DIP18-2 Hooke Lookbook

Page 1

Diploma 18

Slowing Down Wood Cascading The Island Surplus Concrete Modern Pilgrimage Matchmade on the Web Reinstating the Vernacular

02

Proposals for Hooke Park and Beyond

vol.

The Possibility of an Island at the AA Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture New Grounds Salvage Water and Soil Hooke Park SoundTrail

Hooke Lookbook


Shidi Fu

Shreya Kochatta Lydia Cho Ying Liu

Sorana-Stefana Mazilu

Alice Nobel

Ele Mun

Joyce Ka Kei Ng

Connie Lynn Tang & Nicole Ng Hui Min

Andrew Robertson

Clara Schwarz

Ke Yang

2019/20


Content Prelude

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Salvage Water and Soil Modifying the Landscape of Hooke Park The Island Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin

4

9

51

Reinstating the Vernacular A Material Strategy for Affordable Housing

113

Reusing Waste Concrete

165

Modern Pilgrimage Concrete Chapels

205

Surplus Concrete Saving Waste Concrete in Wet Form

241

Matchmade on the Web A Resource Exchange Platform for Roof Tiles

301

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture Carving out Spaces for Protected Bats

361

The Possibility of an Island at the AA or How to Deschool Ourselves?

425

New Grounds An Invitation for Settlement

541

Slowing Down Wood Cascading ‘Woodito’ to Reduce our Ecological Impact

573

Hooke Park SoundTrail Heard and (un)Seen

633

Index

693

Acknowledgments

700


4

Prelude Maybe around 4am (I don’t know, my phone was dead) on our first night in Hooke Park — tutors and students all camping up on a little plateau above the campus, hidden behind trees still thick with leaves in early October, and sheltered by a steep hill to the northeast — I stumbled out of my tent to answer the call of nature. The darkness in the forest was immediately visceral, cave-like, allencompassing. I quickly calculated that if I ventured too far from our settlement I would not be able to find my way back until dawn, or would risk blindly crashing into a shelter that a group of students had built for the night. (Their first assignment of the year.) Finding an appropriate distance, and looking out into the darkness I noticed that in fact it wasn’t completely dark. The forest floor was glowing. Was it light sweeping from a car’s headlights on the little road leading to the campus, illuminating the wood in a weird way? Nope, the light wasn’t moving, and there was no sound or sight of a car. And the strange light was faint and green, scattered in blobs and blotches across a wide area south of our settlement. I crouched down to look closer, and picked up a stick. It was covered in small glowing spots. I held it closer to my eyes, unable to believe them. It felt like a borderline spiritual experience, but a very self-reflexive or self-engineered one — I knew I was “having” it as it was unfolding. Or was this a lucid dream? How, in the UK, one of the most de-natured countries in the world, and in the middle of this strictly managed, well-

pruned, and mostly undergrowthfree forest, with trees evenly spaced and in mono-species stands, was it possible have an Avatar-like moment where the whole forest suddenly seemed alive, wanting to impart a secret to me while everyone slept? Had someone slipped some DMT into the veggie burgers we’d cooked on the campfire a few hours earlier while talking about Ivan Illich’s Tools for Conviviality and Anna Tsing’s Mushroom at the End of the World? I realized I was a privileged witness to a natural phenomenon: the glowing forest floor must be a bioluminescent fungus, feeding on rotting leaves and logs. I brought the stick back to my tent (I did manage to find it without incident), as some kind of evidence, wishing I could have documented this phenomenon on my phone. This anecdote is definitely not to say that Hooke Park, behind its “working forest” self-image and its rational, design-driven programme, harbours great mystical secrets. (Though when I told the warden about my experience the next day he did mention reports of spooky incidents up on that plateau). It’s to point out: a) that the tangible reality of Hooke Park is plenty mysterious already; b) how much we needed to explore the ecosystem here, human and nonhuman; c) the great untapped ecological, pedagogical, and material potential that lies in this woodland and the institution that stewards it.


5

We wanted to work in a very literal, grounded way: testing materials, building prototypes, even ‘preenacting’ the gatherings, events, or transgressions that our proposals, if completed, might give rise to. We were honoured to be labelled a “nonfiction diploma unit.”

…design accommodation for a nonhuman species, since the engineering of the forest eliminated the niches they’d otherwise inhabit?

Instead of camping, all of our subsequent nights in Hooke Park — students spent nearly a month there in total — were spent in the comfort of Westminster Lodge, a residential structure built in 1994 with Hooke Park timber. But our immersion in the forest and the community of Hooke Park only deepened over the course of the year.

…interrogate the economy of selling timber, the impact of clearcutting, the wisdom of feeding the forest to the biomass boiler?

Lockdown made many of the unit’s building aspirations impossible, and our next night in Hooke Park is uncertain. It is difficult to imagine the visceral, physical, and emotional experiences we’ve had this year replicated in an institution postcoronavirus. But the driving questions remained, and new ones emerged. How could we — how could architects — harness and enhance the conviviality built into this unique place? …bring unsellable roof tiles and waste concrete to the forest? …unearth seams of clay and find new ways of building with it? …harvest a rampant poisonous pest and use it as a tool for listening to the forest?

…tap into the waste-stream of wood leftover from Hooke Park’s structural experimentations?

…test the viability of tree stumps as foundations for structures that embrace their temporality? …galvanise Hooke Park’s designation as a “park” and manage its water flows to stimulate biodiversity? …discover a ruined plantation, a state of exception both within this well-managed woodland and the boundaries of architectural education, for thinking afresh?

