Architectural icon, Peter Cook, and his business partner, Gavin Robotham, co-founders of Cook Robotham Architectural Bureau (CRAB), have revealed they're working on an innovative leisure and recreation project in Mumbai.

Speaking in the latest issue of CLADmag, Cook said the new recreation, health and sports facility could represent the future of mixed-activity clubs.

"The core of the building's central area runs through two floors and is surrounded on both by a series of lounge-lobby 'vessels'," said Cook.

"The periphery has a range of activity zones: gymnasia, soccer pitch, field sports, children's area, adventure area, jogging track, spa, pool deck, and cinema."

Cook said the central vessels continue CRAB's exploration of tailored and 'scooped' internal spaces, which was initiated at the Abedian School of Architecture. The project is currently on site.

Cook and Robotham founded CRAB in 2006, after curating the British Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale.

Since setting up the practice, they've completed a range of projects, including a vibrant blue Drawing Studio at Arts University Bournemouth, UK; an apartment block in Madrid, Spain; an open, airy, colourful faculty building for the Abedian School of Architecture in Queensland, Australia; and two new buildings at the Vienna University School of Economics and Business in Austria.

Additional ongoing projects include an Innovation Centre for emerging businesses at Arts University Bournemouth and several housing projects in China.

In his CLADmag interview, Cook reveals how he was able to bring his radical architectural visions to life for the first time, when he teamed up with fellow Bartlett professor Colin Fournier to design the Kunsthaus Graz art museum in Austria, saying: "From an autobiographical point of view, the Kunsthaus Graz was a key breakthrough for me.

"I was somebody in his fifties who'd go down as a footnote in history; who'd done a few books and talked a lot, but hadn't really been considered a player.

"Then, with Colin Fournier, we ran this project and managed to do it virtually on time and on budget, and suddenly everyone said, 'Oh, this guy's an architect after all.'"

Read the full interview in CLADmag Q1 2019 here on digital. And here online

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