ShowCase: Five Franklin Place

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ShowCase is a new feature on Archinect, presenting exciting new work from designers representing all creative fields and all geographies. We are accepting nominations for upcoming ShowCase features - if you would like to suggest a project, please send us a message. Street view. Copyright Archpartners 2008 Five Franklin Place, UNStudio's first major American project, will be a 20-story residential tower on Franklin Place, an original 19th century cobbled passageway that runs parallel to Broadway and connects Franklin and White Streets in the Tribeca historic district of Downtown Manhattan. The building will be wrapped in a constantly shifting pattern of horizontal black metal bands. A direct homage to the applied metal façade decoration of Tribeca's celebrated 19th century cast iron architecture, these gleaming reflective ribbons will grow thinner and thicker, wrapping the entire tower. Street view. Copyright Archpartners 2008 Copyright Archpartners 2008 The facade bands will serve as functional elements of the tower as well, transforming into balconies for more than half of the building's residences, terraces for the penthouses at the top, and sunshades that deflect heat and protect all of the structure's interiors from excess sunlight. The metal bands will serve to also frame panoramic views from inside the building's residences and insure privacy. Copyright Archpartners 2008 The exterior geometries will relate directly to the building's interiors. The facade bands have been brought inside and translated into broad horizontal spatial arrangements. Sources of inspiration for Five Franklin Place's metal band façade, and drawing by van Berkel. Various UNStudio façade studies for Five Franklin Place Ben van Berkel Co-Founder of UNStudio / Principal Architect Ben van Berkel studied architecture at the Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam and at the Architectural Association in London, receiving the AA Diploma with Honours in 1987. His first projects were built almost immediately after founding Van Berkel & Bos Architectuur Bureau. Among the buildings of this first period are Karbouw, the Remu electricity station, and Villa Wilbrink. Being elected to design the Erasmus Bridge in Rotterdam (1996) profoundly affected his understanding of the role of the architect today and constituted the foundation of his collaborative approach to practising, leading to the foundation of UNStudio in 1999. In the interim a blue period resulted in the realization of projects such as The Moebius House, Het Valkhof Museum (1998), and the Prince Claus Bridge (2003). Recent projects, which reflect his longstanding interest in the integration of construction and architecture, are: the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart and Arnhem Central. He has been visiting lecturer at Princeton and had taught at Columbia University, the Berlage Institute and UCLA. He is currently Professor of Conceptual Design and head of the architecture department at the Staedelschule in Frankfurt am Main (Germany). Ben van Berkel has co-authored a significant number of essays and monographs. Photo: Koos Breukel

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