James Westcott for Diploma 18


6


Diploma 18 2019/20 Shidi Fu Shreya Kochatta Lydia Cho Ying Liu Sorana-Stefana Mazilu Ele Mun Joyce Ka Kei Ng Nicole Ng Hui Min Alice Nobel Andrew Robertson Clara Schwarz Connie Lynn Tang Ke Yang Aude-Line Duliere James Westcott Maarten Gielen Lionel Devlieger

Edited by Ele Mun Co-edited by Andrew Robertson Cover design by Ele Mun Index by Shreya Kochatta

Despite our best efforts to properly credit and source the images and data in this book, we are still human. Please alert the editors as to any missing or incorrect information. Contact: opalisuk2019@gmail.com



Salvage Water and Soil Modifying Landscape of Hooke Park The project observes the increasing risk in the relationship between water and soil in HP. Through using woodland treatment as the starting point, it proposes a modified woodland developing plan concerting two perceptives - ecologically and pedagogically.

educational institution like the AA should bridge the issue between architectural and ecology, and it emphasises the care of stewardship from the students as the essential continuing force for the maintenance of HP.

The project envisages Hooke Park as being more like a park: more accessible and inviting to the public and users from the AA. It emphasises the park-like features that enhance biodiversity, improve soil health and water management, which also make aesthetic ‘improvements’ to Hooke Park. The project sets up a few examples to gradually restore the woodland and steer its future management direction. Ecologically, it argues to increase of biodiversity and enhance the public park features, pedagogically, it looks how an

01

Shidi Fu


Table 2 Summary of the effects of predicted climate change on woodland and forestry. Indicative responses to changes in each environmental variable are given, but specific cases may differ from the general responses 10 Salvage Water and Soil outlined.

Variable

Beneficial effects

Detrimental effects

Atmospheric CO2

Increase in growth rate

Reduction in timber quality

Reduction in stomatal conductance and

Increase in leaf area and thus higher wind

lower water use on a leaf area basis

resistance and water use; lower light transmission also affects character of ground vegetation Possible nutrient imbalances Reduction in growth rate

Ozone pollution

Impaired stomatal function and thus increased susceptibility to drought Temperature

Longer growing season

Delayed hardening

Higher potential productivity

Risk of spring and autumn frost damage

Lower risk of winter cold damage

possibly increased

Less snow damage

Longer growing seasons reducing winter

Potential for use of species which are

soil water recharge period

not hardy at present

Reduced winter mortality of insect and mammalian pests More rapid development and increased fecundity of insect and mammal pests Potential for exotic/alien pests to spread to the UK

Rainfall

Reduced intensity of

Winter waterlogging limiting access for forest

some foliar pathogens

operations and reducing stability Root death increasing susceptibility to drought and soil-borne pathogens Summer drought-induced mortality

The Effects of Predicted Climate Change on Woodland Forestry

Facultative pathogens more damaging in stressed trees Possible increase in forest fires Increased number of deep depressions

Wind

increasing risk of wind damage, particularly in England Cloud cover

Increased potential productivity

Increased diurnal temperature range in autumn increasing risk of frost damage

76

Climate change and British woodland: what does the future hold?

Mature Trees Uprooted by Storm in unwell Drained Compartment in Hooke Park

The increased rainfall effect will increase the rate of soil erosion on gully banks, streams in HP, which p


Gully Stream and Soil Condition

Winter Waterlogging

Gully Soil Erosion

poses threat to the delicited relationship between soil, water.

11


12

Salvage Water and Soil

1

2

3

4

The Streampath: clothing the bank for confrontation and cohabitation of the common bed. Gilles Bruni and Marc Babarit. South Carolina Botanical Garden, Clemson University, South Carolina, U.S.A., February , 1998.

Newly installed terraced willow spilling for bank protection.

Terraced willow spilling one year later, viewed from the opposite direction.

The method of stabilising the gully banks is willow spilling. Willow Spilling is a traditional technique pr It applies wood stakes along the gully banks with half mater spacing, and then waving willow rods thro sediment runoff.


Willow Spilling Case Study

13

BANK TOP 16 LIVE WILLOW RODS FOR 0.6M HIGH WALL

0.6M

GROUND SURFACE

2M LONG LIVE WILLOW STAKES 1.4M

0.5M SPACING

Details of willow stakes and rods installation

50MM - 100MM

racticed in England, it is a low-maintenance green infrastructure with local materials and simple tools. ough. If using live willow, it should encourage green growth along gully bank in order to reduce


