Fall 2025 / Icon Mash Up [elective] / Instructor: Ritchie Yao
Team: Louis Houle-O’Connor
Icon Mashup: Richard Rogers INMOS Factory x HDeM Dominus WineryTeam: Louis Houle-O’Connor
Napa Valley, CA
In Icon Mash Up, we selected two case studies and merged them into a single architectural assembly that reconciles differences while preserving identifiable traits from each precedent. I chose Richard Rogers's INMOS Microprocessor Factory and paired up with Louis, who chose HDeM’s Dominus Winery. Here, we confronted the challenges of integrating differing structural logics, environmental strategies, programmatic demands, or narrative ambitions to create a unified architectural proposition.
Mashup scenario:
Rising temperatures as a result of climate change have accelerated the severity and frequency of wildfires in the Napa Valley. Dominus Winery operations continue in spite of the circumstances. Richard Rogers is commissioned to intervene to improve the winery’s fire protection and resistance.
Rogers thickens HDeM’s gabion wall by offsetting it 10' and suspending it from the roof using a truss armature to allow wind to pass through. A zone between the facade and the building is created: presenting an opportunity for occupiable space and to house building services like HVAC ducts. In the interest in preserving HDeM’s contextual design impulses, Rogers conceals the structural move by increasing the height of the gabion wall.
Rising temperatures as a result of climate change have accelerated the severity and frequency of wildfires in the Napa Valley. Dominus Winery operations continue in spite of the circumstances. Richard Rogers is commissioned to intervene to improve the winery’s fire protection and resistance.
Rogers thickens HDeM’s gabion wall by offsetting it 10' and suspending it from the roof using a truss armature to allow wind to pass through. A zone between the facade and the building is created: presenting an opportunity for occupiable space and to house building services like HVAC ducts. In the interest in preserving HDeM’s contextual design impulses, Rogers conceals the structural move by increasing the height of the gabion wall.
INMOS Microprocessor Factory
Newport, Wales / Completed in 1982
The INMOS microprocessor factory is an expression of structure and tech industry, a marker of high-tech architecture movement in the 80s. The project’s quick turnaround necessitated a pre-fab and kit of parts construction that can grow. I was most interested in Rogers' use of a span-tension steel armature to hold up the facade, demonstrating steels’ athletic load bearing capacities.
