Moving Architecture

Hi team, 
As you know, Russell has placed some links for you to his pinterest board which contains some inspiration for you in relation to how your building might move. I found it helpful to look through some of the suggested ideas that Pinterest included after Russells blog as well.


Think laterally. 
Don't just show a door opening and closing, nor a lift going up and down... I know you can do better than that

....try to think about how your facade might be able to move. Can some of it hinge open, or hinge up, or twist around, or slide over itself. Does it move as the sun moves, acting as shading. Does it move for a special purpose, to change a space from one thing to another?

.... perhaps the facade has light images over it, or changes without the built elements moving, through the use of light or smoke

... look at some ideas of folding paper to show how one shape could become another . Here's some folding origami which changes shape
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5S2wJ3NK__o

.....is there something that moves on another object in your home, and you can adapt those ideas to use on your building? Jean Nouvel was inspired by a camera lens opening when he designed the Arab World Institute. Here's a bit of a dry youtube clip, but you get the point
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ9FAwAmt98

.....perhaps there's something in your building that you need some times but not all the time that could fold away, slide away or lift away. Here's a stair that I'm using in one of my projects to access an attic space. A local Sydney manufacturer with an inventive mind....
www.bcompact.com  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uwl5P9DTVg0 

... could your moving part be in the landscape...the movement of water perhaps, or the notion of plants growing over time that form an integrated part of your architecture.

... is your moving part separated from the building itself... These are some of the strangest things Ive seen for a while. Walking sculptures by Theo Jansen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pj-NqWDH2qE

....Or is it purely decorative.... like Phil Prices wind sculptures
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmSzxelt_c0

I hope some of these ideas will inspire some inventive moving parts.
I cant wait to see what you all come up with for next week.

Its a public Holiday next week

Hi all, 
Again, another successful session. 
Not a lot of unanswered queries this week. 

I heard that the Lumion V Mac issue was still misbehaving for some, and that Lumion doesn't always find your sketchup file on your hard drives easily. It was suggested to put the sketchup file onto a USB and have Lumion source it there. I hope that works for you.

So next Monday is a public Holiday, and I understand that Russell will be putting up on Tuesday the 14th,a task for you to do for the following week. We will then have 2 tasks to revise together the week after. 
There is no tutorial next week, but after Russells blog post- perhaps later on the Tuesday or Wednesday I'll put a blog to help explain the task further if needed.

Finally, to reiterated, this weeks task of manipulating another architects plans to suit your own, and then trying it as a section,may help inspire some of you, but shouldn't be seen as a compulsory notion that you must incorporate into your designs. Use it if it inspires you, or use another notion, such as the cross, the bridge, or the bubble diagram to help you plan your building. Your theory will be a driving force behind your designs  too, that you can now use to develop your architecture further. 

the only compulsory things in your designs (at this stage) that you must incorporate are
-The bridge- a raised building, connecting the square house and at least one other building
-Your faculty- either architecture or engineering, set up to your own brief
-Your theory. I want you all to try your best to express your theoretical ideas in a built form
-Your moving parts. Keep this in mind , so you can create some really interesting moving parts in your building (and not just the lift going up and down please!)- you will have a future tutorial on how to create these, so you don't have to try to model these yet.


I'm looking forward to seeing all of your designs in 2 weeks time on the 20th of April. 
Please use the recurring invite to access the group meeting, or use the original email. I believe the meeting remains active from this original email

all the best.
-Catherine

Experiment 2 Feedback from this week, and work for next weeks class 6th of April

Hi all, thanks for today.

It went very well. Thank you all with your patience in regards to the new system

A few questions came up today, some of which I have passed along to Russell for comment, and some I can address below

Russell has noted the following regarding the access of Lumion remotely

“I’ve just posted a video tutorial on the course blog for accessing Lumion files off campus using a VPN: https://arch1101-2020.blogspot.com/

Students in China are not supposed to use a VPN, so I’m still working on another solution for them”- R

If that doesn’t resolve the remote access for anyone who didn’t manage to get Lumion downloaded, or who are on mac, please ask Russell for further clarification

I've asked Russell whether he can provide some additional assistance to those on Mac who were experiencing sharescreen issues with the Teams program.