14

Salvage Water and Soil

0

5M


Willow Spilling Site

15


16

Salvage Water and Soil


1:1 Willow Spilling Construction

17


18

Salvage Water and Soil

1

4

7


1:1 Willow Spilling Construction

2

3

5

6

8

9

19


20

Salvage Water and Soil

0.33

0.95

0.41

Scan Section

Scan Plan

1.61


21

0.44

0.74

Willow Spilling Scan

1.44

1.31

0.36

1.62


22

Salvage Water and Soil

0

1. Beech 2. Ash 6. Mixed Broadleaf

3.Norway Spruce 7. Sitka Spruce

4. Douglas Fir 5. Red Cedar

50M


Old Pond

23


24

Salvage Water and Soil

EROSION ZONE F

EROSION ZONE D

EROSION ZONE C

MAIN STREAM

EROSION ZONE A

MAIN STREAM

EROSION ZONE B ZONE B FLOW INLET POINT

Constructed Ditch Primary Gully Secondary Gully Main Stream 0

New Willow Spilling Along Soil Eroded Gully Banks in Hooke Park

200M


Woodland Restoration Plan

25

FREE DRAINING LOAMY SOILS

WATER CHANNEL RUNOFF

MAIN STREAM

SLOWLY PERMEABLE CLAYED SOILS

INPEDED DRAINAGE CALYED SOIL

MAIN STREAM

Constructed Ditch Primary Gully Secondary Gully Main Stream 0

200M

New Willow Wall as Buffer Dam Along Soil Eroded Gully Banks in Hooke Park


26

Salvage Water and Soil


Willow Spilling Intervention

27


28

Salvage Water and Soil

0.75

0.05 5.99

0.10 5.99

0.30 5.94

5.92


Willow Dam Intervention

29


30

Salvage Water and Soil

Proposing New Ponds along Erosion Gully


New Ponds

31


32

Salvage Water and Soil

Survey of Existing Tracks, Rides and Trails in Hooke Park


Salvage New Tracks and Trails

Proposing New Paths and Circulation in Hooke Park

33


34

Salvage Water and Soil

Boundary between SSSI and PAWS


Interventions between SSSI and PAWS

35


Salvage Water and Soil

0.73

1.16

6.50

36

0.12 1.27

0.86

0.12 0.57

0.72

0.57

4.73

28.51


Staircase on Slope

Salvage Brick 75mm

Rubbers and Soil Fill-in

1.21

225mm

Insulation Sheet Ground Subsoil

0.86

0.57

37


38

Salvage Water and Soil


Staircase on Slope

39


40

Salvage Water and Soil


Old Trail Restoration

41


42

Salvage Water and Soil


Drainage Gutters in the Woodland

43


44

Salvage Water and Soil


Self-Care Garden

45


46

Salvage Water and Soil

Primary Outline:

0 - 2 Years

1. Formalise first new track 2. Restore old pond near birdhouse 3. Install willow along eroded gullies

4. Create trails along NW boundary 5. Fell on cpt 9c,12c & Replant on cpt 5c,d,e

Primary Outline:

2 - 5Y

1. Connect the track gap at SE section 2. Formalise new ponds along NS gully 3. Install willow buffer dams along

Existing Tracks

Existing Ponds

Existing Tracks

Existing

Proposed New

Pond

Proposed New

Pond

Existing Tails

Replanting Cpts

Existing Tails

Replant

Proposed New

Clear Felling

Proposed New

Clear Fe

Treating Erode

Treating Erode


Old Trail Restoration

Years

Primary Outline:

4. Neuter PAWS Restoration Site 5. Apply site for Natural England 6. Fell on cpt 12c,2d & Replant on cpt 2c,i,4f

47

5 - 10 Years

1. Extend new tracks on West section 2. Formalise new ponds along EW gully 3. Connect the trail loop around HP

4. Extend PAWS restoration site and landscape

PAWS

Existing Tracks

Existing Ponds

PAWS

Natural England

Proposed New

Pond

Natural England

ting Cpts

Existing Tails

Replanting Cpts

SSIS Sites

elling

Proposed New

Clear Felling

g Ponds

Treating Erode


48

Salvage Water and Soil




Island: salvaging a landscape

THE ISLAND Salvaging a landscape of Ruin In the few years that it has existed as a part of the park, the Island has garnered quite a few adjectives. An unmanaged woodland, a ruin, abandoned landscape, the dramatic forest to name a few. Living on the other side of the road, the Island is a patch of wood-scape owned by the Architectural Association as a part of their Hooke Park estate. Abandoned for the past 50 years, the Island today is seen as a wasteland. However, waste is nothing but an opportunity existing in the wrong space. The project argues that the island is much more than a ruin or ever a woodland.

then left as an unwant, only to allow for ecology to take over. The island is an unexpected and unintended biological reserve. The project is an attempt to realize the potential of the Island. It argues that instead of concentrating on its economic inefficiency, we could in-fact harness its pedagogical value . Using a path intervention, it tries to salvage the lost identity of the space along with arguing for a deeper understanding of the new nature that island provides.

It is part of larger version of natural environments labelled by Gilles Clement as third landscapes. These are spaces controlled intensively for long and

02

Shreya Kochatta

51


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Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin

22 June, 2020

Eva Franch i Gilabert, Architectural Association, 36 Bedford Square London WC1B 3ES Dear Eva, I hope this letter finds you well. In the current world of coronavirus and lockdown, we have found ourselves adapting to various means of conversation. Zoom, Teams and hangouts have become part of our mundane lives. However, I wanted to use a more personal and compelling format to address the topic. Perhaps an epistolary form of communication to express my intent is necessary. I am writing this letter to share my thoughts regarding a unique landscape that AA owns. I believe this space – The Island as it is known, has the capacity to open a new line of enquiry. It can be a more heuristic and experience-based part of the broader pedagogical experience that the school itself is. The Island also has the potential to become a space of generosity that forges a stronger relationship between the Hooke park and the Hooke village. The purpose of this letter is not to provide a linear series of instructions or a definite way forward but to just spark conversation on this forgotten and unappreciated piece of land, I have found to be very moving. Architecture, Culture and Nature AA has always been at the forefront of radical learning. Engaging constructively with politics, crisis, community and new discoveries is part of our school’s culture. Climate awareness is one of them and Anthropocene, Post-humanism and other such fancy and complex words have entered our everyday lexicon. However, I feel, we need a deeper understanding of the term ‘nature’ that the above seem to address. In Nature’s metropolis1, William Cronon states ‘The most problematic term of all is “nature,” one of the richest, most complicated and contradictory words in the entire English language.’ What we call nature or natural landscapes can be forked into three different versions - The first (original, pre-human), the second (nature doctored to answer to needs and comforts of human) and the third – an unconscious overlap of the above two (ruined and undervalued landscapes of capitalism). The first degree or form of nature is seldom experienced. It is what must have existed many years ago and maybe exists today in locations humans cannot access easily. Second form of nature is fairly common. Hooke park, AA’s woodland campus itself is a fitting case. As diploma 18’s site for the year, we were able to understand the intense management that the landscape undergoes to look sharp and appealing to the viewers. It is a cleaned up and forced version of nature. Trees are engineered to attain the best produce and animals seen as pests are culled to control their growth. Practices in Hooke park

