Many of the BIG models showcased on this blog will be on display as part of a major BIG exhibition, Formgivning (from June 12th to October 20th 2019) in Danish Architecture Centre recently relocated to the new BLOX building on the Copenhagen harbour front.
BIG would like to add some interaction to the LEGO displays by having the guests collaborate on constructing BIG architecture from LEGO themselves! How could this be done? After some brainstorming, the idea of using the DONG – Dortheavej Residence for the purpose came up as it consists of 70 almost identical prefabricated containers. The guests could simply build one container each (or in teams) and stack them to create the final model.
The pictures below show the DONG building. The description is taken from the BIG project website
The characteristic checkered pattern of Dortheavej is based on a singular prefab structure. Conceived as a porous wall, the building gently curves in the center, creating space for a public plaza towards the street.
The housing modules repeat along the curve and are stacked to the height of the surrounding buildings. The stacking creates additional space for each appartment to have a small terrace.
Long wooden planks cover the facade on all sides, highlighting the modules and alternating to accentuate the checkered pattern.
To test the feasibility of the idea, a prototype of a prefab module was built. Based on the architectural drawings, it turned out that modules could be represented very accurately in minifig scale by a 16×32 standard baseplate footprint and 10 bricks in height.
A very important design aspect to capture in the LEGO version is the alternating wooden planks in the facade. The “back” of the Masonry brick in Dark Tan combined with a single line of plates and tiles at the top and bottom gives a nice effect and makes it easy to make a snot construction (as 5 plates = 2 bricks). For the facades with smaller windows, the height of each panel could simply be doubled as seen on the picture below.
Having built the first prototype and being satisfied with the look of the facade, the next step was to consider constructability. How do we make a container that is both sturdy and easy to built for the exhibition guests with simple instructions? The solution was to split the construction in three: The easy, open container module and the two distinct facade types that can be clicked on to the container. In that way, it would be possible to split the construction of the container between more people with different LEGO skills.
The first prototype of this concept was built in grey to optimize the construction and part usage before eventually ordering large quantities of the bricks in dark tan. At this stage, we also had to consider the very limited part selection in dark tan.
The concpet seemed to work, the facades would clip on easily. Next step was to order the necessary bricks and start building more containers to see if the idea of simply stacking them in a curve was feasible. More on that in a later blog post!