Kuwait University College of Liberal Arts

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Kuwait University College of Liberal Arts

Firm

Type

Cultural › Gallery
Educational › University Other

SIZE

1,000,000 +

BUDGET

$1M - 5M

The benefits of campus life—the sense of
inhabiting an academic community, the chance meetings that evolve into
intellectual explorations, the shared experiences that help cement pluralistic
and humanistic values—are not currently available to students at Kuwait
University.
Kuwait’s large swings in temperature—from
5ºC to 60ºC—and relative humidity—from 5 to 85%—challenged the design team to
find innovative ways to balance community with comfort and expansiveness with
efficiency. The design solution addresses these goals by lifting the mass of
the building off the ground plane. This formal move provides building occupants
with an easily accessed sequence of self-shaded and passively ventilated
study/gathering spaces.
The design team looked to traditional desert shelters for tested ideas of
passive sustainability. The diwaniya tent, a traditional gathering place, holds
a special significance in the region: its social function, materiality, form,
and environmental performance are sophisticated responses to specific
environmental and cultural conditions. The combination of self-shading building
mass, a chimney effect at the “tents”, operable fold-up walls, and vegetated
grilles and walls passively ventilate and cool the ground level shared spaces.
Interior courtyard spaces with inward-sloped walls create self-shaded
vertical “tents” and “tent gardens. At vertical circulation, terraced stadium
seating provides informal study space that promotes community awareness and
interaction. Passive ventilation enhances occupant comfort while reducing
energy use, allowing the building systems to apply climate variations rather
than fight them.