are a representation of the ‘nature’ known to us. The vast majority of ‘natural’ spaces that we encounter today are like Hooke park. They are territories of second-degree nature. There are various kinds of second nature but they all are similar in that in these landscapes Nature is groomed for human needs primarily – manicured gardens, controlled water bodies and managed woodlands. At this stage, I am disappointed to realize that throughout my life this artificial form of nature is all I have ever experienced not just in a reality but in mainstream representation too. Paintings, photographs and films all have been perpetuating the idea of this manicured and domesticated nature as the ‘natural’. The Island – a post-management ruin or a third landscape? Within Diploma 18’s research in Hooke park, we also investigated the Island. The Island is a 20-acre patch of land owned by the school, 15 minutes away from Hooke Park campus. Historically, the Island was a controlled coppice for long and then abandoned for next 50 years. Today, the tree plantations done 5 decades ago have failed, the ground is covered with moss and the barks have an early growth of bracket fungi. The general consensus amongst the Hooke parkers is that the Island is a ruin. It is chaotic and unstable woodland which currently has no value. However, interestingly in the Island one finds skulls of the red fox and a rangale of grazing deer. The alterations in its maintenance has resulted in a novel micro-biome formed of the unwanted, the unknown and the new. The Island is an unexpected biological reserve – one that wasn’t intended in the first place. This is why it falls into the category of third nature. A new version of nature being observed as a direct result to the intensive alterations in the environment’s fabric. Crocodiles in the waste water body of a power plant, bats in a badly design car park or species in a doomed landscape like the Island, They all form the third landscape. Third nature, third landscape and third estate: a recurring concept discussed by several thinkers. Abbé Siéyes sees the third estate as peripheral and marginalised spaces that are seen as useless today but have a strong potential to be something.2 In her book, The mushroom at the end of the world Anna Tsing presents third nature as the nature that has managed to survive despite capitalism.3 Gilles Clement designates the third landscape to sum of spaces left behind (délaissé) by man to landscape evolution – to nature alone.4 As a designer, he finds an undervalued aesthetic quality in such forfeited landscapes. The Island is also the result of devaluation and obsolescence, a profound transformation resulting from the two conditions. Third nature is of interest to us because in these evolved


On pedagogical possibilities in Island


Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin

Hooke Parish

Isla

nd

54

Hooke Park Proper

Site Location


A Letter to Eva

environments, there is potential to understand the ecologies of the spaces altered by human use of land – the anthropogenic ecologies. The forces of transformation in these are not governed by the Anthropos but by its unattendance. In simple words, the Island and its rich third nature upsets the current perception of exploited and contaminated spaces and provides a positive view on it. What does it mean for Architectural association to own such a space? I would like to address this question with my personal experience of the Island. When myself, Nicole5 and Connie6 decided to make the Island our site for the year, little did we know how Challenging a landscape it was. The ground conditions, the views as well as the general atmosphere changes in every few metres. It was then understood that the Island had various micro-climates – zones of different atmosphere affected due to the varying forces acting on it. Without human intervention, these forces have profound effects. Dry areas due to edge conditions on the perimeter, extremely damp forest floor near river Hooke, alien plant species due to seed migration between the Island and the woodland next to it. In addition to this, seasonal changes like heavy rainfall, strong winds, stage 3 flooding all impact the space. The place is filled with quick sands and fallen trees which then become home to small birds and insects, allow the animals to dig deep dens and enrich the soil for growth of new plants. The discontinuous and unstable environment of the Island created lasting impressions and captivating moments- moments all three of us cherished. It became our first experience of a more natural ‘nature’. The Island experience educated us a lot. For a school of architectural thinkers and designers, the Island can be a strong geographical and cultural agenda. AA through the Island, can pave the path in shifting such marginalised spaces from realm of worthlessness to the landscapes of the future. The dialectic of devaluation and renewal today is taking a central stage in many architectural discussions. A first hand demonstration of the same on a personal landscape like the Island would definitely yield a profound effect in the architectural community. Portraying the synergy of the what is done by man and how autonomous nature redefines it in its own ways. It asks a sharp question – Can we restrain the forces of engineering and domestication enough to promote evolutionary freedom? Can we redefine the function and future of a ruined landscape? Can we generate value in the Island through conviviality? And most importantly, Can we provide a more meaningful and grounded experience of nature? These spaces are especially imperative for the future generation, who can develop a much deeper and meaningful impression of nature and the wild, than I and many others like me have ever been able to. The Island futures A strong and long term possibility for the Island would be to become a pedagogical landscape for little children.

55

The Wrens Nursery in Hooke village is located two minutes away from the Island. For the little children (aged 2-6) of the nursery, this landscape could be a very enriching space. I talked to Amy Evans, who is one of the tutors and she showed great interest in such a collaboration. The Island will become the new kind of nature that they get used to. The experience will allow them to understand and trace the multitude of relations and forces that create such a dynamic and unusual landscape. They will inherit a culture where power and role of humans is more decentralised in a natural environment. However, this one of the many potential futures the Island can have. As a participant of Hooke park futures workshop, I am learning more about the economics of the Hooke park estate and how can we further increase its value. Our final task is to create a business plan which be pitched to the investors. Whilst collaboration with resourceful international organizations is an option, I do feel that a purposeful exchange with the immediate neighbourhood is more fruitful in the longer run. I see the future of Hooke park amongst the list of revolutionary schools like Black mountain college, Bauhaus, Open city Ritoque etc.7 A common characteristic of all these residential schools is their relationship with the community. However, at the moment, Hooke park exists in its own bubble. The exchange is limited to villagers taking a walk in the woodland. The Island can be an extension of Hooke park’s friendship with the Hooke village. There are many opportunities that this chaotic, untamed, semi- wild and neglected landscape can offer. A landscape of learning for the children of the village is only one of them. I am really willing to take responsibility and develop this further. The first step could be organizing a walk in the Island for the village community along with some members of the AA. We could also host an evening in the Island to start a dialogue and share ideas on how to make it a more meaningful and valuable asset for the school. However, for all of the above we need your support and guidance. The Island gives us a chance to truly understand nature and the self-management it practices; the Island is a landscape of learning. Today it is an introverted space with barbed wires protecting it from any transgression. It will remain a worthless patch of land unless we make some effort to consciously change its narrative. In the hope that you might find this subject as important as I do, I really look forward to hearing from you. Yours, Shreya

1. William Cronon, Nature’s Metropolis : Chicago and the Great West (New York: W.W. Norton, 1992), 11–14. In the following pages, Cronon explains the three different kinds of nature and how the term ‘nature’ has always been used loosely but needs more understanding. 2. Emmanuel Joseph, What Is the Third Estate? (New York Praeger, 1964). 3. Anna Lowenhaupt, The Mushroom At The End Of The World : On The Possibility Of Life In Capitalist Ruins (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017). 4. Gilles Clement, “Le Jardin Planétaire,” www.gillesclement. com, accessed June 17, 2020,


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Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin

Entering the island through the barbed wire boundary.


