PORTFOLIO ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN AARON BELL 2006-2011
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Inverted Hotel
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08 A Roman Facade
Designing from Nature
Portal Design
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07 Sustainable Education
Building a Diagram
Selected Works
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Paperback Soup Kitchen 12 Rodin Exhibit
Aurelian Housing
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Gardening Urban Spaces 11 House for a Scupltor
Prostetic Facade
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Sustainable Education CastelPetrosa, Italy In the summer of 2010, our team at P-Studio colloborated on a competition for a new sustainable school facilitiy for the region of Benevento, Italy. The competition required the design to be built in phases and utlize new sustainable technologies as part of its architecture. In addition, each volume was to operate independently during different phases of construction so the school could operate during the projected 7 years it would take to construct the buidling. Our team designed the school to respond to both environmental concerns as well as its historic, Italian site. On the southern exposure of the building, a double glazed envelope of the building captures the sun’s energy and converts it via solar panels. On the nothern elevation, traditional stone construction and redclay tiles are used to invoke to local venacular.
Programtic Features
Section Looking South towards Classrooms and Faculty Offices
Section Looking North through Gymnasium and Courtyard Space
Section Looking North through Cafeteria and Preschool Outdoor Learning area
Studio Roma Rome, Italy As point of departure for exploring the ancient architecture and urban development of Rome, our studio examined the Aurelian Wall and how it relates to the modernized city. Historically, the Aurelian Wall served as a border and a defence for the city for hundreds of years. As military technologies grew, so did the wall, and what we can observe today is a collage of different parts that depict a narrative of the city since its earliest development. At multiple locations in Rome, our studio discovered the Aurelian Wall suffering from neglect and damage. To accomodate modern traffic needs, holes have been irreverantly slashed through the wall whereas historically an entry into the city would have been celebrated by the construction of a grand portal. Other wall conditions include vandalism, cramped and crowded public spaces along its perimeter, and other issues that we sought to address by architectural design solutions. Ultimately the following three design projects emerged, each designed for a particular condition of the Aurelian Wall.
Roman Facade The first project was the re-design of the façade of an existing building that faces the Aurelian Wall. The design of the facade figuratively uses the ancient Roman ritual of the ‘death mask’, and takes a ‘cast’ of the textural features of the wall and supplants them onto the existing structure.
Portal Design The second project features the same site conditions, but uses a demolished part of the wall as an opportunity to design a modern gateway into the city. The design is the extension of two halls that exhibit historic displays about the wall and creates a public promenade within the historic wall as part of a larger urban program.
Aurelian Housing The third project is sited along the Aurelian wall and connects two important churches; Saint John Lateran and San Giovanni. The Mixed use development includes shops and cafes on its lowest level and incorporates housing into its upper five stories. The building design adjusts the existing park space into seperate zones and creates a piazza near San Giovanni. Along its access are twelve bays that symbolize the twelve stations of the cross as useres move along the street.
House for a Sculptor New Hope, Pennsylvania The design of the building was part of a larger collaborative effort to create an artist community. Each building was sited off the banks of the Delaware River in New Hope Pennsylvania and were to be connected by a single public walkway for both the artists and people visiting their studios. This particular design was for a metal scupltor and allows for larger scale metal working on the roof and small scale projects within the interior. The design relies heavily on the designs of Andrew Caulder for its conceptual and spatial development. The orientation of the design was crucial to the develment of the facades and spatial planning. On the southern facade, double glazed windows are angled to allow for an ambundance of natural light and solar heat gain. A trombe floor system is on the outer most southern portion of the floor and adds additional thermal gain. Horizontal louvers were placed on the east/west axis which are operable to reduce glare and maximize views of the river and town of New Hope.
Elevation Development Series
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Structural Development Series
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North Section 4’
12’
Polythene Insulation Wood Panels Galvanized Steel Louvers Glass Wall Wood Finish Insulation Paarallel Strand Lumber
Galvanized Steel Stairs Concrete Flooring
Pressure Treated Wood
Concrete Foundation
Rodin Exhibit Philadelphia, Pennsylvania The project is the design of a temporary exhibit for a sculpture from the Rodin Museum in Philadelphia. The site is unused and awkward lot located on 12th and Chesnut streen with dimensions suitable for a small scale intervention. Approximately 12 ft by 60 ft, the exhibit begins at street level and gradually moves underground via a 40 ft ramp. While traveling along the corridor, a user experiences a transition of shadows and play of light that would immitate the lighting and visual experience they would encounter upon reaching and moving around the sculpture. The aperatures are created by an intricate ‘shingling’ of prefabricated wooden members that are derived from a visual analysis of the Rodin sculpture. By accomplishing this visual effect, the design seeks to recreate the experience of the sculpture through the architecture itself and would preclude the actual visual experience of the sculpture with its own creation of light and show.
