Practical Meets Artistic: A Match Made in the Heavens

photo: gshowman, flickrOnce in a while we’re struck by an accomplishment in a creative field far removed from our own that nevertheless reflects what we strive for in our own day-to-day efforts. We speak of the Aqua Building, an eye-catching skyscraper on Chicago’s eclectic skyline.  Not that AvocadoVideo has yet produced anything in this league – 82 stories and climbing - yet we’re attracted to the particular way this building was conceived and constructed. 

Like your average tourist, we're compelled to take endless photographs of what appears to be this steep stack of wavy wafers. It's an apartment tower like no other with curved overhanging balconies shaped differently on each floor. Even in still photographs, the building appears to be in motion. But here’s the kicker – this tower of waves does more than just look good. The irregular shapes of the balconies serve to break the force of Chicago’s wind blasts and send them over, under, around and between the wafers, effectively dispersing gust impacts. In a nutshell, that’s what we like about architect Jeanne Gang - her deft skill at fusing the practical with the artistic. 

It’s a skill we strive for in our more modest endeavors here at AV. And when we find inspiration in the kind of work Jeanne Gang is doing, we poke around. How does she do it?

photo: John Picken, flickr

Last week the New Yorker’s Paul Goldberger gave us some hints in an Aqua review. Marveling at Gang's ability to bring, “aesthetics and engineering together,” he described her as unusual among the star architect elites. “Gang has no interest," he noted, "in establishing a look that marks her buildings as her own.” How then does she design? "By trying to identify with the client and coming up with something that she wouldn't do for anyone else." Sounds like a good formula to us, but put that into English. "Style alone doesn't shape her work; materials, technology, an ongoing attempt to see from the perspective of the people who will use the building mean much more to her.”

Do you share Jeanne Gang’s approach to design? What do you think of the Aqua Building? 

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