Contemporary Trends
Contemporary Trends
Contemporary Trends
Rasha Zayour
201603396
Approximate Area
12 000 Sqm
Located in furn el chebbek on a flat site facing a bridge, The Pine Center or ALFA headquarters is an
elegant and simple structure situated at one of Beirut's busiest traffic crossing points. The Pine Center
represents itself as a landmark project known for its unmistakable and widely recognized area.
Comprised of four parking lots, three business levels and topped by a tower of ten repeated floors, the
ALFA headquarters speaks to an early turn of the thousand year complex model; the pine center is
profoundly established in the Mediterranean Modernist architectural talk of the twentieth century.
The center's two bodies; the base with its business and retail functions and the tower, have set up a
prominent structure, unmistakable for its uniqueness through the use of minimalist architecture
features and simple geometries, that are all carefully tailored to fit into the site and surrounding
context, making this building a perfect example of a brutalist structure. Brutalist buildings are usually
distinguished by their monolithic and massive appearance with a very firm geometric style. And this is
exactly how the Pine Center appears; it gives off a very monolithic feel that looks as though it were
carved from a single concrete block. The uniformity of its exterior and the use of concrete (beton brute)
makes the building appear as a fortress or a visually heavy structure that emphasizes a solid unadorned
exterior.
The plan of the project is a perfectly symmetrical right angle triangle, with a core for circulation placed
centrally on its hypotenuse. This gives the project an extremely organized design, through its decrease
of required flow areas. The triangular arrangement additionally gives various views from the inside and
several viewpoint and vanishing points in perspective from the outside.
Huge columns support the structure of the building on the inside with furniture adorning them as to not
make them feel as though they are separate or different entities but rather make them look as if
they were intentionally added to enrich the overall function, outlook and aesthetic of the place.
Showing itself as an outflow of convention and versatility etched in smooth fair-faced concrete, the
façade is left in its natural state, kept away from kitschy or tacky tones. The outside skin of double walls
makes the exterior spatial character an unmistakable quality, where the inner glazed windows are
concealed by their recessed nature as though they were punched in through the rough block of
concrete. The square windows slice through the external fair faced concrete that are altogether
proportioned and applied in a very rational way, making the facades very appealing to the naked eye.
On the back side of the building, tight rounded balconies seem as though they are cut out and projected
from the inner core to give off an appearance of floatiness. And on that same façade, windows lay flush
against the walls, contrary to the embedded windows placed on the other sides. A steel fire escape
staircase seems to have been added later on for safety precautions, as it does not show in the building’s
original plans. The exterior is decorated with lavish greenery, which helps assist the building in its
environmentally conscious stand that opposes the traffic clogged and dirtied city in which it is
surrounded by. The palm trees planted on the sidewalks next to the building help reinforce this stand as
well.
This is a project that has large numbers of perplexing and contradicting attributes, such as its
prominence within a lasting shadowy presence, its formal versatility and contemporary Mediterranean
flamboyance with a futuristic viewpoint, all very much incorporated into the area, culture, atmosphere,
space and time.