BIG news: new book explores form and function with Bjarke Ingels – Wallpaper*

BIG news: new book explores form and function with Bjarke Ingels

Formgiving. An Architectural Future History,a monograph dedicated to the Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG), published by Taschen, delves into the way the mind of the architect

Bjarke Ingels is having one of his moments. On the eve of publication of the Bjarke Ingels Groups new monograph, Formgiving. An Architectural Future History, the energetic Dane is doing the rounds promoting a book that conveys his firms deep streak of technological optimism. BIGs talent for form-making is cut with a fondness for acronyms and neologisms; the firm exists within a bubble of its own making where every project is a self-contained futuristic utopia, capable of multiple functions within an iconic identity.

A parking garage doubles up as a cultural hub, a museum is also a bridge, an incinerator is an urban park, etc. etc. Formgiving brings together over 100 of these synthesizations, raising, defining and answering a few big questions along the way and continuing a hunger for publishing as way of building an image.

Within the book itself, built and unbuilt projects sit alongside each other, with each project conjuring up a narrative. These are usually along the lines of how BIGs approach has exploited a hidden facet within the clients brief to make the final design something more than what it might otherwise have been. Sometimes these aesthetic kinks writ large, like the marble faade of the Collegiate Church Tower in Manhattan or the jumbled Jenga floorplans of Frankfurts Omniturm Tower or the playful pile of LEGO for the blockmakers Copenhagen community hub.

The typical Bjarke Ingelsbuilding subverts its genre, pushing our preconceptions of cookie cutter Modernism with an audacious twist or skew. The firms most successful works tend to be low-rise, the point at which landscape and architecture blend together. The remarkable Tirpitz Museum in Denmark splinters a WWII Nazi bunker into the dunes it once dominated, shining light into what was once a very dark corner of the countrys history.

The popularity of big gestures as opposed to BIG gestures waxes and wanes with the economic climate, and like many architects of the post-Koolhaas generation, the sophistication of BIGs visuals often accelerates past such practicalities as detail or nuance. Bjarke Ingels and his team of over 500 architects continue to make a substantial mark on the world. Every now and again, something of the freewheeling spirit and audacity of Ingelss early work shines through, especially in the projects that fuse landscape with infrastructure. The talents that appeal so much to ultra-short corporate attention spans work better when theyre given space to breathe.

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BIG news: new book explores form and function with Bjarke Ingels - Wallpaper*