What is the role of water, as a basic element of life, in architectural design and shaping the built environment? This post will examine integrating water into architectural design and how architects use water as a key design component of modern projects. To explain the impact of water on the users of the architectural space, Apple retail facilities, designed by the Foster + Partners team, will be used as examples.

Apple Piazza Liberty in Milan is an example of the power of applied water in architectural design.  An inventive use of this natural resource adds value to this public space. 

Apple Piazza Liberty is located just off the Corso Vittorio Emanuele, one of the most popular pedestrian streets in town.

The fountain is dominant in the newly designed, stepped plaza in front of the building. Visitors get into the building through a glass-covered entrance enveloped by the sights and sounds of vertical water jets splashing against the 26-foot-high glass walls. The experience changes throughout the day as sunlight filters through the water. At night the glass ceiling creates a kaleidoscopic effect, with the water falling down the walls and its reflections travelling infinitely up the sky.

The fountain flows down into the base of the Amphitheatre,

defined by broad, stone steps descending below street level and opening up to a stage backed by a second fountain’s wall of water. The design of the entire plaza is supplemented by 21 new Gleditsia Sunburst trees surrounding it.

A solution that includes the movement and different rhythms of waterfalls, the sounds they produce, and the reflection of water surfaces causes surprises and arouses interactive, multisensory experiences of visitors. The mere sight of the dramatic new fountain attracts visitors to the square, becoming a new social hub and an outdoor extension of MilanApple Piazza Liberty.

In the Istambul Apple Zorlu Centre, the water has a functional role in addition to aesthetics. The store has an illuminated glass lantern set in a reflecting pool of water. It acts as a light well, drawing daylight deep into the subterranean retail levels.

The lantern is a deceptively simple yet technically advanced composition of four rectangular glass panes, each ten metres long, held together without mechanical fixings or visible joins, and covered by a lightweight sheet of opaque carbon fibre.

In Apple Zorlu Centre the design solution indirectly connects the inner and outer space. The technical solution uses the water surface outside the building to achieve a light benefit in the building itself. This provides the jewel-like centrepiece of the shopping centre in Istanbul.

Water plays an important role in the design of Apple Al Maryah Island in Abu Dhabi. It is on the island’s waterfront, close to the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange building and The Galleria Al Maryah Island. The large glass surfaces enable the visitor in the facility the panoramic views of the coastline and the city of Abu Dhabi beyond./shorelines views

Water is present in front of the Apple Al Maryah Island. The retail is elevated above steps of cascading water paved with Absolute Black granite stone. The black colour of the stair covering affects the water, so it is also black. From the promenade, the entrance/approach to the building is through two external ramps, which are cut through the water and rise to the store. The store directly connects the mall and the water’s edge, activating the promenade and the public plaza. The same granite continues seamlessly inside the store, connecting inside and outside, promenade and store.

Inside the building, the experience with water is different. Visitors from the mall enter through a mirrored stainless-steel portal, enveloped by the sights and sounds of the water jets that cascade down over the exterior glass walls. The water droplets catch the light and shimmer as they run over the milled glass surface. A 22-metre jointless stretched mirror foil ceiling adds drama to the space – a single uninterrupted plane that creates a kaleidoscopic effect, with the water falling down the walls and reflections travelling infinitely up towards the sky.

Water - Improving Public Space

This post aimed to show examples that confirm that water features add value to buildings and landscape architecture. Reflective water surfaces, dynamic movement and changing states intensify the visual appeal of the space. Solutions that include the movement and different rhythms of water/waterfalls, the sounds they produce, the reflection of water surfaces and unusual watercolours, will be interactive, multisensory experiences for visitors. The elements of water contribute to the atmosphere of a peaceful environment, and in the conditions of a warm and dry climate, water is the corrector of the place's microclimate. These characteristics have a positive effect on the comfort of the space users. Incorporating water elements into architectural solutions/concepts presents unique challenges and is a powerful tool for raising the characteristics of the space to a higher level.