Gold Architecture, Building and Structure Design · 2020
ERC Autumn Village Reception Centre
by Wey Duan Luo
- A' Design Award 2020 Gold Winner in Architecture, Building and Structure Design
- Awarded April 15, 2020
- CLIENT: Ever Rise Construction Co., Ltd
- Estimated Number of Design Views: 23,606
- Verification code D11960A03C · Verify this award
About ERC Autumn Village Reception Centre
ERC Autumn Village is a reception centre in Taipei, Taiwan. The building combines a bookstore, a cafe and a sales reception area within one space of 926 square metres. A skylight courtyard with a waxberry tree stands at the centre, surrounded by interlacing platforms of different floor heights. The steel structure has wooden floor slabs and an external brick wall fixed with H beams and metal parts. Seats, lighting and cabinets are custom made from recycled wood pallets. Flexible layouts allow exhibitions, lectures and forums to be held.
Wey-Duan Luo and Tzu-Ping Chan's ERC Autumn Village Reception Centre represents a distinguished contribution to contemporary architectural practice that thoughtfully engages with regional building traditions while articulating a thoroughly modern spatial and material sensibility. The design demonstrates remarkable sensitivity to the expressive potential of brick as both structural and ornamental material, employing an elaborate perforated screen wall whose cross-shaped apertures transform this humble building element into a sophisticated light-filtering membrane that mediates between interior and exterior realms. The architects appear to draw upon vernacular masonry traditions, reinterpreting time-honored techniques of brick bonding and pattern-making through a contemporary lens that emphasizes geometric precision and rhythmic variation. The juxtaposition of warm terracotta brick against cooler blue-grey stone creates a chromatic dialogue that suggests careful consideration of material provenance and regional geological character, while the generous glazed sections reveal the warm hospitality of interior spaces. Particularly notable is the architects' treatment of light as a primary design element, allowing artificial illumination to project through the perforated screen and inscribe shadow patterns onto the forecourt, effectively extending the architectural experience beyond the building envelope into the surrounding public realm. This interplay between solid and void, opacity and transparency, warm and cool, demonstrates sophisticated understanding of phenomenological architectural principles. The measured proportional relationships governing the facade composition suggest engagement with classical design principles translated through contemporary construction methods. Viewers might contemplate how traditional craft knowledge can be preserved and transformed through innovative contemporary applications, and how architecture can create meaningful thresholds that welcome inhabitants while maintaining appropriate spatial definition.
Press Kit
- Unique Properties
- The design concept of this project has implicated the current phenomenon - the vanishing of physical bookstore in this digital era. Integrating multiple industries like cafe, bookstore and reception center into one space, it also allows exhibitions, lectures and forums organized simultaneously. It has successfully attracted the public, transformed the concept of development project marketing with various interesting design features like skylight courtyard and flexible design elements.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- The area is 926 square metres. With a skylight courtyard at the center, surrounded by interlacing platforms with different floor heights, it forms an open mixed-use space. The arrangement of the metal frames on the glass wall is of note-like sequence. 1F has a courtyard, show house unit, cafe, kitchen and hot food area, bookstore, stair-seating, VR room, administration area, dining area, WC and storage room. Community activities area, exhibitions, seating area, forum space and terrace are on 2F.
- Tags
- Industrial, Flexibility, Bookstore, Cafe, Courtyard
- Production Technology
- The design team has created a unique construction of the external brick wall. It uses H beam and metal parts fixing the inner part of the hollow bricks, creating the facade with modern visual pattern. It is a steel structure building with wooden slabs floors. The custom-made furniture includes lightings, seats and cabinets built of recycled wood pallets. The height of the book displays compliances with consumer usability. The sitting area around the waxberry tree allows people to relax.
- Design Challenge
- Merging cafe, bookstore and reception centre for a development project into one space, is the greatest challenge of this project. Letting each of the businesses perform independently without affecting one another have become the design focus. The design team uses bookstore as the main theme, adding cafe as another commercial attraction to realize the spatial design of a grand reception centre for promoting the development project without any sense of conflict.
- Project Duration
- The project started in 1 October 2018 and completed in 26 May 2019, in Taipei, Taiwan.
- Operation Flow
- The circulation is diverged into two main flows. Business consultation area is located behind the courtyard. Merges the real estate promotional event into commercial space softly, it rises the curiosity of the people. Extra-wide staircase allows people to slow down their pace or sit down to read. Theme exhibition area on 2F promotes works of local artists. The forum area, designed as stair-seating, can hold different events. The flexible changes of the layouts suit different functions.
- Research
- The waxberry central courtyard gathers people to sit and interact with one another. The free-flowing circulation indicates the freedom of modern lives. The aroma of coffee accompanies reading activities of the public, form a lively scene. Going upstairs, surrounding the homocentric rectangular circulation space, one will enter a multifunctional space for exhibitions, cultural talks, parent-child events and etc. Visitors are able to conceive a pleasant experience in this vibrant space.
- Inspiration
- Due to the main facility of the Autumn Village residential apartment which is to be built, is focusing on the reading area, the reception center for this development project has targeted to break through the stereotype of general reception center, using reading activity as the core idea of the whole space to create a unique form of space with innovative integrated marketing model of different industries.
- Image Credits
- Wey-Duan Luo
Colors of ERC Autumn Village Reception Centre
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Mixed-Use Architecture and Innovative Commercial Space Design
We transform commercial spaces into vibrant destinations that blend retail, hospitality, and community functions. Our award-winning architectural approach creates engaging environments that attract visitors and drive business success through innovative spatial design and flexible programming.
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