In 2013, we were privileged to be part of BluPrint Magazine’s list of 20 Young Outstanding Filipino Designers under 40. The article was beautifully written by Joseph Javier and clearly expressed our crusade to contemporize Filipino Architecture. Entitled THE NEW FILIPINO, we had a discussion about our beliefs and design practice, striving towards a NEW FILIPINISM in our architecture.

Thank you again, BluPrint!

Sharing with you guys our latest completed residential project, S House, as featured in Daphne Osena-Paez’ webisode of Urban Zone. Thank you Daphne for providing a platform for us to share our ideas and spread our ideas on “Filipino Rennaisance”. Mabuhay!

Designing houses in the Philippines can be frustrating a lot of times for us. Since we practice contextual architecture, we do not believe in ‘themed’ residenial developments but instead believe in an architecture that is designed specifically for the place its going to be built, the climate there, and should reflect the culture and identity of the people using it. For this project, for instance, the lot is located within a strictly Mediterranean-themed development. We understand the whole point of having rules and restrictions in a subdivision which is essentially to achieve harmony within it. But since the village had a mediterranean theme, and houses there had little or no eaves, we were being restricted to have a maximum of half a meter for our eaves! This doesn’t make sense at all in a tropical climate because we need eaves and canopies and different architectural contraptions to be as long as they can be to protect our fenestrations from heat and rain (which happens to hit the house horizontally when combined with strong winds).

We essentially designed the house as if we weren’t governed by the theme. We designed it to be honest to it’s site, climate, condition, and client’s pramaters. We started off with the idea that as an owner or designer of a private house, we will never have control over the urban condition that surrounds our property. One day, it may look good, the next day, it may deteriorate because of lack of maintenance. The theme of the village, for example is something we cannot control, more so the attempt of the other homeowners to build a Mediterranean house but most often ending up wth a very poor and tacky copy.

Given this fact, we proposed a house that’s defensive. A house that’s inward looking, and whose back is faced towards the street, and whose spaces all are oriented towards it’s own controlled environment, in this case a courtyard in the heart of the house. By doing this, the spaces between the street and the courtyard become transitory barriers that protect the controlled environment within from being degraded by the uncontrollable harshness that our urban jungle creates such as noise from traffic, pollution, undesireable views, etc.  We used public spaces such as circulation areas as visual and auditory buffers that protect the private spaces from the outside world.

We proposed a house with projecting canopies to ensure the interiors from direct heat gain. We realized that if we push back the building line a bit back relative to the allowable building line, we can have longer eaves and canopies. In combination with this, we made sure that cross ventilation occurs throughout the house. The plans of the house are not deep, therefore making it easy for wind to exit through another opening as soon as it enters.  Even walls that open up to an internal hallway have transom windows, to allow wind to cut through. There is no room in the house whose windows are only on one wall effectibely funneling the wind to cut across the entire length of all rooms.

We proposed a house whose general form is still oriented towards the courtyard, articulated with a series of walls that act as if they were hugging and shielding the internal environment of the house from the outside world, made even more expressive by arraying these fins in shifting angles.

We proposed a house that is honest with its materiality – concrete is shown as concrete – raw and unpainted. Wood is shown with all of its grains and knots. Glass is kept as transparent as it can be. The imperfections of all of these materials remain unhidden.

We took a chance on the design as we believed that it represented the client’s preferences, and the cleint ended up believing in the design so much as well. We submitted the plans to the subdivision with our fingers crossed. Despite the theme,  and with a little push and a bit of argument, we had the design approved. Ever since it was built, the village has now been revising their regulations. The mediteranean theme has slowly been eased out as they realized that it was only a market-driven trend and there are now lesser and lesser people wanting to buld their house in such theme, especially after seeing that an honest house can turn out to be much more beautiful and expressive of who they are than themes that developers set. To cause things to change for the better, some rules should really be aimed to be broken.

Text and Photos by Nikki Boncan- Buensalido , As seen in Urban Monologues 2.0, Business Mirror Newspaper (2013)

Last year, I had the chance to visit Seattle in the US.  My family and I took a 3-hour road trip from Vancouver, Canada to the border of Washington State in the US.  It was my first time in Seattle and I read from books that it was a gloomy city – always raining and cloudy.  Records of the local weather bureau point out that Seattle is ranked as one of the five States that receives the most amount of rainfall in a year.  This was what I was expecting and was prepared to get soaked but as we drove into the border, we were greeted by a warm and very fair day with wisps of clouds in the sky with the afternoon sun preparing to set in the horizon.  It was a pleasant surprise and I was excited because I only had 24 hours to soak in all the Architecture and the local flavor of the City. As dusk set in, we were driving into the curb of the apartment of one of our family friends, Cassie Lim.  Tita Cassie, graciously invited us to stay with her for the night and offered to take us around the city in the morning.

