The Penguin Pool, (London, England)
The Penguin Pool
The Penguin Zoo designed by Berthold Lubetkin and the Tecton Group is located in the London Zoo at Regents Park in London, England. The project begun in 1933 and finished in 1934. This architectural structure is an important piece of the British modernist architecture movement. The penguin pool was one of the first structures to begin to explore and demonstrate the structural potential of reinforced concrete and how it can become expressive. The project consisted of a stretched elliptical pool, a deep diving tank enclosed by glass, and nesting areas around the perimeter. This design was based on a concept of behaviourism. This concept was a popular philosophy of psychology in the 1930s as it claimed that the behavior of animals is a result of their external environments. To incorporate this into the design process, Berthold Lubetkin and the Tecton Group wanted to mimic the natural habitat of the penguins to provide an acceptable environment while creating a stage in which these penguins can be viewed. This stage was the main part of the attraction as it showed the zoo’s audience how penguins would act in an artificial replication of their habitat. The most important feature of the penguin pool is the two thin interlocking spiral ramps in the pool. These ramps extend from hidden columns to give the the illusion that the ramps hover over the pool unsupported. The ramps were praised for not only their aesthetic appearance, but the technical expertise that these ramps were derived from. The architects teamed up with the structural engineer Ove Arup who was an emerging specialist of reinforced concrete at the time. Ove came on board the project because he viewed it as an “opportunity to exploit the potential of reinforced concrete. He advanced the idea that the concrete slab or panel was the most effective form for reinforced concrete. This was in opposition to the traditional method of casting it as a column or beam”. In order to do this, he proposed “that concrete structures should be cast as one unit with the joints as strong as the central elements. He argued that with this approach any shape could be achieved”. This concept was very innovative at the time because it was only experimental. To accomplish this in reality was a major step forward and promoted Ove as a leader in the field at the time. Not only did it promote Ove, it promoted the concept of cast in place as one unit. After 70 years of different generations of penguins living in the penguin pool, they decided the pool, despite the ideas drawn from their natural habitat, that the pool was unsuitable for the penguins. This decision was made after the penguins were temporarily moved into one of the zoo’s duck ponds while the park was being renovated. It was deemed unsuitable for the penguins as they discovered the penguins suffered from aching joints because of the constant walking over the concrete. Additionally, because of the concrete, the penguins were not able to burrow in their habitat which was a typical piece of their mating rituals. So when the penguins seemed to enjoy their new habitat even more than their penguin pool, it was deemed more suitable.
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