Sectional Array
Light Sequence and Transition
Corridor Section
Circulation
Cladding System
Building a Diagram North Philadelphia, Pennsylvania The relationship between the diagram and built architecture has been traditionally conceptualized by architectural theorist such as Jaqcue Derrida, Peter Eisenman and others Buildings can be translated into diagrams that can illustrate its particular characteristics of height, scale, texture, etc., but can the reverse happen as well? Can diagrams be translated architecturally and does the resulting structure carry any of the imbedded information of the diagram that was orginally presented? This project begins with a narrative that takes place in the Village of Arts and Humanities in Philadelphia and follows a character as he escapes from prison, confronts is enemy, and meets his untimely doom. The plot was then diagrammed two dimentionally by hand and then translated into three dimensions in the computer. From the computer diagram, a physical model was transcribed and placed into the site as an intervention where the narrative it was based off of took place. The final form of the project is experienced by moving through the intervention, and attempts recreating the original narrative through its architecture.
Character Plot
Site Narrative Diagram
Event Mapping
Computer Model Synthesizing the Three Diagrams
Designing from Nature Artificial Site Architecture and nature are two fundamentally differently perceived things traditionally thorught to be at odds with one another. Architects such as Louis Sullivan and his successor Frank Lloyd Wright saught a solution to this divide through their notion of Organic Architecture that seeks find harmony between the two. This project takes a more literal approach to designing architecture from natural forms of a living organism. The lobster was chosen for its interesting qualities of segmentation, exoskeloton, limbs, and organiztional relationships of its anatomy. These qualities are then translated architecturally to describe spaces and structures that relate to the relationships inherent to the organism.
Inverted Hotel Center City, Philadelphia The Project began as the development of a modular architecturalspace. The module was ergonomic in design and intended for outdoor occupation much like a sophistated tent for urban life. The second phase of the design incorporated traditional programs of a hotel that worked in tandem with the modular system. The program was conceived as part of the urban landscape taht allowed for users to take advantage of its accomodies. The roof of the complex was designed as a park space that was open to the public as well as modular units that could be rented by the hour. .
Prostetic Facade Akron, Ohio Strategically based out of Akron, Ohio is the proposed manufactoring of the Prostetic Facade. It is universal in design and can be applied to a variety of building structures including light framed steel and wood. Each module consists of two layers of rubber membranes that is scored and punctured so that when inflated, creates a textural surface that allows for greater expansion. Five inflatable modules of ETFE fabric is housed within the panel and can be adjusted electronically to control the size of the aperature and amount of light. The design began of the module is based of off researching rubber as a building material and its various properties. Its maleable and flexible nature is modified pnuematically and immitates the breathabiility and wearability of the human skin. Water-resistant, rubber provides great protection from the elements as well as provide acoustic insulation. The pneumatic ETFE pillows within each module can be adjusted by people inside the building and are able to emerge through the rubber skin’s pores to increase or decrease the amount of light within the space.
Gardening Urban Spaces Ludlow Philadelphia, Pennsylvania With so many living below the poverty level in North Philadelphia as well as the rising costs of food, community farming is a great way to provide sustanance and revitilize an area. Vertical hydroponic farming is innexpenise, lowtech, and is the most effective method for growing crops. When designed for tight urban conditions, vertical gardening can create productive recreational spaces for the public. A common site condition in North Philadelphia is the presence of a vacant lots between rowhomes. These lots can drain a city block of its vitality and are often filled with trash and other debris. By designing a low-tech scaffolding system to an adjacent blank elevation of an exisint rowhome, and temporary or permanent system for growing crops can be used by the community. Extending the system horizonantly provides an overhead canopy that can house a farmers market and provide shaded areas in the summer months.
Paperback Soup Kitchen University City Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Nominated for entry into the Annual Stewardson Competition, this design is for a soup kitchen at the heart of University City in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The structural components, floor treatments, and recycling components all stemmed from research into utilizing cardboard tubes, a technique pioneered by Shigeru Ban. It attempts at a net-zero energy system that uses 100% recylclable materials into its design. The building features a variety of programs that serve the homeless community of Philadelphia. A soup kitchen/college diner is at the heart of its programming is situated along the main commercial corridor of the site. Offices for management and personal are located to the north and are connected via a private portion of the building that operates as a dormitory for people in need of temporary and emergency housing. A large portion of the produce used in the commerical kitchen is grown directly on site via the system of cardboard tube planters that can be moved, replanted, and taken offsite for personal comsumption.