Gathering Brief

Based off of our previous office brief what I understood was demanded off of us was to throw aside all notions of digital practices and climate change within our previous designs and create(or rather redesign) a building which solely concentrated on the idea of gifting. This idea of gifting embodying a notion of gifting back to society both in the emotions felt in the space but also as Judy mentions in that the gift should "inspire(d) others to want to be architects".

With Judy's small paragraph being set in the distant future as a reflection of the progress that our architectural careers have made, my initial idea was, what in fact will the architecture of the future be and look like. Will it be so called "bubble architecture", radial cities constructed on the essence of ultimate utopian planning (as envisaged by early 20th Century architects like Corbusier) surrounded by Jetson like flying cars, or rather...will our society and the world be different? Will in fact 90% of the world live on hand to mouth, with the majority of buildings being in fact made from grungy industrial materials instead of the pristine skyscrapers and modernist boxes of the rich, capitalist societies today. In essence much has to be explored.

And it is with this first idea of thinking up of a tradition or inventing a word that I have started in responding to this idea of future architecture and gifting back to the community. My tradition and associated world after some thought about my preferential architecture is. 'Junkstyle modernism'. What this idea embodies is a few things but mainly the aim is in creating a contemporary industrial reflection of late 19th and early 20th Century arts and crafts style, in creating objects of quality and constructed substance that reflect the craft of the modern age, utlizing its many materials through architecture. In many respects it also aims to embody the ideas of modern factories, warehouses and machines in general that have shaped our times, for do we not as a society measure progress in comparison to GDP and associated technological gains as has been shown by the superpowers of Apple. Microsoft and other companies?

It is with this idea of Junkstyle Modernism that as per the brief I aim to renovate my office with particular emphasis on these ideas of using modern materials in a way that pays respect to an industrial arts and crafts feel wherein materials are used in a traditional way for modern standards while utilizing their very materiality in creating interesting textures and feels (taking inspiration from such modern architects as Peter Zumthor), in expressing materials to their ultimate potential in terms of form.

Notes from our first group meeting with Padma and Dermott addressed these following bullet pointed issues that I jotted down:

• Look at Peter Cook - Kunsthaus in Austria, all around it are old buildings, glass blob floating above, almost alien like. Peter Cook is making material choices to reflect the alien building structure, always to reflects an idea.
• Designboom - architectural presentation.
• Presentation reflects architecture, produce one drawing a day, working towards a detail
• Importance on quality of finish.
• Junction of all my materials.
• How the materials go together, which materials I am using.
• High quality augmented drawings.
• Present - like bland contexts, take picture of sight in greyscale, make your site look the best, immediate response to presentation, don't make it underwhelming, take Peter Cook approach.
• Generosity is a big part of gifting.
• Sharing ideas is the best gift.
• Use of materials.
• How to use digital world within architecture.
• Manipulation of light important, digital spaces, use of darkness.
• Gifts external surface with darkness inside.

Week 3 - Review - Shirin Heidari

Name: Shirin Heidari

Student ID: 1577418

Blog Address: shirinarchi@blogspot.com

Group: 3

Again my computer has failed to be able to open the blogspot addresses, unfortunately this means that again I wont be able to add pictures from the associated blog by Shirin but I will aim to do so tomorrow upon visiting the computer suite at the Architectural School.

From the outset Shirin made it clear to me that she was upset and confused by the fact that her model was given a D by Dermott upon her review that morning. She was rather upset throughout the peer review and likewise the review followed a slightly different format which I will try and conclude within a few paragraphs.

The main idea between Shirin's project was that of a canopy structure hanging between the facades of two building structures. The canopy on the outside would be made from stained glass, polished metal sheets and would be sitting on top of a wooden bridge that made up most of the inter building span. Shirin (from what I saw) had a number of developed sketches within her sketch book but in realisation fell short in achieving the task asked of her in creating a 1:1 scaled detailed that emphasizes the structure and how the canopy is create which in fairness she tried to make as polished and as covered as possible. This was observed in her fine welding of the metal plates together, the gluing of the stained glass/plastic to the metal and the lack of joining of her wooden bottom slats to the metal of the sitting-on-top canopy. Without a lot to look on I set about helping her figuring out a way she could fix it in order to get reconsidered with a couple of ideas coming through that she could:

1. Instead of welding her metal canopy and gluing her stained glass to the metal, she could have used a number of spider-clips or inter piece grips that could have held all the pieces in position using an intricate and interesting structural form.
2. She could have explored the bolting down of the wooden slats to the bottom of the metal canopy.
3. Further functionalism could have been addressed with possible use of silicon in the joints of the stained glass windows in order not to let water through.

All in all Shirin's project had potential and while she stresses that both Dermott and Padma weren't there for her checkup the day before in the tutor groups, it is just one of those unfortunate situations where the brief is just misunderstood despite an object of certain quality potential.