I've asked him if he or any other tutors have any photos of the site, as google maps street view doesn’t take you right through the site. Hopefully there are some floating around to help you out.

There is also no Environmental Sciences building (the new one) showing in the model. So I've asked for some dimensions so you can all plonk a big rectangular prism into the model to represent it. Sadly it actually looks like a big rectangle. Please design better building’s than that!

Here is some useful information for you all. I was asked about trees several times today. This map shows in blue the most significant trees on the site- those worth retaining. You can build high above these trees if you need to, but just don’t remove them please. Other trees are less significant, so could be removed if necessary, to fit your building in, or to cut through for a building connection. The yellow tree was removed late last year/early this year and has been replaced. The new tree is so small it could still be moved, so it is ok to use the part of site indicated in yellow.

Following is a campus map, which names the building, and will help you to consider your connections, plus help us when discussing the buildings

https://www.estate.unsw.edu.au/sites/default/files/documents/UNSW%20Campus.pdf

Finally some questions regarding the design.

We are wanting you to look at 3 different directions to help you establish your architecture

-The notion of the cross as a way of considering connections between buildings, and as a notional light connection down to the ground. You are connection the Square House and at least 1 other building, but can connect as many as you like

-The massing of the spaces required. As outlined in last weeks blog, you should write your own brief, defining what you think should be in the architecture or engineering faculty. You should work out the sizes of those spaces. Think about this yourself, and don’t just copy Russells example from a previous student, as that example has a very very large lecture theatre which will making siting your building difficult. Then consider which spaces need to be near which other spaces by drawing some bubble diagrams that you can explore in 3D.

-Finally, your architectural theory. This should be something you are interested in, as I am going to ask you to really research how that theory works, and it will be an over riding design notion for your architecture from here on.

From these 3 notions your architecture will emerge. It may visually change from the rectilinear crosses you worked on from week 1, and the bubble diagram may evolve. Don’t feel that you must keep things exactly as they are from week 1. Please evolve the ideas and shapes to form your own bridge architecture. Organic forms, angular forms, plans that are spread out some distance (as long as I can walk easily from one end to the other without puffing), or condensed multilevel forms are all ok. Remember your building is a bridge, so will only touch the ground lightly, with the majority of the bulk up at level 1 , 2 or 3.

Please don’t feel restricted by these first task, rather inspired by them

For next week Id hope to see from you all

-your briefs: room sizes/ bubble diagrams

-your 1 point perspectives, presented as well as you can (remember the hand drawing element is worth 25% of this assignment) There are likely 1 or 2 more hand drawings exercises which will contribute to this mark

-your crosses to scale in the campus model. Adjusted to suit our discussions this week and with some notion of the building mass that matches your brief. Its very important to start to work to scale this week, and to use the real sizes of the spaces you need

- Use Lumion if you can get it working. Or keep your sketchup models, take a copy when you progress. You can then go back to the old model and render the old shapes in Lumion later for the final submission.

- Read one or more articles on a theory of architecture that inspires you, or that you would like to explore. I am happy to help teach you how to express those ideas, so don’t feel intimidated by tackling a tricky topic. Your 3-5 words should really be a short summary sentence that describes the theory that you would like to explore. Remember that some portion of your building will, in the future need to move, so a theory that might inspire which part of your building might move, might help later.

Please all keep your eyes on my blog and on Russells blog for additional posts.

Feel free to reference back to past years students for some clarification, although there have been some minor tweaks to the course this year, due to the remote teaching.

