New York City has seen rapid redevelopment that has capitalized on previously undesirable locations. Sitting at the top of these locations are the sites that have access to waterfront. Most of the ventures in these areas are private economic interests that only address public value when there is a direct return on profit. If not taken into consideration many of these waterfronts will be absorbed and, with the constant return of people to the urban core, there lies a need to create public and cultural infrastructure. In a city that is filled with numerous icons, parks, theaters, and museums an aquarium is one of the few remaining public typologies that doesn’t exist within the immediate area.On a site that borders the East River and the Eleventh Street Basin in New York City, arch out loud proposes the implementation of a public aquarium and park to provide communal space for the surrounding city, a program that provides valuable waterfront space to residents and tourists alike. arch out loud challenges designers to experiment with conventional interpretations of this program and investigate how it can create a more appropriated relationship to its context.
1st Finalist
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“ VAW – VERTICAL AQUARIUM WATERFRONT ”
Water is the key element of the project and it is strongly introduced, flooding the site area to give continuity to the riverside park. The architectural intervention moves to the edges, in a set of different straight line pavement stripes, that follow the orthogonal urban fabric of New York. These landscape bands promote slow movement, permanence and contemplation of urban space. The intervention concludes with four water towers emerging from the East River itself, creating a sculptural image that will be the central element of the urban design proposal, in dialogue with the bottom iconic skyscraper view of Manhattan.2nd Finalist
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“ L.A.N.T.E.R.N.A. ”
Light And Nature for The East River New York AquariumTwo landscapes appears in front of people coming to the area: on one side Manhattan, on the other side a system of lanterns, a new way to enjoy an aquarium: L.A.N.T.E.R.N.A. is a life and light experience! The aquarium becomes a new landscape for people, even if they won’t enter it. They are invited to have a walk along multi-layered paths in between the tanks which are linked with the surrounding environment and the urban context: while walking outside you are able to glimpse the inside whereas from the interior you can appreciate the park, the waterfront , the skyline.
3rd Finalist
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“ THE QUEEN S FISHES ”
There is no proper way to build an Aquarium to the advantage of animals, as we are used to visit. The most spectacular Aquarium is the ocean itself in all its glory and its beings in their evolved habitat. Spreading pillars all over the site, offers the possibility of developing an uninterrupted undersea life. It certainly evolves by itself and induces the ‘Natural Aquarium’. On site marine researches can be done by pedestrians on the waterfront get informed by surrounded points of information, while taking a look down under water, observing fishes and corals in their natural behavior.4th Finalist
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“ NYC AQUATRIUM ”
The project creates a dynamic system that interacts with its surroundings, offering multiple ways to experience the water world. The site is excavated to become a large and unique water basin, with the Aquarium and the Marine Centre a submerged island accessed via a pathway. A sloping beachfront covers the Parking area to form a panoramic public space, while a boardwalk surrounds the basin and becomes a floating ring connecting the two waterfronts and encompassing the Aquarium and its sliding roof, a green island that closes to become a planetarium protecting the arena and the biome domes within.5th Finalist
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“ AQUA DEPENDENT ”
“Aqua Dependent” proposes an aquaculture aquarium exhibiting the interdependency of humans and the water that connects them. Threads of circulation ripple around the nodes of public spaces and guide visitors on a pathway following water from the East River as it meanders through constructed wetlands and to each of the aquarium’s habitats. The cyclical movement of water between each habitat showcases the symbiotic relationships and processes necessary to create balance between the aquatic organisms and the humans who depend on them.6th Finalist
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“ AQUATIC RESILIENCY ”
This proposal seeks to challenge changes in cultural and ecological climates. The scheme subtly rejects the competition ‘boundary’ of site and strategically implements a folded ecological topography carving away at the existing canal edge. This ground topography stretched into a larger Aquarium mass (80,000 sf) facilitates live exhibits and folds softly into two smaller research armatures – Marine Biology Research Center (30,000 sf) and Rising Sea Level Research Laboratory (10,000 sf). As water rises, either by tidal change or anticipations of rising sea level, the Aquarium and its landscape resiliently accept the flood – allowing water to cultivate an ecologically savvy ground.7th Finalist
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“ VERS LA MER ”
In light of rising sea levels and flooding events threatening metropoles around the world, this proposal investigates a maritime urbanism where the built fabric of the city shifts from traditional solid ground to a floating existence in harmony with the ocean. ‘Vers la mer’ – ‘towards the sea’ utilizes the potential of the Queens riverfront and Anable basin for such an investigation. Rectilinear volumes based on the built fabric on land are coming loose and float, anchored in the enlarged Anable basin and are surrounded by a floating water garden in which the public can enjoy and experience life on the water.8th Finalist
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“ THE WHALE ”
The following is a proposal to create building which function depends on the water level. The base level of the aquarium is an independent structure which floats on the water surface. If the level of river rise up the underground level is going up and getting closed creating a watertight space. With a view to the close distance to the Central Park, whole site is arranged in way to recreate main paths of the complex. Instead of locking animals the exhibition is using interactive, 3d projections on fog located in special chambers to attract visitors without any harm to animals.9th Finalist
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“ FRAMED ”
The point of this project is to give people ability to watch animals in their natural habitat and climatic conditions, with species and plants that they use to have around them. The best would be to move audience to the place, where those animals come from. This is where comes in place the FRAMED project which main purpose is to take visitors to the trip. Imagine a catalogue of square-base blocks which are pieces taken from 6 different climate zones. Those elements become a main exhibition which allows visitors to see underwater and waterside environments in unchanged form and scale.10th Finalist
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“ MERROIR ”
Merroir envisions the twenty-first century aquarium as a node within larger hydrological and ecological networks, an aquarium that is not a collection of animals behind glass but rather a series of experiences and encounters with an estuary as a dynamic living system. The aquarium site is at the center of a set of thirty diving bells distributed across the metropolitan region. Three distinct bell networks offer varied experiences for visitors to engage different, dynamic ecologies: mobile bells based on aquatic habitats, cadastral bells based on the built environment, and datum bells based on bathymetry and sea-level rise.11th Finalist
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“ NYC VIVARIUM – A LIVING SANCTUARY ”
The proposal aims to reconnect and re-establish a natural environment and ecology where all living things coexist. The traditional private nature of aquariums is challenged by proposing a surface public park that coexists with and sustains a subterranean water park below. In the surface public park, seen as the realm of humans, ‘ocean animals’ are on display, thus an aquarium (a place to relate to water). In the subterranean water park, seen as the realm of the ocean, humans are immersed into the experience of the ocean, and is therefore referred to as a “aquamergo” (immersive experience into water).12th Finalist
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“ NYCEA – NEW-YORK CITY ESTUARY AQUARIUM ” 
NYCEA puts emphasis on the issue of pollution in the Hudson river and aim to give New Yorkers awareness of flora and fauna of their estuary. The industrial layer is raised releasing the nature original state. The fragmented aquarium is slightly and linearly filed on this nature to give a clean environment for the aquatic species. The exploration ends with a wake-up call where the New Yorker is face-to-face with the pollution in the East river. The future of NYCEA is an aquarium without any walls between the basins and the river, where all species live in a healthy environment.
NYCEA puts emphasis on the issue of pollution in the Hudson river and aim to give New Yorkers awareness of flora and fauna of their estuary. The industrial layer is raised releasing the nature original state. The fragmented aquarium is slightly and linearly filed on this nature to give a clean environment for the aquatic species. The exploration ends with a wake-up call where the New Yorker is face-to-face with the pollution in the East river. The future of NYCEA is an aquarium without any walls between the basins and the river, where all species live in a healthy environment.
