Karst Water Filtration Staircase by Chi-Hao Chiang is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2022 Bronze A' Design Award in Building Materials and Construction Components Design Competition Category.
BronzeBuilding Components· 2022
Karst Water Filtration Staircase
Client: Chi-Hao Chiang
Bronze A' Design Award Winner in Building Components Category
Verified Award Winner
Verify Award Status for #127386The Design
About Karst Water Filtration Staircase
Karst, a modular staircase designed for Governors Island in New York, is like a solutional cave for people to see and hear the flowing water, with a water filtering system that brings the sensation of nature into the house, connecting the community of humans and water. Each module has a pocket for placing a bag of crushed oyster shells. The shells composed of calcium carbonate can react with acid rain to help neutralize acidified ocean by absorbing carbon dioxide. In the end, it is a filter system that can blur the boundary between humans and nature on Governors Island.
The Recognition
About the Bronze A' Design Award
Karst Water Filtration Staircase is a Bronze A' Design Award winner, a highly prestigious recognition granted to outstanding designs distinguished by creativity, ingenuity, and astuteness. Bronze winners are amply skillful and strikingly creative artifacts that authenticate the vast experience, imagination, and resourcefulness of their designers. Karst Water Filtration Staircase is expected to be a highly regarded, admired, and cherished object that is notably professional and innovative. This Bronze A' Design Award-winning design incorporates best practices in art, science, design, and technology, and is excellent for its attention to detail. Karst Water Filtration Staircase splendidly satisfies needs, touches desires, charms feelings, and appeals to curiosity.
Interviews
Design Interview
What is the main principle, idea and inspiration behind your design?
We were trying to find a balance and communal community between nature, people, and the environment.
The solutional caves then became the inspiration as water plays a key character connecting all the other elements in this environment.
What has been your main focus in designing this work? Especially what did you want to achieve?
The main focus is to find a way to connect the interaction between behaviors of humans and water. The natural movement of humans and water can form a contrast in this piece.
What are your future plans for this award winning design?
We would like to keep making this design more practical and feasible, then seek any collaboration to make the design come true and help the environment.
Behind the Design
Press Kit
Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.
- Unique Properties
- Karst, a modular staircase designed for Governors Island in New York, is like a solutional cave for people to see and hear the flowing water, with a water-filtering system that brings the sensation of nature into the house, connecting the community of humans and water. Each module has a pocket for placing a bag of crushed oyster shells, and the shells composed of calcium carbonate can react with acid rain to reduce ocean acidification by absorbing carbon dioxide.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- 2032 mm x 5740.4 mm x 5130.8 mm
- Tags
- Staircase, Concrete, Water Filtration, Governors Island, Sustainable
- Production Technology
- It will be made out of concrete, and the bags with crushed oyster shells inside as the filtering material.
- Design Challenge
- Finding a way to combine two very different forms to be consistent and functional is the design challenge.
- Research
- Question the relationship between industrial standardized building material and organic material in the present time when concrete jungles are sprawling on the land. Our goal is to allow nature to appear and break the traditional boundary that we humans created, separating ourselves from nature. After the explorations of physical material combinations, we took styrofoam and pine cone models to deconstruct and reconstruct. After simplifying, two different forms combined in a consistent way.
- Inspiration
- The goal is to allow nature to appear and break the traditional boundary that we humans created, separating ourselves from nature. After many physical explorations, the proposal was narrowed down to create an interactive community for humans and water. Also, the reason for naming the staircase Karst is from the Karst terrain, which is famous for solutional caves, with its cave form and the process that acid rain can act with the crushed oyster shell.
- Project Duration
- The project started in February 2020 in New York and finished in May 2020 in New York, and was exhibited on Governors Island in New York in October 2020.
- Operation Flow
- First, the rainwater drips from the pockets with bags of crushed oyster shells. After the filtration, it trickles down on the cliff and flows through the troughs. Potentially, this staircase can be not only applied indoors but also separated into modular sliced units then installed along the island. It is a filter system that can blur the boundary between humans and nature on Governors Island. In the end, the filtered water can return to the harbor and benefit the island.
- Team Members
- Chi-Hao Chiang
Zhixian Song - Image Credits
- Image #1: Industrial Designer Chi-Hao Chiang, Front View of Karst, 2020.
Image #2: Industrial Designer Chi-Hao Chiang, Side View of Karst, 2020.
Image #3: Industrial Designer Chi-Hao Chiang, Filtration Bags of Karst, 2020.
Image #4: Industrial Designer Chi-Hao Chiang, Handrail of Karst, 2020.
Image #5: Industrial Designer Chi-Hao Chiang, Steps of Karst, 2020.
Video Credits: Architect Zhixian Song, Application of Karst, 2020.
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