Status: research / unbuilt

Hudson River, New York

building area:

ground floor / market hall: 13,000 SF

floors two to eight / shipping containers: 366 containers @ 22’ x 8’ = 64,400 SF

total: 77,400 SF

HIVE

“Love is the river of life in the world.”

- Henry Ward Beecher

It is estimated that globalization has given us 40 million total shipping containers in the world, with several million in transit at any one time. At 175 SF per container, that’s seven billion SF of goods shipping capacity plying the world’s straits, oceans, bays and ports to bring us anything our hearts desire.

The containers vary in size, most being about 8’ x 8’ x 20’, and they are made of steel deck welded into a steel frame to make a rigid beam. Each container has holes in the top four corners of the frame into which are inserted the hooks on the massive gantry cranes that unload the cargo. The fact that containers are structural - they are essentially hollow beams - make them uniquely suited to this loading and unloading process, and also to other construction possibilities. For instance, they can be welded or bolted together to make enclosures with very large spans.

design response

HIVE is 366 repurposed shipping containers stacked and welded into a self supporting vault and set on three barges on the west side of Manhattan on the Hudson River. The image of the massive container ship hauling goods around the world is preserved, but with a twist: the center is hollowed out to make a grand civic hall, and the containers above that form the vault are occupied and give life to the community assemblage. The hall and the cells combine to make a buzzing network of activity: a vast market hall at the base connected directly to river walk and plaza, elevators and catwalks, and the cells themselves alive with residents and workers.

The barges provide flotation and serve as a dock for small vessels. A row of vertical containers lift the vault off the barge floor and allow light and air into the interior market hall - a grand space that soars eight stories. The vault assembly above houses HIVE’s private program spaces which look into the public space below. Each container space is 8’ x 8’ x 22’; two would make a micro apartment, while clusters are suitable for office use.

HIVE is a proposition that inverts the image and use of the container ship from being an agent of material transport and consumption to being a social place for gathering, working, dining, and shopping. HIVE takes raw and massive industrial and infrastructural building blocks, and transforms them into a desirable destination that enlivens the linear gardens set along the rivers edge.