Press Release
Golden A' Design Award in Architecture, Building and Structure Design Goes to Bienville House Duplex by Nathan Fell
The international grand jury of the 2019 - 2020 A' Design Award & Competition recognizes Nathan Fell for architecture, building and structure design
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
COMO, Italy, April 22, 2020 /DesignNewswire/ A' Design Award & Competition has announced that Bienville House Duplex by Nathan Fell, designed for Nathan Fell Architecture, has been granted the Golden A' Design Award in the Architecture, Building and Structure Design category. The result belongs to the 2019 - 2020 A' Design Award & Competition and was decided through blind peer review by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members, who scored anonymized entries against predetermined criteria.
What the Golden A' Design Award Means
The Gold A' Design Award is granted to designs that demonstrate a high level of innovation and a significant impact on their intended audience. Recognized as a major achievement by the A' Design Awards, these designs are characterized by their visionary approach and the exceptional skill of their creators. Winners of the Gold A' Design Award are noted for their ability to push the envelope in art, science, design, and technology, delivering solutions that not only meet but exceed expectations. These designs serve as benchmarks for excellence, encouraging further innovation and inspiring future generations of designers.
More About Bienville House Duplex
Logistics of this working family required them to be home indoors for long periods, which in addition to work and school became disruptive to their wellness. They began to contemplate, like many families, whether a move to the suburbs, exchanging proximity to city amenities for a larger backyard to increase outdoor access was necessary. Rather than moving far away, they decided to build a new house that would reconsider the limitations of indoor home life on a small urban lot. The organizing principle of the project was to create as much outdoor access from communal areas as possible.
About Nathan Fell
An American Architect with over 20 years design experience in a wide range of project types. Project designs accept the American ideal of space, but reconfigured and distilled to favor an urban lifestyle.
Award Record
Nathan Fell is a winner of 1 A' Design Award, including this recognition.
About the A' Architecture, Building and Structure Design Award
The A' Architecture Design Award is an international architectural design competition recognizing good architectural designs by best architects worldwide. It is organized within the A' Design Award & Competition and is open to architectural design studios, building contractors, structural engineering firms and architecture and design consultants from all countries. Typical entries include skyscrapers, museums, residential buildings, commercial complexes, educational institutions and religious structures. The awarded architectural projects are published at https://dezigners.org/design-category/architecture
About A' Design Award & Competition
Organized annually since 2008, A' Design Award & Competition is an international, juried design accolade. The competition is open to entries from all countries. The philanthropic mission of the A' Design Award is to advance society through good design, by recognizing and promoting superior products, projects and services that benefit society, and by creating a global awareness and appreciation for good design practices and principles. Nominations are peer reviewed and evaluated anonymously by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members against predetermined criteria such as functionality, ergonomics, engineering, presentation, innovation, usability, sustainability and technology, with score normalization applied to remove biases. Awards are conferred at Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze and Iron levels. Eligible laureates receive the A' Design Prize, which includes the award trophy, the certificate of design excellence, the hardcover yearbook, a lifetime license to use the A' Design Award winner logo, exhibition of awarded works, an invitation to the gala night and award ceremony in Italy, inclusion in the World Design Rankings and Designer Rankings, and public relations and publicity services. Registration, uploading a work and receiving a preliminary score are free of charge, and Professional and Digital Edition laureates are not contractually obliged to pay further fees to claim the A' Design Prize. More information is available at https://competition.adesignaward.com
Press Resources
- Winner Page: https://dezigners.org/95980
- A' Design Award Page: https://competition.adesignaward.com/95980
- Media Showcase: https://www.designnewsroom.com/!95980
- Laureate Profile: https://dezigners.org/d/265345
- Further Information from the Laureate: http://bit.ly/36LzeTe
Media Contact
Giulia Ferrari, Press Office
Designers.Org
Via Leone Leoni 32, 22100 Como, Italy
press@designers.org
+39 031 4491953
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Fact Sheet
The Work
- Project
- Bienville House Duplex
- Function
- Duplex
- Category
- Architecture, Building and Structure Design
- Discipline
- Spatial Design
- Industry
- Architecture
- Colors
- Black, Dim Gray, Silver, Thistle and Dark Slate Gray
- Images
- 5
- Client
- Nathan Fell Architecture
The Recognition
- Laureate
- Nathan Fell
- Country
- United States of America
- Recognition
- Golden A' Design Award
- Edition
- 2019 - 2020
- Design ID
- #95980
Credits
- Image Credits
- All Photographs by Justin Cordova. All Drawings by Nathan Fell Architecture.
Design Details
- Unique Properties
- Forms are configured to accentuate transparency between 1st Floor interior spaces and exterior. Upper floors contain private spaces, wrapped by exterior surfaces forming an echelon of suspended cubes legible from multiple viewpoints. Walls supporting the cubic forms are a series of exposed concrete walls with a gap between the walls and the cubic form to render each (the wall and cubes) distinctly. The static forms juxtapose the animated interior space as a frame, reinforcing the transparency.
- Inspiration
- Logistics of a working family requires family members stay tethered to their homes for longer periods than each would prefer. This can become disruptive to your wellness when all your time at school, work and home is spent indoors. The homeowners preferred the city to suburbs, so rather than moving far away, they decided to make a bold change by building a new house that flipped the script on indoor home life on a small urban lot.
- Research
- Materials had to be research for practical constructability, affordability and visual appeal. Additionally, the design had to comply with local flood zone requirements, historic, zoning and code provisions without a variance. The original concept had to compressed back due to these regulation and practical restraints, resulting in a more complicated design.
- Challenge
- New Orleans is a city that is often proudly slow to change, and sometimes more romantic about the past than future. This can cast an air of inevitability over new residential development within the city, that tawdry mimicry (more associated with suburban development) is the only possible path for a design. The house is constructed using materials that make sense environmentally even if they may be unconventional regionally while using certain historic paradigms a precedent (such as the poly-entry lowest level).
- Realization and Technology
- The exterior load bearing walls are concrete cast in place board formed ThermoMass walls which help stabilize the temperature through the thermal mass of the inside wall. Due to site constraints it was only possible to cast the 30 feet tall wall in 10 feet pours across the site, then pull the forms and frame floor as the walls cured. Form panels were reassembled above only after floor were framed.
- Operation and Interaction
- The duplex maximizes use of a small urban lot with space for or groups of people in each unit. The central goal of the design was to configure communal spaces in a way that best accesses outdoor light, air and volume. The rear unit consists of 4 beds, 3.5 baths and the front is a rental unit with 3 beds, 2.5 baths. The layout orients the rental unit as its public face, actively engaging travelers with the city, while mirroring the position of the primary unit with the rear yard to favor seclusion.
- Project Duration and Location
- The project is located in New Orleans, LA (USA) and started in January of 2017. It was completed in June of 2019.
- Specifications
- Thermomass, Cast in Place Concrete Walls, two walls, 30 ft tall x 73 ft long. American Fiber Cement, Exterior Cladding and 1st Floor Ceiling, Approximately 4200 sf. LaCantina Sliding Glass Doors 12 ft high x 40 ft long, 12 ft high x 14 ft long and 12 ft high x 16 ft long. Lumenwerx, 1st Floor Linear Downlights, VIA 4 LED (22 lights). Minka Air, 1st Floor Ceiling Fans, 8 fans.
- Keywords
- Urban, Outside, Transparency, Frame, Mass, Duplex, Open, Monolithic, Cubes, Communal
