Dutch architecture studio MVRDV has designed the Woma mixed-use building in Miami's Wynwood neighbourhood with a central plaza and a facade broken up into colour-blocked sections.

Developed by Uribe Schwarzkopf, a firm behind several recent high-profile Quito buildings, Woma will have 163 residences in Wynwood, a former industrial district now known for its murals and entertainment facilities.

MVRDV designed the facade system to visually break up the building by using multiple different colours and varying the width and pattern of the spandrels and mullions.

MVRDV designed a colourful building for Miami's Wynwood district

This, according to MVRDV founding partner Jacob van Rijs, is meant to bring the building down to human scale.

"Woma is neighbourhood-oriented not just visually but also functionally," van Rijs told Dezeen.

"It prioritises human scale and pedestrian connectivity, while integrating abundant greenery, neighbourhood retail, amenities, and a diverse residential mix – becoming a place where people can meet, interact, and feel part of the community of Wynwood Norte."

The differently coloured sections were designed to give the building a more human scale

The red, blue, yellow and green elements also reference the presence of the fashion business in the area. On top of the colours, some of the facades have been depicted with panels of scalloped mettalic mesh.

MVRDV said that, overall, the facade is "textile-inspired".

The building will be built around a central plaza

Furthering a relationship to fashion, the structure will also serve as a headquarters for Miami-based fashion designer Rosita Hurtado, who owns the site.

The entrance to her portion of the structure will be marked with a facade of golden, scale-like elements, informed by Hurtado's fashion designs.

Formally, the structure will have various setbacks and cantilevers that reinforce MVDRV's description of the structure as a series of "stacked blocks".

Read: MVRDV wins competition for "new world wonder" in the Netherlands

The cantilevers showcase the thick external structural elements that slope and cross, giving the building a jagged exterior in places.

A central plaza will be accessible by a wide staircase that abuts Hurtado's facade, allowing visitors to move through the block-wide structure. In the plaza and on street level, some of the building entrances will be arched.

Woma will have green roofs, some of which will serve as social areas, as well as a rooftop pool. It will also have a rooftop pickleball court.

A rooftop and setbacks will allow for outdoor pools and social areas

Uribe Schwarzkopf CEO Joseph Schwarzkopf related the building to a "mosaic", hinting at its status as an expression of the community.

"Cities are not made of concrete and glass – they are made of relationships," he said.

"Like Wynwood itself, Woma is a mosaic: a patchwork of identities, creativity, and community. The facade expresses the neighborhood's deep connection to art, craft, and fashion to create a building that could only exist on this block."

MVDRV has taken a similar approach when dealing with the patchwork nature of American neighbourhoods.

For its first US project, in New York's Harlem, which takes its name from a Dutch city, the studio created the multi-colour Radio Tower and Hotel.

In China, it has pushed this even further in the design for a cultural complex in Shenzhen, which features not only different colours on the facade, but different material types.

In its home city of Rotterdam, the studio also recently made waves with its winning design for a "new world wonder", a collection of bulbous volumes covered in greenery.

The renderings are courtesy of Uribe Schwarzkopf. 

The post MVRDV "prioritises human scale" in design of colourful Miami building appeared first on Dezeen.