Primary and Middle Years Program Extension Building 2019

for Al Mashrek International School

Design by Arini
Construction by Maani Ventures

Arini designed flexible learning spaces to promote a sense of wellbeing and creativity.

Several elements are spread across different levels with various steps and sloping surfaces that all together form a miniature landscape for children to explore during lessons.

Several elements are spread across different levels with various steps and sloping surfaces that all together form a miniature landscape for children to explore during lessons.

Featuring shops and installations from:

Turquoise Mountain
lrth Collective
Petra National Trust
Safi Crafts
Iraq Al-Amir's Women's Co-Op

Through a journey of discovery into the crafts and materials of Bilad Al-Sham, this showcase offers a different understanding of craft, in which tradition is seen as a sum of the available resources and materials from which we can craft possible futures.

At the level of Omar Bin Al-Khattab Street, Rihla fi Al-Hiraf features crafts from across Jordan; from its northern region to its eastern Badiya, and down to the southern Jordan valley.

Following a display of ceramics, clay, and paper recycling produced by the Iraq Al-Amir's Women's Co-Op, the journey ends in the south with the natural dyes extracted by the women of Ghor Al-Safi at Safi Crafts. 

By combining maps and storytelling with walking and performance, we feature artisan and training workshops, installations in-the-making and shops where products are sold.

Material journeys are showcased through techniques of transformation from natural to composite states and from raw materials to crafted forms.

Visitors, artisans, and designers are taken on a journey through the multiple, dynamic and ever-changing crafts of Jordan’s Badia and Ghor region to the versatility of Levantine materials, as well as, their alteration with digital fabrication and computational design.

(DIS)CONNECT

Design by Daniel + Qusai

This modular public interactive installation has different compositions of typical seating elements, designed to create a setting that will provoke and encourage social interactions. 

Reciprocal Frame Tensegrity Pavilion

Design by Yazeed Balqar

A reciprocal frame is a self-supporting structure made of three or more beams arranged in a closed circuit. This pavilion takes reciprocal frames a step further by adding tensegrity to the structure, which is a combination of strut weight and cable tension. 

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Nīla

for Amman Design Week 2019

Commissioned by Amman Design Week

Design and construction by Arini

Construction manager: Esam Aljabi

Photography by Jenna Masoud , Amman Design Week, and Edmund Sumner

The installation canopy was made by women in Ghor El Safi (Safi Crafts) using traditional techniques in cultivating indigo and creating dyes, which are then transferred to modern applications in design.

100 Boxes

for Amman Design Week 2019

Commissioned by Amman Design Week

Design and construction by Arini

Construction manager: Esam Aljabi

Photography by Jenna Masoud , Amman Design Week, and Edmund Sumner

The installation was designed as a module, leaving room for growth depending on the crowds. Multiple levels are created to open more room for interaction.

The limestone gravel was inspired by the landscape done on the site.

Sīk is an abstraction of a journey that resembles a block, slowly taking shape from a more intact center. As the passerby approaches the installation, Sīk reveals a path into its parts, emphasizing the role of the journey in altering our perception of the object. 

The clay coins used to create this spatial experience were produced as part of a continued collaboration between Petra National Trust and Cambridge Highschool

In this commission by Petra National Trust, Arini challenged the traditional use of clay, a fundamental craft in the inherited cultural and artistic heritage of the Petra community, which PNT foregrounds in their youth-empowerment programs across that region.

The challenge was to present the material of clay in new innovative ways for the visitors to explore as part of their Journey Through Crafts ‘Rihlā fil Hiraf’, along the lines of the 2019 Crafts District’s curatorial vision that highlights the evolution and transformation of seemingly frozen notions of craftsmanship.  

The final result mirrored the experience of walking through the Siq of Petra, in which one would find themselves slowed down by the sand underneath as they become immersed in the atmospheric quietness and the intimate path through the clay coins.

Rêverie Retail Shop 2019

for Reverie Clothes Boutique

Design and construction by Arini

Branding by Eyen

The shop is built in an old Ammani Apartment in Jabal Amman. They provide locally designed and made clothes and accessories.

The boutique exhibition is made using soft earthy colors and pink hues by employing the Rosa Marble and natural wood as the main materials.

The commission also includes the main office and workshop in the back of the house area.

The mural is made by combining 3 different materials in a unique composition. A circle mirror a marble slab and wool tassels that were made by the women of Jabal Al Natheef.