See you all next week at 1pm for the group session, and then again for your individual follow up sessions scheduled after. The invites for this weeks meeting should be recurrent so will show up in your calendars again. If not you can click on this weeks invite and join the meeting next week using the same link.

Look after yourselves

-Catherine

Experiment 2

Preliminary preparation work for the 29^th of March

The idea of this Experiment is to design a connecting building, a bridge and a faculty of architecture, in the negative space, between the buildings and significant trees, around the Square House building.

Using onsite observations, and the 3D model of the university you can find an appropriate area in which to consider siting your building.

Lets start with this weeks homework.

Using the 3D campus model, and either (if you feel comfortable) attend the site and have a look around. If you don’t feel comfortable, we completely understand. Please use so the 3D model to help you understand the building locations, heights and forms, and please use google (or other) satellite images to give you a sense of where the significant trees are. We will also try to have some photos taken and uploaded.

When considering the space consider your restrictions too.

You can’t demolish any buildings

You can’t significantly block any buildings sunlight (where’s north?)

You can’t block any significant thoroughfares (although I don’t mind you moving the roundabout that’s near the Square House building)

You can’t chop down any significant trees . We need them to breath

You’ve been asked to model in a ‘x,y,z’ axis cross, but please play around with the cross form.

Russells example is a basic form only

You should play with the proportions of the cross, consider different length, widths and numbers of each connection. Your building is going to emerge from this cross form, so take your time with it. Perhaps you wish to try some different options to give you more to explore as the weeks progress?

Here are some hand drawn examples from previous years to inspire you

As you are 3D modelling these into your copy of the University campus, consider which buildings you might connect to your new faculty.

You must connect to the square house….but which other building, or buildings would you like to connect to?

The gym so you can do some aerobics at lunch time? The law building so you can access their Library? Nida, and the you build above the road? Or the Round House for quick access to the pub

I would like for you all to consider another aspect of the assignment and prepare this for our next online meeting which will be Monday the 30^th of March

Ask yourself…What is the Faculty of the Build Environment going to need as a faculty of the future.

I want you all to look back and consider how these facilities have changed, how teaching has changed. I want to look forward and consider how they might continue to evolve in an ever changing society.

As an example :

As a student 25 years ago, we had only a very small computer lab of about 10 linux computers (that’s for the entire faculty). We had huge studios spaces, and the need for large drawing boards, and small portable ones. We hand drew, we had our drawings scanned and copied for presentation. We had rolls and rolls of paper prints to store… we made physical models from cardboard, requiring a library of materials, big cutting boards and a lot of paper recycling bins. Oh and bandaids after those late night accidents with cutting knives…lost the top corner of a finger- still a strange shape….

To prepare a written assignment we had to spend time in the library. It had several copies of the important books, but not many, so you could only keep them for a week or so, and had to write out by hand, quotes you might need later. Our home computers were the size of bird cages, and no one owned a printer. We submitted our assignments through a slot in the wall. There was very little online content and hardly anyone had internet connection at home.

We had a great social life, with a fantastic common room, with a pool table. We all met up weekly to share some drinks and have a chat. Every day we played pool together in between lectures. We unwound well, we made a lot of friends. We were good pool players!

This is already so very different to how you are all taught today.

Think about the faculty you are working in now and how in another 25 years the students needs might change. What can you do to ‘future proof’ this building?

Ask yourself….What’s wrong with this faculty building- could I improve on some aspect? What’s missing? What don’t I like?

This is YOUR faculty and you get to adjust the brief.

Russell has asked you consider the following

Lecture Theatre
Studio Spaces
Offices for Academic Staff
Offices for General Staff
Workshop
Computer Labs
Gallery
Research Space for Academic Staff
Meeting Rooms for Staff
Meeting Rooms for Students
Library

But are these things all needed?

Will Lectures become a thing of the past- where you watch them at home and ask questions via forums. We are only just now introducing these things- but is this the way our education will evolve?