57

‘‘It is pretty inconvenient and there’s no services there. So, it’s a bit bulky. Don’t know what to make of it, I suppose there is no connection with the main park activities. I don’t have a personal relationship with it.’’ - Charlie Corry Wright, Workshop Manager Hooke Park Estate


58

Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin


Dynamic character of the landscape

59

Chaotic character of the landscape Early site visit sketch was produced during a site visit just one day after the storm Dennis (February, 2020) hit the area. It depicts the dynamic and chaotic nature of the space.


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Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin

15

5

14

5

16

15

175

13

5

5

150 5

0

15

5

18 5

0

5

18

140

13

170

160

12

5

195

20

0

16

5

17

145

15

135

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0

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19

0

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15

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110

12

100

120

130 190 155

18

0

115

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5

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180

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155 13 0

115

14

0 145

0

10

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0 5

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107.7

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135

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95

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13 10 90

170

5

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181.1 180

170


Island and Hooke park proper

UNMANAGED ABANDONED NEGLECTED FALLOW WILD RUIN

DOMESTICATED MANAGED CURATED VALUED STABLE SAFE

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Artificial Nature

Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin


Artificial Nature

63

The picture clicked in Hooke park represents a second degree nature. The landscape is tamed and curated intensively through procedures like constant pruning and culling to achieve desired result.


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Cycle of timber plantation

Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin


Woodland Management

65

Woodland Management Woodland Management is a cyclical process starting from plantation to pruning to clear felling.


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Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin


Activities of Control

67

Activities of Control Wildlife engineering, species selection and many other processes are involved in woodland management.

1.

2.

3.

1. Shidi Fu, Skin of a a Culled Squirrel, 2019, 2. Andrew Robertson, Headpiece of a Culled Deer, 2019, 3. Hooke Park, Pruning Workshop at Hooke Park


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Housing non-humans

Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin


Housing non-humans

69

Island is not controlled in a similar manner to Hooke park and therefore is seen as unmanaged. Although human’s presence is negligible, the island continues to be a home to various non-humans.


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Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin


Layers Island: of management salvaging a landscape in the island

71 BIRDS

OWLS

BATS

SPIDERS

MOTHS BUTTERFLIES RODENTS

DEER FOX MOSS

FUNGUS ANT COLONY


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Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin

1m 900 mm

800 mm 700 mm 600 mm 500 mm

400 mm

300 mm 200 mm

100 mm

0

1m 900 mm

800 mm 700 mm 600 mm 500 mm

400 mm

300 mm 200 mm

100 mm

0

Spread of moss in 1 metre square of forest floor


Moss cover

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Moss Cover

Spores disposal

Germination

Leafy gametophyte

Developement of rhizoids

Due to its damp and low-sunlight ground condition, the moss covers the ground as well as the fallen and some living trees. Species Detail One of the moss found in the island is brachythecium rutabulam that spreads through transfer of spores on the ground. It encapsulates moisture in the ground and reduces soil erosion.


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Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin


Fungus Colony

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Fungus Colony

Fungus create intense mycellium network below ground feeding on organic food matter. They provide nutrients back to the soil by decomposition and also act as food for animals such as deer and squirrel. Species Detail Scarlet elfcup (Sarcoscypha coccinea) are a fungus species found in extremely damp conditions in the nothern hemisphere. These were sighted in the island due to the passage of hooke river and the wet bank near it.


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Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin

Flight Patterns

Birds perform tree selection and have flight patterns suitable to their own needs. Their selection process for the trees is both horizontal and vertical and it tends to inform their flight patterns.


Flight patterns

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Fox skull in the island Skull of the red fox (vulpes-vulpes) was found in the island, signifying to its natural death. Unlike other territories in the neighbourhood, foxes in the island are not pests that need to be culled.


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Salvaging a Landscape

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Fox Territories

An extremely adaptive animal species, the fox is not particularly selective of its environment. However the soft soil and the availability of hiding spaces makes the island a comfortable space for territory creation. Species Detail Red Fox (Vulpes vulpes) is found commonly in the area. Natural predators, they are both cherished and stalked in the managed parts of woodland.


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The Third Landscape

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“The Third Landscape designates the sum of the space left over by man to landscape evolution, to nature alone.”

- Gilles Clement

1.Alessandro Rocca, Planetary Gardens : The Landscape Architecture of Gilles Clément (Basel ; Boston: Birkhäuser, 2008).


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What has managed to survive?

Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin


What has managed to survive?

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Island: salvaging a landscape

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N The issue of the highway: The AA is both the owner and the current client of the space. It takes almost 13 minutes to reach to the island passing through the highway, the field and finally transgressing through the barbed wires. Moreover, the 200 acres HP proper offers so much to the 15 full time residents , that the chance of going to the island almost never comes up.


Enlarging the Scope

Enlarging the scope: Whilst remaining under the ownership of AA, the island can open new grounds of relationship with the locals using the island. The island will find new value with the visitation from the Hooke village.

