An Oyster Habitat

The design project consists of a combination of an artificial underwater oyster reef – built with Biorock® technology – and an oyster restaurant in the Black Sea. The sustainable benefits of this idea: oysters filter the seawater, cleaning it from harmful nitrogen, which works against the warming of the oceans and protecting the coast from erosion through their reefs.

The design achieves its form through some boundary conditions, such as wind, waves and sun. But also by the given functions and their circulation among each other. Cable-like basic struts form the core of the design appearance. They flow similar to wavy lines around the inner cavities of the building. The pipes are compacted by enhancing matter and thus form the final version of this experimental design concept.

The concept of the building is a sustainable and conscious approach to oysters: visitors learn how to move underwater in the diving school, but also how to harvest oysters and how to grow them. After self-picking the oysters, they are prepared in the restaurant and served as desired. The remaining shells are in turn used to grow in the breeding tanks for young oysters. In addition to the digitally created design studies and draft, some experiments with steel grids in water tanks under different voltages have been made to test the Biorock® calcification process – with good results.