Being an architect, all the items on my Seattle Bucket List were all modern buildings.  After our first stop at the Pike Market to pick up our early morning breakfast at the very first branch of Starbucks, we headed towards the Seattle Central Library which opened in 2004.  The Central Library is the flagship building of the Seattle Public Library System and was designed by world-renowned architect Rem Koolhaas and Joshua Prince- Ramus of the Office of Metropolitan Architecture or simply OMA.  Right smack in the middle of a normal street with normal buildings, was this very expressive art piece.  As you turn the corner, the first glimpse of the building jolts you alive.  An American Institute of Architecture blog notes that this building was voted 108 on the list of Americans’ 150 favorite structures in the US.  The building also received the 2005 National AIA Honor Award for Architecture. At 11-stories of 56 meters high, the building is made of a diagrid structural system, bare concrete and glass.  The building’s massing is composed of a three structures piled, peeled and pulled off from each other in some angles enveloped a structural system that also acts as the skin of the building.  As if inviting users inside, the architects of the building wanted to allow people to still experience how to use books despite the fact that almost anything can be pulled out of the internet.  Koolhaas and Ramus wanted to make sure the program of the building’s spaces functioned as reading nooks and public spaces recreated as a “Living Room” with light filling in from the outside,  encouraging users read more books and stay lengthily inside the library.  The wanted to create a building that was functional and kinetic rather than static and imposing, which is usually how other old libraries look like.

Right smack in the middle of a normal street with normal buildings, was this very expressive art piece.

Next stop was the Experience Music Project Museum or the EMP.  The EMP is located in the heart of the Seattle Center Campus where the Seattle Needle can also be found.  The EMP was designed by Architect Frank Gehry. Having been acclaimed for other famous structures such as the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, Frank Gehry, another maestro in the world of Modern Architecture.  The EMP Museum is the home to some of the most significant eras of popular culture, science fiction, rock and alternative music.  Similar to its architecture, the museum is dedicated to push risk-taking ideas further so that it can fuel creativity of pop culture further.  The colorful reflective exterior of the building is made up of riveted sheet metal which changes its form as one turns every corner of the building’s façade. Frank Gehry describes the building to take the form of a “smashed up electric guitar”.  Our local guide mentioned that to some local residents, the building is reminiscent of a “crumpled piece of musical score sheet”.  What was interesting too is that the purple side of the structure is inspired by Jimmy Hendrix’s song “Purple Haze”.

Loved the colors all over the facade so I decided to take snap shots in each colored background

When I visit architectural landmarks, I make it a point to experience the building on all sides since some have entirely different angles and forms. The details of each particular structure also leave traces as to how the building was constructed and the though process that goes with the design concept. At every turn, the building contorted, bent and cracked to form crevices some of which formed pedestrian entrances and display boards.  There was even a hole in the building to allow the monorail track to slice through!

Sufficient to say that truly, creativity has no limits. Both the Seattle Public Library and the Experience Music Project Museum are notable landmarks in Seattle.  Both carry a distinct identity.  Both are avant-garde, modern and contemporary. The concept of reading and appreciating music is not a new thing.  The Seattle Public Library and the EMP Museum has just found new ways to allow the user to experience reading and listening to music in a new light.  These two buildings have successfully bridged the gap for the elderly and the young by introducing a new and tangible experience.  Both architects used normal elements such as books and music that we are all used to and translated them into something relevant for the current times.  They were able to translate it into something that the younger generation can understand.

Taking these into our local context, I hope that someday, we too can create modern buildings that are responsive to local context and local culture but at the same time these buildings may also allow our people to experience the mundane things in different ways. Allowing them to expand their knowledge based on personal experience is a more effective tool. I invite you to join me as I explore the adventure of life and as I relate a series of observations to dissect what the Urban Fabric contains and to go deeper than just mere aesthetics.

storefront

"all great artists sign their work" - steve jobs

A few months ago, we were comissioned by the Relzbach Group to do a re-vamp of their store. Aptly called AKTIV, its a brand they developed that carries multiple brands under their wing such as Gola, New Era, Hunter, and Buff, among others.

Given all of these multiple brands with identities of their own, the real challenge was how to make the store look harmonious with all of these brands that have their own identities. Our solution was simple – to develop a module that could function in multiple ways as well, so that it could adapt to the specific need of each product. We started with a display shelf whose dimension was based on a shoe – this box is stackable to display multiple shoes, or be adjusted in dimension, to display products with differnet sizes such as bags and shirts. These boxes were also used as light shelves, to illuminate products that are far from the source of light in stores which is usually the ceiling. The boxes could also be used as signage bands – and with this, a certain visual organization was achieved as even if their logos and signages looked different from each other, the similarity of the module size and configuration that houses these logos are the same.

