Darling Harbour: A New Outlook, Inspired by Atelier bow-wow

Atelier bow wow a group of Japanese architects founded in 1992 describes the urban nature of Tokyo through the significant drawings they portray in their own guide book; Made in Tokyo (2001). Within various drawings Atelier bow wow like to show or present various attractions or even purpose built constructions in which may seem very odd to be together. This oddness or even strange concept shows things like a carpark and shopping centre together or a highway through a mountain. they like to portray this with very simple map like drawings showing things together that create a new or different urban concept. The purpose of their guide book is basically to show an alternative method to understanding the urban environment and even showing a progression in time of an urban environment.

In saying this i have created my own concept of what I think Atelier bow wow are trying to portray. I have designed my own concept in the city of Sydney where i portray my own alternative to the urban environment. In my hand drawn sketch of darling harbour i have designed a new concept where there is a shopping centre built around, under and on top of the western distributor. This is unusual hence the reason of the concept. It is very strange to have a road run through a building both made for important purposes yet made for very different purposes and still work together in a organised fashion.

This building creates a whole new perspective of darling harbour and with the construction of Barangaroo and convention centre etc. There is a must for a large, commercial shopping centre in darling harbours urban environment and why not have it the first thing you can enter when driving into the city. Your driving over ANZAC bridge and a couple of hundred metres down the road is this huge attractive building that eats you as you drive in.

Atelier bow wow gives us an example of a spaghetti shop wrenched under neath a baseball centre, now who could of thought such things would go together yet are so strangely ignored in an architectural figure like way. Even the example of the Sewage courts used as a disposal plant and sporting facilities, “although these buildings are not explained by the city of Tokyo, they do explain what Tokyo is.’ stated in the guide book.

This is where i believe my new concept explains the new and upcoming urban environment in Sydney where two different things can come together and work in an odd fashion. Driving through a shopping centre how weird, but how cool and interesting, leaving a large statement fro whoever enjoys the experience. In the end I’m trying to portray a concept in which can describe Sydney’s urban environment where we have these two different things coming together. Atelier bow wow portray eccentric drawings and so these drawings portray an urban environment that comes together in an odd fashion yet works in a sophisticated way just like my concept in which things of different meaning turn into one defining such an urban environment.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Atelier bow wow — Made In Tokyo guide book (2001) (Tokyo: Kajima Institute Publishing Co., 2001)