Color At Its Best. The Allure Of Contrasts

2023 Author: Hannah Pearcy | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-05-24 11:12

Color is a medium that attracts great attention and can charge architecture with a second level of experience. But the absence of colored colors is also surprising - two contrary examples.

Black and white shopping centers basically consist of a series of shops with the same chains and concepts. But sometimes you can find small precious items in between - for example in Linz, where a center called "Plus City" is growing. In the middle of the huge sales area, the “ice cream parlor” has settled on a minimum of 25 square meters and offers its self-made ice cream there. The frame could hardly be more unusual, because the Linz office X Architekten decided to dissolve the spatial normal case, a three-dimensional deconstruction, so to speak, over which a two-dimensional graphic is laid. This, in turn, is completely autonomous over the space - similar to the Dazzle principle designed for confusion and camouflage. The graphics use only black and white,According to the corporate design of the ice cream maker, it relies on hard light-dark and shape contrasts. "Dressing up the shop as Erlkönig helps the small business to assert itself in the large mall," says architect David Birgmann. "The resulting confusion between two- and three-dimensionality, between silhouette and folding picture, was very interesting and motivated us."

The expansion was carried out using drywall, which received a laminating fleece cover and was finally covered with foil. An EP coating was used for the floor.

Object: Ice cream parlor

Client: Schwarz (w) eis gastro GmbH, Linz

Architecture: X Architects, Linz

Location: City Plus, Linz

Photos: X Architects Photos: X Architects

Polychrome The Australian architects Mc Bride Charles Ryan went about their work very differently when they designed a new school in Melbourne. The rotunda shows a dark, monochrome facade on the outside - but where the building opens, an overwhelming variety of colors pours out. The inner courtyards, passageways, stairs and lounge areas shine in rich colors, whereby large areas on the vertical alternate with smaller, sharp-angled ceiling panels. The architects were inspired by the principle of the hard shell and the soft core, as is known from the egg. On the other hand, both the color and the shape decomposition are reminiscent of a view through a kaleidoscope.

For the concept, the office received the Australian “WAN Color in Architecture Award 2016”.

Object: Ivanhoe Grammar Senior Yeras and Science Center, Melbourne

Architecture: Mc Bride Charles Ryan, Prahran / Australia

Photos: Mc Bride Charles Ryan Photos: Mc Bride Charles Ryan Photos: Mc Bride Charles Ryan Photos: Mc Bride Charles Ryan