Renewal-Zone：解码自然之力︱伦敦摄政广场公共空间更新

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Nex- Architecture与木结构专家Xylotek合作，打造了一系列创新式层压橡木凉亭，点亮了伦敦摄政广场的公共空间。摄政广场位于摄政公园东侧，尤思顿车站以西，是多功能的商业居住项目，由British Land在20世纪90年代中期开发。

© Luke Hayes

凉亭采用了天然材料和木质街具，配以大面积的植物，从设计上呼应了British Land振兴摄政广场内外的公共空间和人行步道的愿景。三座新的半遮蔽凉亭供人们与朋友、同事闲坐放松，也可用于户外戏剧音乐表演，让穿过摄政广场的路人从尤斯顿路的快节奏中解放出来。

© Luke Hayes

近期，摄政广场园区的企业租户已从蓝筹企业转变为媒体、科技和生命科学企业，这推动了对办公建筑的更新改造及对环境效能的提升，呈现出更贴合当代需求，焕然一新的工作空间。

© Luke Hayes

新的租户为园区带来的年轻人群渴望更具活力的舒适空间。新冠疫情进一步推动了British Land对摄政广场整体空间自然健康的舒适度的提升。在受邀的设计竞赛中，建筑师面临的挑战是为租户打造一个更受欢迎的场所，同时激活摄政广场与周围街道间的联系。

© Luke Hayes

大自然是设计的灵感来源，林中偶然邂逅的木柴捆赋予了摄政广场三座凉亭启发。细长的橡木条汇集成精致的格子，与茂盛的植物一起将访客环绕在其中。两座较大的凉亭呈圆形，中间的圆孔开口将人们的关注从地面上的植物引向天空。

© Luke Hayes

三座凉亭的规模自西向东逐渐增大。第一座邀请人们汇集于此，闲坐交流。第二座在道路中心布置了大型的圆形旋转座椅，邀请大人儿童前来玩耍。最后一座凉亭则为当地剧团打造了一座新的阶梯式表演空间，在夜间及周末还可作为音乐场所使用。

© Luke Hayes

凉亭的完工提升了摄政广场公共区域的改造。不论是工作生活在园区的人们，还是路人都拥有了多种全新的方式聚集于此。自然以富有想象力的方式引入开发的中心，Townsends打造的景观提升了该地的生物多样性。

© Luke Hayes

通过概念草图、模型研究和VR模拟技术，Nex- Architecture在设计早期便确立了凉亭的形状、规模和位置。之后与负责设计至生产步骤的合作方Xylotek共同完成了研究计算，将不规则的格子结构打造成薄橡木板条组成的严谨而不均匀的几何造型。

Xylotek所面临的关键挑战是完成结构的设计，从而让木板条保持纤细造型同时能够为格子结构提供支撑。最终设计采用了场外生产的形式提升工艺质量，减少浪费并缩短现场组装的时间。可持续生产来源的橡木应用其中，细条弯曲后进行了层压塑形。最终层压条叠成格子被运送至现场，与松散的板条组装起来。

© Luke Hayes

看似富有想象力但毫不费力的自然趣味造型，需要结构和装配的独创性以及对细节的极度关注。构成每个亭子的板条分四层排列，交替层朝着相反方向旋转。每一层的板条都具有相似的测地曲线形状，意味着可由原本笔直的橡木细条打造。一层中的所有板条都可以在单个弯曲夹具上完成，而视觉差异是通过随机覆盖的重复图案改变板条长度来实现的，从而在规则的底层图案和自然变化间营造出视觉效果。

项目共采用了400余块橡木板条，总长度超过10公里。每块橡木板条由五层8毫米的薄板压成，横截面为65x40毫米。通过将短橡木两端指接，可以创建长达9.5米的薄板。胶合层压工序在Xylotek位于布里斯托尔的工作坊中定制的分析夹具上完成，每个凉亭的分段都在这里进行预组装，现场定位并覆以更多的板条盖来打造出弯曲完整的3D格子造型。

入口的拱门也由胶合橡木板以最为契合凉亭的复杂曲率和单向弯曲形式支撑。表层的处理工艺增强了材料的耐用性和防火性能。

© Luke Hayes

A New Way In - Public realm transformed with timber

Nex- Architecture has collaborated with Xylotek advanced timber structure specialists to create a sequence of inventive laminated oak pavilions newly enhancing the public spaces of London's Regent's Place. Lying east of Regent's Park and west of Euston station, Regent's Place is a mixed-use commercial and residential campus developed by British Land from the mid-1990s. 

