Articles by Diego Hernández

Designed by Ben van Berkel / UNStudio, CapitaLand’s new Raffles City is a sustainable urban hub for living, working and leisure located in Hangzhou, one of China’s most picturesque cities. It forms the eighth Raffles City development in China.

Building Layout

Rothschild Tower is a simple graceful residential tower lightly resting on a retail base. The design is inspired by Bauhaus principles that were based on functionality and a certain sparseness or economy of means using modern mass produced materials, and in this case a repetitive planning module. The fundamental considerations that shape the tower design are the quality of light in the plan, views to the city and sea, an efficient assembly of “served” and “service” spaces around the core, and the building’s relationship with the existing fabric and massing on Rothschild Boulevard.

The site is a promontory on the relatively small island of Krokholmen in Stockholm’s outer archipelago: a typical archipelago landscape with windswept dwarf pines and soft mountain outcrops produced by the inland ice. The plot benefits from open views, in the east all the way out to the lighthouse Almagrundet in the open sea, and it is at times exposed to strong winds. The family wanted a maintenance-free vacation home in one level with social space both inside and outside.

In an era of privatization, cities are facing a major challenge: investment in the public domain depends increasingly on the private sector. As a result of this reframing of the collective agreement, the role of architecture is often reduced to the visual impact of its shape and surface rather than contributing to a new educational, social and civic dimension. The competition launched by the Ecole Centrale Paris for the design of a new engineering school has become the perfect opportunity to explore ways to answer this demanding challenge.

In an era of privatization, cities are facing a major challenge: investment in the public domain depends increasingly on the private sector. As a result of this reframing of the collective agreement, the role of architecture is often reduced to the visual impact of its shape and surface rather than contributing to a new educational, social and civic dimension. The competition launched by the Ecole Centrale Paris for the design of a new engineering school has become the perfect opportunity to explore ways to answer this demanding challenge.

Located in a suburb of ChauDoc town in AnGiang province, Southern Vietnam, this house is a sharing residence of 3 nuclear families who are kin. Although this project budget was tightened with local standards, which only allowed us to build a house with thin corrugated metal panels, we have tried to satisfy not only the regional spirits but also the rich lifestyle in which is fulfilled by sunlight, greenery and natural ventilation, as it were, living in a half-outdoor gardens.

Sun Room is an in-situ composite woven bamboo shell, which explores the potential of digital design and fabrication techniques to reinvigorate traditional craft.

The TH House is located at a new urban area in the outskirt of Hanoi. The house is a very popular type of house in Vietnam that the main structure was already built by the developer of the whole area. The people buying this kind of house usually need to do the “finishing” work before moving in. But the skeleton of the house itself causes a lot of problems, mostly related to natural ventilation and lighting. So the question for the architect is how to finish the construction to simultaniously solve all the problems coming from this skeleton and have a humble difference while still keeping the same structural elements to the surrounding houses.

The project consists in 14 apartments in Tudor Creek, Mombasa-Kenya. Characterized by a moucharabiah structural shell, it is distinct with its search for privacy and optimized natural ventilation and light. With our vision, the apartments benefit from the experience of outdoor living, contact with nature and the integration of the surroundings into each private home.