Indie Lab Office Building / StudioSC + Base Taller

Indie Labs is the product of a collaboration between two studios: StudioSC, based in New York City, and Base Taller, based in Medellín, Colombia. With deep personal and professional ties to Medellín, StudioSC was invited to join the design team for a ground-up office building just outside the city center, perched at the edge of a natural preserve.

The original house is a simple weatherboard bungalow with charming stained-glass windows and internal timber detailing. However, at the rear, an uninspiring renovation from a few decades past was not making use of the north-oriented rear yard. Our brief was to update the house to accommodate a young family and establish a richer connection with the surrounding landscape and garden.

The Jinyu Xingfa Science Park has emerged as a campus for international cutting-edge research and development through the transformation of a former cement factory in Huairou Science City, Beijing. The multifunctional science park covers an area of approximately 36 hectares and is characterized by the preservation of 54 buildings.

SITE I – The project starts without a site. The client, now living in a small apartment in the middle of Tokyo, wants (the possibility) to commute. The idea is to get a sizeable piece of land within an hour's train ride from Tokyo. The architect is hired as an advisor to make sure that the place is right to do something interesting. Together, they visit several sites in Kamakura. A frustrating few weeks begin. The sites they visit together are either too small or too expensive. Or both. Nothing comes of it.