Reverberating Architecture Outdoor Recreational Equipment Centre

Abstract

Reverberating architecture exists through the echoes of its creative or architectural image. It is an architecture where the being of that architectural image reverberates and is felt throughout the whole transformative process until its echoes engage with the inner experience of the onlooker. These reverberations might impact the onlooker in such a way that it provokes a new architectural image within him or her. My design thinking was very much influenced by this thesis theme, as well as the concept of an indoor-outdoor system that intertwines. The concept is to design an outdoor recreational equipment centre with speciality shops for mountain biking, kayaking and canoeing, hiking and climbing. This retail complex varies from conventional retail centres in that it is an interactive retail store. This implies that the equipment can be tried before purchasing it. The architecture and the extreme sport activities [climbing, the mountain bike track and the kayak and canoe channel] would be used as communicating devices for specific brands. A precarious balance was needed between the plan, the architecture and the extreme sports existing within the architecture. Therefore a language was developed where by architecture not only responded to the site, but also with the movement happening in and around the site.