These modules were then rotated in such a way that it faces the storefront for premium visibility, stacked on each other, to form these “toblerone” shaped display modules (as the client fondly called it), that create an even bigger module collectively formed by the boxes. Sort of like an picture (toblerone) formed by pixels (boxes).

Being a store that focuses on an active lifestyle, we wanted to simulate the spirit of movement. By stamping these toblerone shaped modules throughout the perimeter of the store, a certain rhythm was achieved thru repetition, creating a visually appealing and dynamic atmosphere.

The choice of materials presented much difficulty during construction because of the absence of veneers. Concrete is seen as concrete. Metal is presented as metal. We wanted to achieve a certain kind of rawness in the interiors – the same kind of rawness people feel when they’re active. Call it visual honesty.

the space upon entry

the sales counter

view from the interiors, looking towards the storefront

bench / display

ceiling details - the shape is similar to the AKTIV identity

Text and Photos by Jason Buensalido , As seen in Urban Monologues, Business Mirror Newspaper (2007)

“Jorn Utzon, the architect of the Sydney Opera House, has never seen his masterpiece in the flesh since he left Australia in 1966.” said our animated tour guide. As if the design of the structure wasn’t interesting enough, I found out that the history of the building’s construction was even more colourful.

I recently took a trip to Australia where I felt like I was on another architectural pilgrimage. Any architect you talk to knows what the Sydney Opera House is, so it would be a shame if I didn’t see it with my own eyes. When I did, I didn’t realize that my jaw was dropped because the sight of the magnificent structure. It moved e, causing me to just stop and gaze in awe.

The idea of having an opera house in Sydney formed in the 940s, when a world-class visiting conductor came to the city to do a performance. He was able to talk to the city officials and told them that if they wanted to be a serious metropolitan, they needed to have a place where culture can flourish; they needed an opera house.

The visiting conductor probably hit an insecure nerve among the city politicians because after he left, they organized an international competition for the design of the Sydney Opera House. It was a very prestigious and high-profile competition, as over 200 entries were submitted from all over the world.

The entry of Jorn Utzon was already thrown in the trash can. Majority of the judges said that it was too different and too bold to be the new face of Sydney. Luckily, there was one judge who came in late and saw the entry in the can. He picked it up, spread it out, and showed it to once again to the other judges – “This should be our winner PRECISELY because it is different!”. Jorn Utzon, an unknown Danish architect, won 5000 dollars and the commission of the project. He moved his entire family to Australia and set up an architectural office there to oversee the construction of his work.

Originally, the budget for the opera house was 7-millon and the timeframe for construction was 7-years. What happened was it took 14 years to build, and about 102-million, which is about 1.2 billion today.

Naturally, the people of Sydney reacted during the course of construction. They started complaining that their tax money was being spent unnecessarily to build an opera house that they didn’t need in the first place. “We’re laid back people. We’re a country who loves the outback! We don’t need no opera house !”, I can almost imagine them say back in the 50s. The officials, since they wouldn’t take he blame themselves, they blamed the architect, Jorn Utzon. They tried to take him out of the picture and cut him out from the team to the point that he wasn’t being paid his salary anymore. Finally, in 1966, Jorn packed his bags and went back to Denmark with his family, giving up the fight for his masterpiece.

When he did, an Australian architect was asked to take his place. The Australians didn’t know anything about designing opera houses, so they were sent around the world for three years to study the design of different opera houses. They finished the  opera house on October 20, 1973 and was opened by no less than Queen Elizabeth herself.

The design of the building is very interesting as well. When Jorn Utzon was conceptualizing for the competition, nothing was coming into his mind. Luckily one morning, he was simply peeling an orange when he realized that the forms of his design could actually be derived from his breakfast! He then cut different triangular shapes from the orange’s sphere and put it together to come up with the final design of the opera house, calling it his ‘spherical solution’. Maybe architects should eat while designing too. You’ll never where you might get inspiration from.

The design of the Sydney Opera House was derived from triangular sections of a sphere. The architect was eating an orange one morning when he suddenly thought of a ‘spherical solution’.

The Sydney Opera house is consisted of three sail-like structures sitting on a podium. The smallest structure is a restaurant, and then the two are performance halls. The sails have a very modern sculptural quality and it makes you wonder how they were able to put together a structure as complicated as that way before computers. The sails are made of pre-cast panels held together by tension rods throughout the hollow portions of the structure. They say that the opera house has more steel than the Sydney Harbour Bridge nearby. The structure was actually put together like LEGO, the famous toy product which incidentally is from Denmark as well.