Review - Week 3 - Rosa Song

Name: Rosa Song

Student ID: 5753213

Group No: 3

Unfortunately upon starting my review and trying to get into Rosa's blog address at srs9292@blogspot.com, the block address did not let me enter due to "phishing" error. However I will do my best in reviewing her work without additional pictures and illustrations due to this problem. Rosa as part of the augmented reality group taken by Padma and Dermott were to create a number of drawing with a use of applied paper media on top to illustrate their office spaces in regards to other buildings within the greater triangle for this semester and a 1:1 scale model of a building detail.

Rosa decided to create sculptural seat installation within some modern courtyard space near Britomart (the precise location wasn't totally understood) but used the idea of a wavy almost infinity type bench form to create a seat that dealt with the idea of round curved shape punctuated my smooth empty seating spaces.

The idea as Rosa portrayed it is the idea of simple benches creating fun exciting spaces, giving passerbys somewhere to sit. What I was most impressed with was the 1:1 models produced not just by Rosa but the entire Augmented Reality group this week, with the impact of 2 extra weeks worth of work being clear. Rosa's project consisted of a smaller 1:5 model made from cardboard and covered with wood tape, making it look convincingly like a solid cross section of the wooden bench section without it being made from the actual material. Her 1:1 model was equally impressive showing of definite craft skill with model that utilised a curved shape created through the joining of different wooden slats glued along a central curved wooden backbone. Additional material and structural integrations was the use of bolts to hold the wooden slats on the backbone with the addition of a plexiglass window type hole, surrounded by silicon to not let water finished off the model with a degree of class and functionality.

Otherwise a job well done.

Modulor - Le Corbusier

The door designs for my building in the pictures below have been done in the inspiration of the Modular system of human measurement from the diagram above. The front door has seemed to conceptualise the shrinking spiral like moving (rotating) system in reflecting the dimensions of human anatomy and thus making it extremely suitable for the front door of the building, reflecting the measure of those that inhabit it.

As seen int he pictures below, my front door has a very geometric shape, consisting of a number of half cylinders in red/pink colour and blue colours accending from small shapes to large at the tope. My aim was to initially create a circular spiral shape but due to time restraints (and the need for sleep), I perhaps had to "cop-out" and go for a simpler shape, although I did aim to recreate a similar thing at the throughfair to the engineering studio space which has a large concrete rotating spiral shape that stops the general public from entering into the more confidentional client based areas with computer/valuables.

Finally a few pictures from the back show a similar use of half cylinders to create a descending size of cylinders with an alpha pattern on them that also aim to mimic the proportions and idea of the Modulor by Corbusier in measuring the ratios of human measurement, and by doing so creating the access back door for the carpenter area.

Final with Addition Corubusier Modular Spiral Inspired Doors

The bottom two pictures show my images of my final office views from

the front and from the back. While I am happy with my final project as

a whole, I cant say that there cant be massive improvements as well. In

terms of my major goals, to create an architectural space that uses

the Carpenter Centre as inspiration to create an office space that

uses the ideas of directional light and views, I believe I have

provided a number of different aspects such as the use of light

chimneys, use of gaps, slat construction. flexible prims, a sculpty

white cloud like prim (referring to Ronchamp influence from Le

Corbusier) to give part of the building a sense of lightness away from

the monumental nature of its general concrete construction. I have

also included a number of both reactive and rotational scripts in my

doors and slats on the windows, playing on my and Corbusier's idea of

a building being a machine for living in and the continuation of my

idea of a living, almost "breathing" building that moves with the

influence of people and most importantly light.

What I am perhaps happy with the final product, areas where I think I

could improve are things that Judy has picked up on even looking at my

Matrix this morning, this is the creation of a unique space (that is

perhaps more united than mine) spatially and that interacts to a

further degree with the occupants and allows more mingling between the

5 occupants, creating a more successfully form of architecture. Had I

had perhaps a few more days and a few more prims (I see Judy cringe) I

would have added in a few more interesting structural features that

further interact with the surrounding buildings to its sides as well

as adding in my bought furniture for the office space. In architecture

there is always more that you can fix and with this being a bit of a

learning curve for me, I managed to explore creating an entire office

space from the inside outwards, with the space and the feelings

including light and monumentality in the space dictating the way my

architecture is formed.

The top three images show the construction process of my back access door to the Carpenters office area. The door has been modeled off the illustration at the top of the page with Le Corbusier's Modular Man, thus the doors being one half of a rough representation of the associated Modular spiral that reflects the proportions of the human body. The top part of the doors is larger, with the smaller bits descending to the smallest at the bottom. I have given the doors an alpha texture with a mixture of red and black in accordance with this making the doors similar to that of red and white stripes, thus making them visible when opening for passersby to take care or lorry drives to take care in not hitting their trucks on them. The alpha channel follows a similar pattern to that of the criss cross Victorian industrial trusses however closer together to allow more influence of the red to show through and stand out for caution. The doors swing open on a cantilevered hinge system thus allowing trucks to back up in close to the carpenter office space.

