The
Winners of the 2010 World Architecture Festival were just announced last week as the festival concluded in Barcelona, and one of our favorite winners was the
Yevlakh Seed Industry Campus, an innovative and brightly-colored seed manufacturing facility in Yevlakh, Azerbaijan. The production facility designed by Turkish firm,
TOCA, took home first place in the category of production, energy and
recycling for its pioneering and integrative design, which combines all of the plant's processes into a single structure to streamline seed production.
The seed manufacturing facility is the first of its kind in the country. It’s equipped with the latest seed growth technologies and can produce 250,000 tons of seeds annually. Located near the agricultural districts of Azerbaijan, the entire manufacturing plant is designed as integrated parts of a single machine, and the architecture is defined by the function — two design strategies that help streamline the process of seed production.
The plant is made up of four areas: seed processing, packaging, storage and categorization. The packaging house is for cleaning up, classifying seeds by quality, and packaging them — then the warehouse stores the packed seeds. A maintenance building provides space to store vehicles and work on repairs, while the storing silos provide space to store and dry seeds. Skylights and natural ventilation help reduce energy use in the buildings and keep the facility at its proper temperature.
Speaking about the project, the judges remarked, “It is a unique project that works as a machine and its form emphasises the machinery, the plan is clear. The use of strong provocative colours has symbolic meaning and provides a unique character related to the function of the building. Additionally, the reinterpretation of the shed form is a very strong strategy.”
+ TOCA
Images ©Sergen Sehitoglu
This is great architecture for a manufacturing facility. Great job. You should submit it to the Holcim Awards – http://on.fb.me/holcim-awards