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‘We haven’t really engaged that way too much. Right now we’re on friendly terms with most of those people, but, only in a passing way.’ Charlie Corry Wright, Hooke park workshop manager

‘This piece of woodland isn’t ours and we don’t use it. I don’t think I have seen anybody using it.’ Sarah Mcconnel, Hooke park Local working at Hooke court

Relationship of Hooke park and Hooke village


Ridgeway connecting island to hooke village

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The Lost wessex ridgeway

N.d., n.d., https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=17/50.80020/-2.66965&layers=N.


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“Home :: Wren’s Nursery - Hooke Court, Beaminster, Dorset,” www.wrensnursery.co.uk, accessed June 17, 2020, https:// www.wrensnursery.co.uk/.


New user: The Wren’s Nursery

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New User : The Wren’s Nursery

A third landscape is an enriching space for future generation to learn about untamed nature. The local nursery of Wrens is a great user for the island.

“Education and outdoors cannot exist without each-other. It is where children get the freedom to make decisions and learn from them.” - Interview with Amy Evans, Wrens Nursery Hooke Parish



Current conditions of the island Right now the island is an introverted space. Perimetered by barbed wires and enveloped by overgrowth, the island has an unwelcoming aura. Even if it can be argued that island has a strong pedagogical value, it needs an intervention to facilitate this learning.


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Path as a physical Intervention starting an active dialogue with the third landscape

Gilles Clement, “Le Jardin Planétaire,” www.gillesclement.com, accessed June 17, 2020, http://www. gillesclement.com/cat-jardinplanetaire-tit-Le-Jardin-Planetaire.


Intervening in a third landscape

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Intervening in a third landscape Wall as a device to foreground third landscape


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Before the marks

Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin

After the marks

A line in Japan, Richard long, 1979

Spiral jetty,Robert Smithson, 1970

Hadrian wall, 122 AD


Marking the Landscape

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Marking the landscape

Stripping it further down to more minimal gestures within the landscape. The above examples show the effect interventions can have on a scape. The intervention assists the user in interacting with the landscape. these all create marks that become an imprint, forever changing the way we look at the otherwise plain landscape.


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From the asphalt road to the historic ridge-way in the fields, and following the path in the island.


Walking through the marks

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Walking through the marks Concentrating the marks in one horizontal plane, helps in creating a continuous flow starting from the road, through the ridge-way and into the island all throughout the change in one’s immediate atmosphere.


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Damp areas on site

Intersecting Habitats


Field research

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Field Research Due to strong and variable edge effects, the micro-climate of the island is zonal. Near the Hooke river bank, the soil is extremely fertile and support strong biodiversity whereas near the fields, the effects are adverse.

Ground conditions of the island


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Palletized stack of offcuts spread throughout the site in Haysom quarry

Distance from the island to haysom quarry is 66 kilometres or 1 hour approx


Material choice for the path

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Material choice for the path

stone extracted

product cut on request

delivered to the site

offcut to the product

left on quarry for 3-4 years

sold to buyers if found

crushed to gravel for sub-layer or stone dust to mix with mortar.

Production of stone offcuts in a quarry

Juliet Haysom, Quarry offcuts, interview by Shreya Kochatta, May 15, 2020.


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River

Loose boundary for children

Spaces to sit on or rest and notice the ecology around .


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Exploring ecology near the river


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Safe path through the unpruned plantation


Island: Salvaging a Landscape of Ruin

A moment near the overgrown coppice

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1.

2.

4.

6.


Process of stone path building

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5.

Analytical drawing of the various processes involved in path building

3.

1. Secondary production (offcuts) from the Haysom stone quarry. 2. Various different batches of offcuts collected on site. 3. Involvement of public charities like Paths for all and Dry stone walling society for construction of the footpath. 4. Gradual development of the footpath based on the batches received. 5. Opening up the island for visitation. 6. Invitation to the children of Wren’s nursery.


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Bibliography

Clement, Gilles. “Le Jardin Planétaire.” www.gillesclement.com. Accessed June 17, 2020. http://www.gillesclement.com/catjardinplanetaire-tit-Le-Jardin-Planetaire. Cronon, William. Nature’s Metropolis : Chicago and the Great West. New York: W.W. Norton, 1992. Haysom, Juliet. Quarry offcuts. Interview by Shreya Kochatta, May 15, 2020. “Home :: Wren’s Nursery - Hooke Court, Beaminster, Dorset.” www.wrensnursery.co.uk. Accessed June 17, 2020. https://www. wrensnursery.co.uk/. Joseph, Emmanuel. What Is the Third Estate? New York Praeger, 1964. Lowenhaupt Tsing, Anna. The Mushroom At The End Of The World : On The Possibility Of Life In Capitalist Ruins. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017. Mariano Gómez Luque, Ghazal Jafari, and Harvard. Posthuman. Cambridge, Ma: New Geographies Lab, Harvard University Graduate School Of Design, 2017. Rocca, Alessandro. Planetary Gardens : The Landscape Architecture of Gilles Clément. Basel ; Boston: Birkhäuser, 2008. Daou, Daniel, Pablo Pérez-Ramos, and Harvard University. Graduate School Of Design. New Geographies. 08, Island. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Graduate School Of Design, 2016.


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Reinstating the Vernacular A Material Strategy for Affordable Housing My project is about rediscovering the potential of clay construction, a material that is universally found and has virtually zero embodied energy, has great material and spatial qualities, but has been rarely used in the west since modernity. Currently, a new two-layered loadbearing and insulating wall system, Cobbauge, is being developed by University of Plymouth and French partners. Having tested multiple cob mixes of clays and hemp fibres in the lab, a first Cobbauge housing prototype is underway, and will be the first in the history of cob building to comply with UK building regulations, a great promise for upscaling cob construction. By combining the abundance and cheapness of clay and hemp with a communal selfbuild framework, the efficiencies of the “flying factory”, and the inherent economies of cohousing, affordable housing can be approached from a material strategy.