The third, fourth and fifth image display a similar use of the Corbusier spiral from the Modulor diagram to create a rotating front door that responds to the "open" command. The door is coloured in the colours depicted in Le Corbusier's drawing of it (Red and White), changing up the general monotony of the monumental structures around it at the entrance for the clients into the Dental space making it more inviting and friendly to children aswell rather than a completely austere finish.

Additions to the Building Thursday Morning - Notes to Follow

And last day...Even at this moment I am finishing off parts of my

building for the hand in tomorrow. Major new additions to my building

which is not included in my matrix is the inclusion of a funnel

entrance at the entrance of the building. This was mainly added as a

final monumental use of directional light,as in a telescope to

immediately reflect this idea of controling and funneling light in the

office space as used in the Carpenter Centre by Le Corbusier through

his use of slats. The entrance although quite dark due to its

monumental concrete construction will create a theatrical entrance

into the space that funnels in the dentist office space, which due to

the addition of the light chimneys and alpha channel slat windows will

be a place that will fully play on the idea of direction and

meaningful use of light within the office space, main idea that I

could get of Corbusier's from the Carpenter Centre.

The second picture down shows a representation of my rotating helix

that symbolically alludes to the idea of the Modulor Man, much like

the Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci, the Modulor created Le

Corbusier represents the proportions of man and the associated

perfection according to such ratios of body part dimensions. My door

aims to seperate the more daily public client spaces (carpenter and

dentist area) with those of the more secluded or selective client

based systems such as the artist,architect and the engineer. The door

turns with a swipe card, but for Second Life use, revolves 90 degrees

with the command open much as the front and back doors.

Addition Development

After finishing the main core structure of my office space I wanted to go back through the brief and make sure I had completed all that was required of the task at hand.

Firstly to make it a more homely office space I went onto the Second Life website, visited the marketplace and with the purchasing of 2500 Linden Dollars I set out on a buying a number of furniture that I could place inside my building. This included:

• A dentist chair
• A number of normal office tables for the separate office areas.
• Workshop benches for the carpenter.
• Bauhaus and a mixture of Le Corbusier furniture for the space to fit in with the style.

The only problem I did not for-see was that each piece of furniture is made out of a huge collection of individual prims with the likes of the dentist chair containing around 28 prims connected together and with the lack (ie. no prims available on Second Life) I have been forced to not include them, which although wont be a major setback seeing that I can add them later if need be for presentation in my final hand-in at end of term.

The biggest problem I have found with the reduction in prims is that I still haven't quite finished building my three thresholds and doors as specified in the brief, meaning I will have to delete a number of objects to make this possible. However, in retrospect this sort of constraints can be a good learning curve in working with restrains posed by future clients, budgets, etc that have to be adhered to hence I will have to do some rearranging to make completing this part of the brief viable.

An addition to my project on the second image down is the addition of a big sculpted prim from Tessa Forde in my class which fully utilizes the idea of the space being organized around a sense of lightness even if a lot of concrete is used within the space itself. Again I would like to reiterate the sense of creating a space that capitalizes on views, the play of dark and light within it through a number of light chimneys and direction windows and through this very open and light space it also complements the two office spaces underneath used by the artist on the mezzanine floor space and the architect below (both termed as artistic professions), with the sculpty visually emphasizing this concept. As seen further I have the entire structure draping around the top of the building and falling away towards the back access entrance leading to the carpenter's workshop. The sculpty is held up by a number of columns which have been flexed and that have a slight wind effect on them making them sway slightly, created the effect of a fully floating structure that aims both to work with the ideas expressed through the building but also in a sense contradict with the heavy aspect of the concrete and blocky figures around it.

As seen also in the second picture down, the slats to the left side of the higher ramp have been given an alpha channel texture, consisting of a very engineering criss-cross truss pattern that aims to create a direct connection to my lamp templates as seen earlier in my blog. What I like about this is that the patterns work directly in context with the Victorian made train bridge next to it but with the prim being flexible it also creates a sense of contemporary architecture with a form that is quite Victorian industrial in pattern but behaves in a way exemplified by the use of modern material such as perhaps carbon fibers block that offers some bending, acting as a vertical cantilever.

This alpha channel motif has further been carried on down on the bottom slats of the dentist clinic allowing optimum light to enter the area but also with making all the bottom dentist slats flexible aswell, on a windy day, one on the inside of the building would experience a rhythmic movement of interior shadow criss-crossing over each other with the swaying ('breathing' of the building), making this an important aspect of furthering that feeling of controlled and effective use of light within the building.