Footprint

A pavilion commissioned for the Chelsea Flower Show by The Times monthly science magazine Eureka won the second annual AJ Small Projects Sustainability Award along with £750, while a Special Award was created to recognise Office for Subversive Architecture’s stunning collage of reclaimed materials at Manchester’s Cube Gallery last year.

The 2012 judging panel included: Moira Gemmill of the V&A; Keith Bradley of Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios; Rider Levett Bucknall’s Mark Weaver; Paul Reed of Marley Eternit;  AJ editor Christine Murray and myself.

Referring to the Eureka Pavilion designed by Nex Architecture, the jury commented on the pavilion’s beauty and originality, along with its literal interpretation of sustainability.  All elements can be dismantled and recycled.

The brief called for a garden and pavilion which illustrate human dependency on plants for medicinal, commercial and industrial purposes. A collaboration between landscape designer Marcus Bennett and NEX, the pavilion uses principles of biomimicry and computer algorithms to replicate the cellular structure of the leaf capillaries of plants.

Timber ‘capillaries’ of sustainably-sourced spruce form the main structure, and 136 unique secondary timber cassettes support 586 ‘cells’ of recycled plastic. The structure further mimics plant biology by capturing rain water from the roof and transferring it to the ground via the timber capillaries.

Designed as a temporary structure which is entirely recyclable, the pavilion was relocated from Chelsea to Kew Gardens where it remains on display.

Read more about the Nex Times Eureka Pavilion in the AJ Buildings Library here.

The jury created a Special Award for £750 to recognise the Office for Subversive Architecture’s poetic installation at Manchester’s Cube Gallery last year.

The installation is a collage of ‘found’ objects donated by the City of Manchester.

The materials were sorted and ‘detoxified’ and then reinstalled with no cutting of individual elements.

The jury referred to the exhibition as a ‘provocative observation on the disposable ethos of society today.’

Read more about OSA’s exhibition in the AJ Buildings Library here.

Jack Woolley’s Old Workshop, the overall Small Projects winner, made ingenious use of a ‘found’ site.  All 156 Small Projects 2012 entries can be viewed in the AJ Buildings Library here; the 24 shortlisted projects are here.

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