03

A co-housing development in Bridport, Dorset is reinterpreted with a sense of generosity and flexibility to enable self-build customisations and extensions in Cobbauge, seeing the laborious building process not as a risk but as an opportunity for selforganisation and resilience. By reducing costs from outsourcing construction, additional programs such as communal kitchens and bathrooms that would have been luxurious and inaccessible for individual, low cost houses are now made possible at the community scale. From sourcing raw materials to the communal build program, to the aftercare and maintenance of the home, a self-built home is naturally embedded with a sense of ownership that incentivizes housing as a long-term process, offering a far deeper sense of ownership and participation than housing typically delivered by a developer.

Lydia Liu




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1


Research

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2

Cottages that look like they are built from structural stone are built of concrete blocks with stone cladding. Vernacular, rather than a process, has become to represent a product with an appearance.

Photos taken at St Catherine’s Flint, Dorchester, Nov 2019


Rather than accepting the industrialised and inauthentic vernacular, can we reanimate its original meaning as self-build housing using local materials, for local needs and affordability?


3. Distinguishing clay from silt in Hooke Park, clay is elastic and is suitable for cobbauge construction where as silt crumbles apart and should not be added to the material mix.


Bibliography

4. First sample of cobbauge made in Hooke Park.


Research

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5

6

Building with Cob

Cob is an ancient building technique out of unfired clay and fibres. It has an incredibly low embodied energy and due to its high thermal mass the indoor temperature can be kept very consistent. However, it is still a niche practice in the UK, since it is very specific and laborious to build, requiring a good hat and boots for structural stability and to prevent condensation problems , and hence only for knowledgeable building owners that understand and will engage in the maintenance work. It is also very laborious, as I experienced digging and building a wall prototype, sampling the Cobbauge technique.

Photographs taken in Hooke Park, March 2020


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7

9

8

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00+

Give a cob house a good pair of boots and a good hat and she will last forever.

7 8 9 10

Bowhill, Exeter. Grade I listed cob building in Devon. Moisture can penetrate into the walls from the roof or the ground due to poor surface water drainage. Abrasion impact damage is most likely to be found at the corners of buildings. “Cob cottage collapses moments after earthquake.�

Devon Live. 19 February, 2018 Historic England Conservation of Earth Buildings Historic England Building Archive


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11

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12 12

Extracting Clay in Hooke Park Building with clay is very unstandardised. On the site of Hooke Park alone you can find two types of clay. By the concrete foundations on campus, the clay has a higher sand content, while by the stream, the clay is ‘purer’, with higher clay content, due to the downward stream of water washing away impurities in the subsoil. You can also find clayrocks, clay compacted into a solid by the rush of water in the stream.


Testing

Photographs taken in Hooke Park, March 2020


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is a two layered wall system being developed by University of Plymouth and French partners, an interregional project Funded by EU. Each layer optimizes the structural and thermal performance of cob to comply with UK building regulations. Seeing their different mixes and testing methods at their symposium, at Plymouth in January, and the various types of fibres that not only serve as insulation, but also reinforce cob mix and speed up drying process. Their best mix for a loadbearing and insulating wall is a 50cm thick wall with structural and thermal mixes using hemp straw and hemp shiv.

13


Research

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16

13 Cobbauge Team with 1:1 wall prototype 14 Internal structural layer 250mm dense cob, 2.5% hemp straw 15 External thermal layer 250mm lightweight cob, 50% hemp shiv 16 20 cob mixes with various clays and fibres 17 Thermal conduction testing with hot plate 18 Display at Cobbauge Symposium

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Photographs taken at Cobbauge Symposium, January 22nd 2020


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Why Cobbauge? For the first time, cob buildings will comply with UK Building Regulations in terms of structural and thermal performance. Moreover, it can be prefabricated in a formwork and be upscaled in production. While many contemporary rammed earth buildings use cement for stabilisation, Cobbauge uses all natural materials to create a loadbearing and insulating wall.


Research

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Cobbauge Facebook page



Research

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“...stabilised rammed earth is really dry pack concrete.”1

Harper, “Architectural Review Feb 2020.”


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Also, given a designed two-layered timber and mesh formwork for the 50cm thick wall, it can create various corner situations and unique window details specific to monolithic earth construction. And still, there are yet to be buildings to be built with Cobbauge...

Laundry

Toilets

Kitchen

Restaurant Exhibition space

Restaurant Offices

Activity Room

Garden Room

Library

Living Room

1


Research

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1 2

2

Plan for a communal house in Cobbauge Two-layered timber and mesh formworks for corners and tapered edges in Cobbauge


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Reinstating the Vernacular Second Homes in Bridport Area Source: ONS 1991, 2001, 2011 census data Symondsbury Bridport Allington Bothenhampton Bradpole 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0% 1991

2001

2011

2021

How can we implement affordable housing in Cobbauge, for the town of Bridport, Dorset?

Bridport is a town 20 minutes away from Hooke Park with a population of 7800. Its housing production is expcted to increase by 20% in the next 20 years, with three ongoing housing developments. The picturesque local vernacular has attracted many second home buyers, creating a housing crisis for the local people. Bripdort has an ageing population and the percentage of second homes are expected to increase.

There are multiple organisations working on creating more socially inclusive and ecological housing, to incorporate local materials and to provide local employment, such as Assemble’s proposition from 2019, focusing on the use of timber frames and hemp insulation.


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Bridport Co-housing +53 homes

2 Watton Village +200 homes

1

3 Vearse Farm +760 homes

20


“There are other construction approaches which are also sustainable, such as building with cob walls, as structural elements. However, these are likely to remain, for the foreseeable future, niche products for one off build projects or extensions.”2

Crabtree, “Local Materials in Construction, Jan 2012.”


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Self-Build

?

