Architects Sergei Tchoban and Sergey Kuznetsov of SPEECH Tchoban/Kuznetsov designed the building to house the collections of the Tchoban Foundation, which the architect founded in 2009 as an archive of architectural drawings from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

Located on the site of a former brewery, the five-storey museum will be the foundation's first address and comprises a stack of overlapping concrete volumes with a glass penthouse positioned on top.

Architectural reliefs cover all three of the yellowish-grey concrete facades and form repetitive patterns. The surfaces are also broken up into groups of gently angled planes, intended to mimic overlapping sheets of paper.

"This artistic touch is supposed to emphasise the function and contents of the exposition in the museum's architectural look," explain the architects.

The ground floor of the building accommodates an entrance hall, shop and library. The collections will be housed on the three middle floors and will only be accessible by appointment, while the the glass penthouse and roof terrace will function as an events space.

The Museum for Architectural Drawing is set to open in June and will present both a permanent drawing collection and loans from international collections.

Architects Sergei Tchoban and Sergey Kuznetsov have worked together on various projects as SPEECH Tchoban/Kuznetsov, but also run their own separate studios. Their past collaborations include curating the Russian Pavilion at the 2012 Venice Architecture Biennale.

See more museums on Dezeen, including the new Design Museum for Barcelona.

Photography is by Patricia Parinejad.

Here's a project description from SPEECH Tchoban/Kuznetsov:

Museum for architectural drawings of the S.Tchoban Foundation

The Architectural Graphics Museum is meant for placing and exposing the collections of Sergey Choban's Fund founded in 2009 for the purpose of architectural graphics art popularisation as well as for interim exhibitions from different institutions including such famous as Sir John Soane's Museum in London or Art school in Paris.

For the construction of the Museum, the Foundation purchased a small lot on the territory of the former factory complex Pfefferberg, where the art-cluster is formed. Here are already located the famous architecture gallery AEDES, modern art gallery and artists' workshops. The Architectural Graphics Museum that is being constructed will become a logical continuation to the development of the new cultural centre in a district Prenzlauer Berg that is very popular among Berlin residents.

The new Museum building will flank the firewall of the adjacent four-storey residential house. Such neighborhood and the location under the conditions of the current development implied the irregular space-planning arrangement of the Museum. The volume that is compact in terms of design rises up to the mark of the neighboring roof ridge, forming five blocks clearly cut in the building carcass and offset in relation to each other.

The upper block, made of glass, hang over the whole volume of the building in cantilever. The façades of the four lower blocks are made of concrete and its surfaces are covered with relief drawings with architectural motives, repeating on every level and overlapping each other as sheets of paper. This artistic touch is supposed to emphasise the function and contents of the exposition in the Museum's architectural look.

On the first and third floors from the side of Christinenstrasse, the flat surfaces of the massive concrete walls are alternate with large glass paintings accentuating the main building entrance and recreation area in front of one of the graphic cabinets. On the first floor there will be the entrance hall – library. Two cabinets for drawings exposition and archive are located on the upper floors. The levels are connected by an elevator and stairs.

Address: Germany, Berlin, Prenclauer-Berg, Christinenstrabe, 18, Pfefferberg
Customer: S.Tchoban Foundation. Museum for Architectural Drawing

Authors: Sergei Tchoban, Sergey Kuznetsov
Chief architects: Philipp Bauer, Ulrike Graefenhain, Ekaterina Fuks (nps tchoban voss)
Architects: Dirk Kollendt, Nadezhda Fedorova, Frederik S. Scholz

Start: 2009 - 2011
Construction: 2011 - 2013

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by SPEECH Tchoban/Kuznetsov appeared first on Dezeen.

TANK wanted to create a more spacious and flexible layout in the compact Japanese apartment, which was previously divided by a narrow corridor into various cramped rooms.

"I considered that the room should have flexibility and the tenant can arrange it as she likes," explains the designer.

The team began by making the bathroom much larger and inserting sliding doors on both sides, enabling an extra route between the bedroom and the hallway.

The narrow entrance hall is designed as a "Doma" - a traditional Japanese entranceway - with a bare concrete floor that contrasts with the raised wooden flooring of the living area.