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Dalieh, the Kinetic Canopy for Amman Design Week 2017

Commissioned by Amman Design Week

Designed and built by Arini

Site construction Manager: Esam Aljabi

Photography, Aspire Photography, Ali Alsaadi and Moh'd Musa

Bamboo wooden strips are kindly provided by Zawayed

Function: 17x17m canopy to cover the Zain Cultural Plaza during Amman Design Week 2017

Special thanks for Jafar Aljabi

Commissioned by Amman Design Week and designed and built by Arini.

Dalieh – grapevine – is a free-flowing and kinetic canopy that stretches over Zain Cultural Space at Al Hussain Cultural Center. The suspended structure’s translucency, which alters depending on the viewing angle, enhances the sense of spatial ambiguity and acts as a protective layer to limit unwanted heat and glare.

Dalieh is composed of 10,300 pieces of bamboo strips that were discarded from the curtain industry. Dalieh was inspired by Alejandro Aravena’s approach in exhibiting scrap metal in the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale.

Bamboo wooden strips are kindly provided by Zawayed
Construction site manager: Esam Jabi

Editors and workshop curators: Arini

Editors:

Liyan Aljabi
Heba Alnajada
Mohammad Aljabi
Christoph Lueder

Collaborators:

Prof. Dr. Christian Schmid
Dr. Siobhan Campbell
Ed Wall
Samar Dudin
Ohoud Kamal
Mohammad Al Hajji

Community partner: Ruwwad | رواد التنمية

Academic Partner: German Jordanian University

Publication design: Twopoints.net

Arini produced an in-depth study of the socio-spatial structures of the refugee camp’s built environment. Arini continued its investigation; throughout 2014 we carried out focus groups, discussions and meetings with the community.

Mapping Jabal Al Natheef project investigates and compiles data in the pursuit of interventions that are scenario and time based. Considering design as an open act of capacity building, we examine mapping processes as active agents of change. This presents a chance for us urbanists, architects, and designers to understand the spatial dynamics of a community —that evolved to become integrated into the economic activity and into their urban environment— consequently unlock its socio-economic opportunities.

This project introduces two phases of intensive investigation and extensive exploration.

In Phase I, which began in winter 2012, we carried focus groups, discussions and Mapping Jabal Al Natheef workshop —Autumn 2013—. At the end of this, we bring forward this publication to present the research the contributors and we have been working on. In Phase II, which begins the following winter, Arini team will continue its exploration of strategic design as an instrument engaging both material and social change; social scenarios will be coupled with novel design proposals to develop physical interventions concerned with the everyday life of the camp residents. The iterative methodologies focus on investigations of spatial, structural and material organisation, engaging in discourses of architecture and urbanism.

Approach

The project approach focused on dissecting one study strip into five areas and layers related to those areas:

Built Environment: What are the elements of the built environment, their condition and typologies?

Housing: What are the existing housing typologies?

Needs: What are the needs of the inhabitants of the area?

Socio-economic status: What is the condition of the inhabitants of the area

These five areas provided the framework around which the collected data was organized.

Methodology

Both qualitative and quantitative research methodologies were used, and then employed critical analysis to review the data.

Qualitative: One-on-one process, posed questions directly to individuals of the community, the interviewers investigated the richness of emotions and impressions through multimedia recordings. Qualitative data were in the form of interviews, group discussions and observations.

Quantitative: Detailed social questionnaires distributed to a sample of 50 inhabitants of the area.

Critical Analysis: Both research techniques were followed by a critical analysis of the data, where we reflected on the generated information to come up with patterns, urban indicators, and relationships in order to develop conclusions.

This project was made possible by the brilliant 29 participants from multidisciplinary backgrounds we had on board; architectsurban plannerscurators we had on board.

Angel Jirkisian
Hadeel Mohmad
Haitham Kurdi
Hiba Jarar
Khaled Ali
Lana Salameh
Lina Ghanem
Luai Kurdi
Mayassa Al Damerji
Mohamamd Mango
Mohammad Naji
Nadin Sh Yassin
Namariq Al Rawi
Nida Mouhsin
Nizar Taha
Noura Al Khasawneh
Nujud Ashour
Nure Shammout
Ola Kaka
Rand Al Haj Hassan
Raslan Hawi
Sally Odeh
Sara Nowar
Shada Qahoush
Sofeen Salameh
Sonia Nimri
Tara Yamak
Zeid Madi
Zeina Al Thawabteh

This project was made possible by a generous contribution by the following organizations:

Heinrich Böll Stiftung Middle East

Aramex

Click here to see the day-to-day workshop details