Nature has been one of the biggest inspirations for architecture throughout history. The second branch of This Earth designed by Seniman Ruang, continues to redefine the idea of dessert shop experience by taking inspiration from the world’s nature, wrapped through a collaboration of designed environment and beverages products.
Project Name – This Earth 2.0
Studio Name – ErreLuce
Project size– 48m2
Site size – 48m2
Completion date– 2021
Building Level – 1
Location– Indonesia
Photography– Jo Christian
Celebrating what was formed and came from earth, the second branch of This Earth acted as a demonstration of Biomorphic Architecture, a contemporary design approach influenced by nature to mimic the beauty of our earth.
Located at the beachfront of Batavia Cove, a popular recreational area in Pantai Indah Kapuk, Jakarta, the building adapted the organic form of a seashell and transformed it into a functional architectural structure. It has been said that seashells are nature’s perfect architecture, as a mobile home for a wide variety of mollusks, seashells change their form to meet the needs of the inhabitants and many precedents use it as the basic architecture geometry. Its curved structure resists load through its inherent curvature that not only dictated the aesthetic value, but overall efficiency and behavior under load of the structural system. Their smooth and round design demonstrates high mobility makes them easy to quickly scoot around the ocean.
This 48 square meter pop-up building, applied the principle of symmetry, curvature, and repetitious pattern of a seashell. The structural performance relied upon the three dimensional curved ribs of iron pipes whose size was gradually and symmetrically escalating towards the centre of the building. Covered by translucent membrane, this shell defined the form of the roof and walls, functioning simultaneously as structure and enclosure. It unified architectural and structural form that not only allowed efficiency and increased stability, but also generated an enticing ribbed interior space. The transparency of the lightweight membrane allowed the building to shine from within at night and highlighted its attractive architectural form.
The middle entrance was an open space where customers ordered and took away the drinks, while most of the other indoor space was utilised as kitchen and bar. The floor was elevated to achieve the required width of functional space inside the shell structure, where the space below functioned as mechanical and electrical room for kitchen equipment and air conditioners. Two rounded windows at the end of the building could be rotated to circulate air into the room, where in front of it were a customer’s drinking area with sea view to enjoy.
The design aimed to create communication between architecture and its context, by taking inspiration from its natural existence and responding to the potential of its surroundings. This earth provided simplicity and elegance in the aesthetics of a seashell form; the smoothness of the curvature, the fluidity of lines and the lightness of structure.