An exposed larch frame extends out beneath a raw concrete ceiling, while vertical batons combine with plywood sheets to form a screen dividing the bedroom from the living area.

The bedroom and adjacent closet are doorless, with walls and ceilings designed to look deliberately incomplete.

"There are no doors for the bedroom or walk-in closet," explains TANK. "The walls and ceiling have an unfinished look, I leave it to the tenant's taste as to how to utilise these rooms."

A clear glass lampshade houses a bare bulb that descends from the ceiling in the bedroom, casting long shadows from the wooden frame.

Other projects we've featured by TANK on Dezeen include an apartment with floors and ceilings covered in the same boards and a Tokyo apartment with removable patches of carpet to be used as flip flops.

See more Japanese houses on Dezeen, or see our Pinterest board filled with Japanese residences.

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This house by Spanish architect Daniel Isern looks like a cluster of concrete cubes, stacked up on a steep hillside on the outskirts of Barcelona.

The rural site faces out towards the coast, so Daniel Isern designed the four-storey residence with balconies and terraces on three of its floors, as well as a pair of glazed sunrooms.

The form of the building comprises overlapping volumes that integrate several cantilevers. Isern explains: "The reduced dimensions of the plot and the desire to leave the minimum imprint on the land led us to seek out a floor plan which, matching the trees that surround it, emerges from a trunk well anchored to the land and opens up in branches on each floor."

The entrance to the house is on the uppermost floor. There are no rooms at this level, so residents work their way downstairs to find a living room and bedroom on the next level down, a dining room below that and a master bedroom on the bottom floor.

A concrete walls extends out from the north and south sides of the house and integrates a storage area for firewood.

Other concrete houses from Spain to feature on Dezeen include a stark building with richly stained timber shutters and an X-shaped house that hangs over a hillside. See more houses in Spain.

Photography is by Adrià Goula.

Here's a statement from Daniel Isern:

Mediterrani 32, Sant Pol de Mar 2012

"For me, a landscape does not exist in its own right, since its appearance changes at every moment; but the surrounding atmosphere brings it to life - the light and the air which vary continually. For me, it is only the surrounding atmosphere which gives subjects their true value." Claude Monet.

The project for this house emerged from a very simple premise, to build on a very steep piece of land with a gradient of almost 100%, boasting wonderful views and on a tight budget. It was this highly complicated plot of land, surrounded by pine trees, that defined a good part of this project. The land, and its perspectives, constantly changing as the hours pass, the colour of the trees, the movement of sun and shadows...

On the one hand, the reduced dimensions of the plot and its complex orography, and on the other the desire to leave the minimum imprint on the land led us to seek out a floorplan which, matching the trees that surround it, emerges from a trunk well anchored to the land and opens up in braches on each floor, in such a way that each branch becomes the terrace of the upper level at the same time as it becomes the porch of the lower one.

All this helps create a very formal building, with huge cantilevers facing out to emptiness, the woods and the sea which lie before it. A structure which opens up to these views and the sun, and which thanks to the terraces and the porches confuse the interior with the exterior. A building which is equally formal in both its volume and the materials which compose it. Concrete, iron, timber and stone combining in a way that emphasises the character of each one. In the end, the whole building represents a dialogue between emptiness and fullness, between materials, between outside and inside; seeking out a balance between these highly contrasting parts.

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by Daniel Isern appeared first on Dezeen.

Positioned on the northern shore of the river near the village of Rio de Moinhos, the structure is built on the site of an old fishing boat dock that had fallen out of use due to regular flooding.

Ateliermob's brief was to create a public installation on the site. To withstand the changing water levels, the intervention needed a solid structure that would resist decay even if submerged for a few days a year.

The chunky concrete bleachers rise up in a northerly direction, facing a stage that cantilevers out across the riverbank. A telescope is mounted at the very top, while rectangular concrete benches and tables provide a picnic area on one side.

"The new element wipes out the boundary between land and water, projecting itself on the river, and on a flat terrain it erupts in the air as a reference in the landscape," say the architects.

The Rio de Moinhos Open-Air Theatre is the latest in a series of riverside installations designed by Ateliermob for the banks of the Tagus since 2007.

Other amphitheatres on Dezeen include a summer theatre in Estonia and a stage set in Sicily designed by OMA.

