By: Ryan Kemp | March - 23 - 2011
P-A-T-T-E-R-N-S & Maxi Spina are on familiar terrain with the design of Jujuy Redux, an apartment building currently under construction in Rosario, Argentina. With Jujuy 2056 completed less than ten years ago, the team returns to the same street to continue their exploration and invention. Situated on a corner site in a low density neighborhood, Jujuy Redux challenges the inescapable components and conventional assemblage of mid-rise housing.
The design centers on the engagement of the building envelope (balconies, projecting slabs, windows strips, etc.) in an unorthodox manner as to dissipate the homogeneity of vertical housing. Rather than stacking the components, the design uses torsion as an apparatus to carry them up the façade. The balconies peel away at the corners and torque backwards to create horizontal surfaces, while also framing the surrounding views. Undulation along the facades presents Jujuy as simultaneously heavy and light relative to one’s vantage point.
The notion of an architect so invested in exploration and invention designing a work sharing a previous client, location and program is a perilous one. However, P-A-T-T-E-R-N-S & Maxi Spina avoid the architectural idiosyncrasy of fetishizing the precedent (which they designed ) in an effort to offer an innovative approach to mid-rise housing.
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