New York City, USA
In 2021, New York-based #WeThePlanet commissioned the architects 3deluxe to develop an environmental and people-friendly concept for a Manhattan corporate building that will contribute to transforming our cities into greener, people-friendlier, and more climate-resilient places.
For its unparalleled design promoting sustainability in every way, #WeThePlanet Corporate Building has recently been awarded a 2022 International Architecture Award by The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design and The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies.
A landscape approach was developed that intelligently densifies the urban environment without sealing more soil.
Thus, the building will be placed on an existing flat roof and lushly landscaped to regulate the urban carbon balance and overheated climate, reduce energy use, promote biodiversity, and significantly improve air quality.
The design team has created a biotope as a semi-public space that occupies the same area as the indoor space used by people.
This follows 3deluxe’s 50/50 principle, which states that 50 percent of any building project should be reserved for nature.
The simple shape of the building corresponds to that of a steep slope, allowing usable interior spaces to be placed under a the incline.
Its sides are generously glazed, to maintain a comfortable indoor climate and to integrate the largest possible sensor-controlled area for smart technologies for energy recovery and consumption reduction: transparent photovoltaics, eyrise® smart glass, algae bioreactors, and solar film made from recycled kitchen waste, among others.
This building project is a socially interactive house that involves the environment, while aiming to show what kind of innovative technologies can play an important role in a carbon-neutral city in the future.
This creates the vision of an inner-city natural biotope that not only promotes climate preservation but also offers city dwellers social interaction, higher quality of life, and new experiential spaces for the senses.
For example, people from the neighborhood can use the rooftop garden for urban gardening and beekeeping; schools and kindergartens can impart knowledge and experience nature; cultural events, readings, and lectures can take place in a climate-friendly and pandemic-safe outdoor environment.
In return, local people will care for and maintain the biotope.
It will expand the habitat not only for people but also for birds, insects, and various plant species, thus promoting biodiversity.
At the same time, the biotope will store rainwater and humidify the environment on hot days, absorb fine dust, convert carbon dioxide into oxygen, and improve air quality.
The roof garden will insulate the interior of the building from cold and heat and reduce energy consumption.
The building will be like a living organism, positively affecting its surroundings in many ways.
The project is anticipated to be finished in 2024.
Project: #WeThePlanet Corporate Building
Architects: 3deluxe / design systems d.s. gmbh
Client: #WeThePlanet
Photographers: Sascha Jahnke
