Morphosis - New Academic Building, Cooper Union

Morphosis
New Academic Building
Cooper Union

출처 : ARCspace.com

“We literally designed out from the core, always keeping in mind that the building should be as strong and innovative as the institution itself.” Thom Mayne

The new Academic Building at the Cooper Union occupies an unusually unencumbered site whose four free facades rise from a glass-framed lobby. Entered from the north-west corner, the lobby extends the exterior surface to the inside to become a mezzanine overlooking the gallery on the floor below.

From the entry lobby the ground plane moves on to the central atrium, a “vertical campus,” that rises to the full height of the building. This open connective space, spanned at various levels by sky bridges, ensures interaction throughout the building while opening up view corridors across Third Avenue to the Foundation Building. The atrium also contributes to the building’s high degree of physical and visual permeability, which helps integrate it into the college’s neighborhood.

To further dissolve the boundaries between inside and outside, a semi-transparent screen of stainless steel spans the entire width of the building along Third Avenue, slanting and strategically breaking to allow views into and out from the building.
This stainless steel skin reduces the influx of heat radiation during the summer and serves as a “coat” in cold weather.

The juxtaposition of steel and glass in the building’s skin system allows for heightened performance and dynamic composition on several levels: The steel screen fluctuates in its offset from the glass enclosure from one to eight feet providing a useful tool to vary the scale and texture of the facade relative to the site’s surroundings.

The use of this innovative skin is in keeping with the mission of the Cooper Union to find environmentally sensitive design solutions that will allow the building to achieve a minimum Silver LEEDTM rating from the U.S. Green Building Council