One would think that the exterior of the performance halls were purely white. But upon closer inspection, I found out that it is finished with tiles with 3 shades – off-white, cream, and beige. This makes sense because if it were too white, the structure would be too glaring. The tiles are triple glazed, which made the opera house one of the first self cleaning buildings in the world. The dirt from its surfaces simply creeps down to the drains whenever it rains. Meant to look like giant fish scales, Utzon got his inspiration form Moroccan buildings which are usually clad with tiles.

The surfaces of the opera house are clad with tiles of 3 shades – off-white, cream, and beige. The tiles are triple glazed, which made the opera house one of the first self cleaning buildings in the world. Meant to look like giant fish scales, Utzon got his inspiration form Moroccan buildings which are usually clad with tiles.

The first among the two performance halls is fondly called the black theatre because of its interiors, and is the smaller one between the two. It is an opera and a ballet theatre, with a backstage that can be lowered two levels down. That is where the sets are changed, since the space on the stage level is too small. In reality, there are a lot of flaws in the black theatre, and that is why it is due for a renovation soon, with a budget of 500 million.

Then we proceeded to the bigger performance hall. I thought that I had my share of awe that day, but I was further moved by the design of the interiors of the second hall. It had a soaring ceiling with a shape that seems to spring from the ground, changing and morphing into different configurations as it goes up. Unlike the other theatre, this one doesn’t have a proscenium. There are seats even at the back of the stage. There is no need for microphones during performances at this theatre because the combination of hardwood and softwood used for the interiors bounce all the sound coming from the stage back to the audience. The organ is equally impressive. It is the biggest mechanical organ in the world. It has about 140 pipes, took 10 years to build, 2 years to tune, and cost about 3 million dollars.

The three sail-like structures sit on a podium. Utzon got his inspiration form a typical Mayan temple, where you climb up a long set of stairs to get transported into a different world. In the same manner, going up the stairs of the podium was meant to symbolize your transportation to a world of art and culture, leaving the stresses of urban life behind. The heaviness of the podium also complements the lightness of the sails. This is where all the service spaces such as the practice stages and studios are housed.

The interiors of the big performance hall had a soaring ceiling with a shape that seems to spring from the ground, changing and morphing into different configurations as it goes up. The author fulfilling one of his architectural pilgrimages

I guess every high-profile structure has its own story. The Eiffel tower and the triangular entrance the Louvre was loathed by Parisians. The Statue of Liberty was rejected by the Americans when it first arrived. The Guggenheim Museums, both in New York and Bilbao, received endless negative criticisms. Now, all these structures are weaved seamlessly into their respective cities. They now stand as the foremost symbol for the people that once rejected them, just like the Sydney Opera House.

We designed a series of townhouses for DMCI Homes and VConsunji Inc way back in 2009. The Sofia Townhouse, as it was called, was so successful that it was dubbed the “most beautiful townhouse in the Philippines” by some websites.

See design in these links:

http://www.dmci.bobonbeachresort.com/mahogany-place-3-taguig/

http://www.buensalidoarchitects.com/projects/sofia-townhomes-dmci-homes/

Perhaps that was because in 2008, Buensalido+Architects bagged the first prize in a national competition called “Ang Pinakamagandang Bahay Sa Balat Ng Lupa” (The Most Beautiful House on the Face of the Earth) against over 40 other architectural firms.

The interiors for this townhouse is a tribute to the Filipino spirit. As we constantly push for contemporary Filipino architecture, we found the aesthetic expression of this design intent through triangles, an abstracted representation of banderitas (or flaglets) that one would commonly see in local fiestas and festivals. As a country, the Philippines has one almost every day.

The Living Area

The Dining Area

The Deck, with the Fort Global City Skyline

It is a manifestation of the Filipino’s optimism and positive outlook in their lives, always knowing how to smile no matter how bad their situation is. This was captured with the different bursts of colors within the house, achieving a sense of vibrancy, festivity, and positivity.

These conceptual ideas were physically implemented in a contemporary and innovative way: the banderitas and triangles on the interior surfaces were achieved with a CNC milling machine, therefore attaining precision in its production and avoiding human error. Light fixtures were located above the cutouts, creating an ever-changing pattern of shadows, depending on how many lights are turned on. A certain kind of material honesty was aimed for, so for the concrete flooring for example, was kept as is, applying a special kind of lithium-based sealant to achieve a smooth, terrazzo-like effect.

THE HOUSE was featured in the Philippine Star, a national daily broadsheet in the Philippines, in it’s Modern Living section. Tanya Lara captures the story of the owners and interiors of the house in her article, Crazy Quilt.

Online version here - http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=836712&publicationSubCategoryId=85

Thank you so much Tanya, and to the Philippine Star!

page 1 of philippine star, modern living section

full spread - first half

full spread - second half