of cultural activities. The stacked floors of the garage and its circulation ramp are literally re-used to accommodate new functions. 

Additionally, new architectural elements are introduced, such as a performance hall which acts as cultural beacon on top of the garage, and an open air atrium cut through the slabs as public space. Adaptive reuse is here perceived as a strategy to reduce material flows in the city, using its material stock as opportunity for further development.

The twentieth century was the most innovative century historically, however, as society progresses we have begun to leave much of this innovation behind in the form of unused infrastructure. The only fundamental way to advance is through the adaptive post-occupation of this infrastructure. The project uses the armature of an existing fallow parking garage to host a new cultural program (music, food, and art) creating a spatial and social interface. Globally it is a societal responsibility to innovatively adapt the existing urban environment rather than destroy existing infrastructure and design via tabula rasa.

The project’s cultural program operates with varying scalar and spatial differences along a continuous circulation path, the former parking ramp. Parks within the armature provide relief as a public soft-scape, while a full-height light well reduces the original density of the garage. Through the materialistic treatment of old vs. new the experience is equally didactic and spatial.

The stacked circulation of the parking garage is reused, and program is plugged into this structural/ social armature. This program is infinitely expandable and replaceable to accommodate varying future use, which promotes longevity. This new configuration acts as a continuum of an urban street, an extension of the local urban fabric. The project simultaneously reduces the consumption of new construction material as well as construction waste which contributes significantly to landfills worldwide. At a time when we are running out of places to “hide trash”, it is key to not generate any additional waste. The very nature of the project makes it inherently sustainable.

In the next decade, Rincon Hill in San Francisco’s South of Market district will add 20,000 residents to the area and in so doing, become a high-density mixed-use neighborhood. The project provides social and cultural program, synergistic with their mixed-use ideology, through a myriad of program/events, which activate the site continuously. Economic vitality is ensured through the “plug-in” system of program, which allows for rapid reconfiguration based on real-time market trends.

The introduction of program along the circulation system resists monotony. The new experiential quality is similar to an urban street, where program and spatial experience are constantly in flux. The main performance hall sits proudly atop as the final destination, providing a cultural beacon.