Photography is by Zoraima de Figueiredo.

Read on for more details from Ateliermob:

Rio de Moinhos Open Air Theatre

Following an international competition for the banks of the Tagus River in four counties in central Portugal where ateliermob got the first prize, they were asked to design three projects in the municipality of Abrantes.

Located on the right bank of the Tagus River, near the village of Rio de Moinhos, the Cais das Barcas served as a fishing boat dock and transported people and goods between the two banks. Over the years, that space lost its essence, both due to the nearly non-existent maintenance as the constant flooding of the Tagus (the height of the pier is +18.00 m, and the 1979 flood overflowed the river, which rose to 31.00 m).

Following a study of the dynamics of the local population, which can be characterised as having intense activity in recreational and popular associations, and it was understood that an outdoor space that could serve as an informal area for groups and communities and that could withstand submersion for a few days of the year. The new element wipes out the boundary between land and water, projecting itself on the river, and on a flat terrain it erupts in the air as a reference in the landscape.

The project seeks to recreate a place that spring-starts from the renovation of the pier, adding new collective reference meanings and uses. A new space for the local people that acts as a gathering place for the community or as an idyllic meeting place. The entire area around the auditorium, parallel to the existing dock, is redrawn maintaining its natural character, yet providing it with urban furniture – benches and tables for a more effective use by the population. Rio de Moinhos has experienced a difficult relationship with the river, noticeable its urban morphology - from times of flooding to times of drought. Every year, during the rainy season, this structure may become partially submerse.

The proposed structure seeks to reclassify the area, creating a new meeting space for the local community. When no events are taking place, this amphitheatre will be ideal to contemplate the river, the landscape and from its highest point, Rio de Moinhos.

Project: Rio de Moinhos Open Air Theatre
Place: Rio de Moinhos, Abrantes, Portugal
Promoter: Câmara Municipal de Abrantes (city council)
Construction: Construforte – Sociedade de construções e Empreitadas, Lda
Architecture: ateliermob - Andreia Salavessa and Tiago Mota Saraiva with Vera João, João Torres, Ana Luísa Cunha, Zofia Józefowicz and Sophia Walk (competition: Carolina Condeço, Nuno Ferreira)
Structures: Betar Estudos - José Pedro Venâncio and Maria do Carmo Vieira
Lights: João Pedro Osório

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Located within the Alpine countryside, the cemetery serves the eight-percent Muslim population in the Austrian state of Vorarlberg and comprises a simple rectilinear building with five burial enclosures.

Bernardo Bader Architects used red-tinted concrete for the construction of the building and its surrounding walls. The surfaces remain exposed both inside and outside the complex, revealing the rectangular imprints of wooden formwork.

A long rectangular window stretches across the facade, screened by a latticed oak framework that displays one of the traditional patterns of Islamic mashrabiya screens.

The building accommodates both prayer rooms and assembly halls. The largest room opens out to a private courtyard and features lighting fixtures set into circular ceiling recesses.

The five rectangular graveyards are lined up at the back of the building. Each one contains several trees, benches and small patches of grass.

Completed in 2011, the Islamic Cemetery is one of 20 projects on the shortlist for the Aga Khan Award 2013. Five or six finalists will be revealed later this year and will compete to win the $1 million prize.

Other architect-designed cemeteries completed in recent years include a seaside graveyard in Italy and a pair of wooden pavilions in Belgium. See more stories about cemeteries, funeral chapels and memorials.

Here's a short project description from the Aga Khan Award organisers:

The cemetery serves Vorarlberg, the industrialised westernmost state of Austria, where over eight percent of the population is Muslim. It finds inspiration in the primordial garden, and is delineated by roseate concrete walls in an alpine setting, and consists of five staggered, rectangular grave-site enclosures, and a structure housing assembly and prayer rooms.

The principal materials used were exposed reinforced concrete for the walls and oak wood for the ornamentation of the entrance facade and the interior of the prayer space. The visitor is greeted by and must pass through the congregation space with its wooden latticework in geometric Islamic patterns. The space includes ablution rooms and assembly rooms in a subdued palette that give onto a courtyard. The prayer room on the far side of the courtyard reprises the lattice-work theme with Kufic calligraphy in metal mesh on the 'qibla' wall.

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