Using natural materials, timber furniture and extensive planting, the pavilions have been designed in response to British Land's vision for revitalising public spaces and pedestrian routes in, through and out of Regent's Place. The three new pavilions are semi-sheltered spaces designed for friends and colleagues to sit and relax between meetings or after-work hours, for outdoor theatre and music performances and for those walking through Regent's Place from the fast-paced Euston Road.

Recently, the Regent's Place "campus" has seen a change in tenants from corporate blue-chips to media, technology and life science companies. This shift has prompted the refurbishment of the office buildings transforming their environmental performance while offering refreshed workspaces better suited to contemporary needs. 

In turn, new tenancies have brought a younger population to the campus and an aspiration to create a livelier and more welcoming public space. The experience of the Covid pandemic further accelerated British Land's ambition to augment a greater sense of natural wellbeing throughout Regent's Place. The challenge for the architects set out in an invited competition brief was to create a more inviting place for tenants while enlivening connections between Regent's Place and surrounding streets.

Inspired by nature and particularly by the bundles of fine wood kindling encountered in woodlands, the design of the three Regent's Place pavilions gathers thin strips of oak in delicate lattices to enclose visitors while also revealing lush planting around them. Rounded in form, the two larger pavilions have a central oculus that draws people's attention from ground level planting to the sky.

Moving from west to east, the pavilions increase in size. The first welcomes people to gather and sit in conversation. The second encourages children and adults alike to play with a large circular spinning seat positioned in the centre of the path. The final pavilion creates a new tiered performance space for the local theatre group, and a venue for evening and weekend music. 

The finished pavilions extend the transformation of the public realm at Regent's Place. Those working, living and passing through the campus have adopted a variety of new places to gather in settings that bring nature imaginatively into the heart of the development encouraging biodiversity with its landscaping by Townsends.

Nex- developed early designs through sketches, study models, and VR simulation to determine the form, size and location of the three pavilions. With these decisions made, Nex-collaborated with design-to-manufacture partners Xylotek to complete computational studies that developed the irregular lattice structures into geometrically rigorous but non-uniform patterns of thin oak laths.

A key challenge for Xylotek has been to complete the design of the structures so that the laths remain slender while being sufficiently stiff to create self-supporting lattices. The final design took advantage of off-site manufacturing to improve the quality of craftsmanship, to cut waste and reduce on-site assembly time. Using sustainably sourced oak, thin strips were bent and laminated into their final curved shapes on room-sized jigs. Laminated strips were then layered together to make lattices, before being transported to site for final assembly with further layers of loose laths.

What appear to be imaginative, yet effortless and natural, plays of forms demanded structural and constructional ingenuity and forensic attention to detail. The laths forming each pavilion are arranged in four layers, with alternate layers spiralling in opposite directions.  Within each layer the laths share similar geodesic curved shapes, meaning that they could be formed from initially straight oak ribbons. This meant that all the laths in one layer could be formed on a single bending jig, whilst visual dissimilarity was created by varying the laths lengths in a repeating pattern overlaid with a degree of randomness. This process created a visual play between a regular underlying pattern and a sense of natural variation. 

There are a total of over 400 laths, made of over 10km of oak lamella strips. Each oak lath has a cross section of 65x40mm and is made of five layers of 8mm oak lamellas. By finger-jointing short lengths of oak end-to-end, lamellas of up to 9.5m length were created. The glue-lamination was carried out in Xylotek's Bristol workshop on a set of bespoke profiling jigs, and segments each pavilion were preassembled in the workshop, positioned on site, and then overlaid with further laths to create the full 3D lattice of curved oak.

The doorway arches are also formed of glue-laminated oak and are formed in a way that best matches the pavilions' complex curvature with single-direction curved elements. Surface treatments were applied to the laths in the workshop, to provide both fire protection and add to the durability of the timber.

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