Or is the one on one aspect still very important, and you gain so much by attending in person

Do you need larger studio spaces? Better acoustics in those studios? Powerpoints!!?

Or will all tutorials even become taught online. Perhaps as pandemics become the future we will have to?? Or do you consider the one on one tutorial important enough that we will find a way to keep it alive. Perhaps having a few weeks WITH tutorials and now having them online will help you answer that question.

Are there workshops that the Square house already has that you can tap into? Perhaps you don’t need more? You should check out their facilities and consider this. You are only a faculty of 100 students.

Or are they already over crowded, so you should include more facilities in your building? Is there something they don’t have that we really should have?

Library… what is a library these days. In our days it was a huge space full of books-essential to getting your assignments done. Is it now more about accessing online content? Do any of you ever go to the library to read or find books? Perhaps its size has changed, and what you look for in a library is a different thing? Or would it benefit you having lovely books with illustrations as inspiration? Drink cups of tea and whimsically think about what it would be to be able to design like the greats?

Is there another space we haven’t thought of yet, that you forsee as being essential in the Faculty of the built environment in the future?

I want you all to think ahead. Think outside the box. Create your own faculty.

In the first task that I’m giving you, I want you to have answers to these questions and then consider how much room they need.

Russell has given you a link to a past students spreadsheet where they calculated how much space their building was going to take up.

Have a look on Experiment 2s home page

https://russelllowe.com/arch1101_2020/experiment2/brief/brief_exp2.htm

This is a very important first step, as how can you design a building if you don’t know what’s in it, and you don’t know how big those spaces are?

Again, when I see you (although virtually) next, Id like for you think about that spreadsheet and please set one up for yourself. I want to know how you will be approaching your design and what your ideas for the future faculty are. Please don’t just copy theirs. I want to see original thoughts here.

Now that you know What is going into your building and How Big those areas are, start to think about connections.

These are diagrammatic connections are called Bubble diagrams.

Even though you are at a very preliminary design stage, having an understand of what spaces need to connect to what other spaces, will help you create your build form later.

To set up a bubble diagram. Start by drawing- in rough proportion to each other, the sizes of each space

From there consider how those spaces connect. Do you want your bathrooms close to your lecture theater for instance? Should the gallery be close to the student social areas? does the teaching staff want to have their quiet research space right next to the rowdy student social areas?....

Here is an example from last year. You can see from this example how the floor plan of the building is already starting to form just from this bubble diagram

S- Studio

CL- Computer Lab

T- Toilets

SM - Staff meeting room

O- Office

R- Research

CA- Common Area

Shaded region- path

By the 29th Id like to see your abstract ‘x,y,z’ axis cross forms in the model. More than one option if you like. Id like to know what is in your faculty, how big those spaces are going to be and what the essential connections are between those spaces.

If you could all upload this to your blog as a preliminary work it will greatly help me when we meet online next.

Thanks everyone and stay safe in these strange times

-Catherine

Hi team,

We are in strange times at the moment, and in an effort to relieve everyone's stress and concern I've decided to teach you all from home today- 16th of March.  I am not unwell, so nothing to worry about there. I just think it would be difficult to teach you one on one sucessfully, whilst trying to heeds the governments suggestion of 1.5m of social distancing. I feel we will get  a better result if we talk using an online forum

We'll be going over Experiment 1 designs today, so please try to Skype me during the day to show me where you are at.

If we run out of time, or the day ends up in a total mess due to general confusion, please try Skyping me tomorrow. Again I'll be working from home tomorrow and will have the app open on my computer and on my phone

my Skype address is
catherine.bakker2

You can also send me written messages if you need to through Skype so we can organise a time together to meet if that works better for everyone.

For today you can either Skype me from the faculty, or please just take yourselves home and skype me from there.

There is no class next week and as a faculty we will work out a better remote teaching system for the week after, to ensure you get the best education we can give you in these trying times.

Thank you for your patience and understanding
-Catherine Bakker