Industrial Production

v

Local employment

v

Optimised production

x

Laborious

x

Monopoly of profits

Time-consuming

Cob housing is considered a niche product and unable to be upscaled, since it is traditionally self built. But now, with Cobbauge, it is possible to build with cob on an industrial scale. Nevertheless, the potential of the material extends beyond the speed and efficiency of an industrial scale production. Since the material can be locally extracted and processed, thanks to the Flying Factory, a right balance between machine and

Costs and carbon emissions in the transport of materials

labour can benefit communities at a scaled economy of building, providing local employment and helping to reverse rural-urban migration. Bridport Cohousing is one of such communities. Developed by the local community land trust to create 53 affordable homes, of which the 9 self build plots are the scope of my project, and the land adjacent currently reserved for building workshops.


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Traditional self build in the UK has many strict guidelines, in order to moderate each homeowner’s individual desires and bespoke alterations to create a coherent whole.

Self-build guidelines adapted from Bridport Cohousing brief

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21

Instead of self build as an individual endeavour, combining efforts in a communal self build project can create a generous development with shared spaces, such as a communal house in the LILAC development in Leeds. The LILAC development is the first to use an onsite flying factory for the prefabrication of straw bale panels, and also the first in the UK to implement the Mutual Home Ownership scheme, which enables truly affordable housing because the monthly rent is based on their income rather than market prices.

LILAC. http://lilac.coop/


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Reinstating the Vernacular

Energy and Climate Change grant? ÂŁ808,855 Infrastructure grant

More Funding?

Key Partners Material Consultant Practical Training Provider Machinery and Formwork Supplier Local Hemp Supplier

Inheriting the qualities of LILAC, it is an assisted self build framework that can enable housebuilding in Cobbauge. It is only through a communal effort that is able to mediate the laborious process of an upscaled construction with cob, a material that is nonetheless free and locally found. With training provided by material experts, and machinery and formworks rented from local contractors, the assisted self build framework takes place in a temporary Flying Factory onsite, placing itself between a self built project and an industrial production in a large factory.


Business Model

£2,000,000 grant

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£46,500 Community-led project development grant £250,000 fundraised

Bournemouth Churches Housing Association

purchase self-build plots

Bridport Cohousing Equity Fund

pay monthly

Assisted Self Build

allocate shares

Sources materials onsite and locally

Members of Bridport Mutual Home Ownership Society

A temporary ‘Flying Factory’ is set up onsite, renting machinery and formwork from external contractors, With training from Cobbauge experts.

Build 20 homes on

9 self-build plots


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Proposed Site Strategy

Reinstating the Vernacular


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Transforming the existing site with 9 individual self-build plots, the community will build 20 cohousing and private homes, with the land adjacent allocated for clay extraction and the Flying Factory. The homes will require 3000m3 of clay, equivalent to 10 25m swimming pools, a massive amount but still available and accessible onsite. The blocks, each 1.5m wide, 1m high, and 50cm thick, are designed in an optimum proportion for the structural cohesion of cob,

and for the handling on a pallet truck and a small crane. After extraction, the claypit will be landscaped into a 2m deep lake and nature reserve. Clay is dug onsite and hemp is sourced from local farms. Bridport has been historically known for its hemp-farming and ropemaking industry, and though the local hemp farms have all closed, they can be revived for Cobbauge production.


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Flying Factory The raw materials are processed in the Flying Factory by the resident community. With the help of rented machinery and training from the Cobbauge team, the community are equipped with tools and skills of mixing the correct ratios for the cob mix, to organize themselves in a schedule, to build the Cobbauge blocks.


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Plan of Housing Site in Year 1 From cohousing to 2-bed homes, the housing form is designed with the behaviour of the material, and the architecture of sharing, in mind. Sharing their boundary walls reduces the labour in building and also allows for future adaptations, while the shared central courtyards follow a traditional cob typology that makes use of the thermal mass of the material, maintaining a consistent temperature in the interior open space.


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153 Bedrooms have timber-framed hemp partitions, a thatched roof, and a window looking into the communal courtyard.


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The Luxuries of Assisted Self Build The communal courtyard is transformed into a complete open kitchen with a cob oven and niches for cooking, seating and shelving, as residents have come together to build the additional communal feature. Thanks to the economies and ethos of a self build project that reduces costs from outsourcing construction, additional programs that would have been luxurious and inaccessible for individual, low cost houses are now made possible at the community scale.


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The Luxuries of Assisted Self Build The most luxurious extension is the communal bathroom, with the bath enveloped in a raised cob platform with a waterproof tadelakt plaster, pipes hidden in the thick wall for water heat recovery, as well as pockets in the walls for seating and shelving. Entirely self-built by the residents, the laborious building process of cob is not seen as a risk but as an opportunity for self organization and resilience.


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Plan of Housing Site in Year 5 with annexes built The architecture of the development is embedded with a sense of generosity and flexibility for the growing and shrinking needs of families over time.


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Repatching Day Cob will also gradually erode, and just like all other buildings, require maintenance. Every few years, the community will engage in the ritual of Repatching Day, patching up holes in the walls using clay dug from below their communal garden. Using all natural materials from clay, hemp and thatch, the houses can return to the ground without pollution.

From sourcing raw materials to the aftercare and maintenance of the home, self-build is naturally embedded with a sense of ownership and emotional value that incentivizes housing as a long-term process.


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Sources

Texts 1

Harper, Phineas. “Outrage. Architectural Review.” Feb 2020.

2

Crabtree, Tim. “Local Materials in Construction.” Jan 2012. accessed Jun 16, 2020, https://www.dorsetcommunityaction.org.uk/wp-content/ uploads/2019/09/Local-materials-in-construction.pdf.

Images 1-2

Photograph taken at St Catherine’s Flint, Dorchester, Nov 2019.

3

Photograph taken at Hooke Park, Dec 2019.

4

Photograph of 1:5 wall prototype, Mar 2020.

5-6

Photograph taken at Hooke Park, Mar 2020.

7

Historic England Building Archive. https://historicengland.org.uk/imagesbooks/archive/. accessed Jun 16, 2020.

8

Historic England Conservation of Earth Buildings. https://historicengland. org.uk/images-books/publications/earth-brick-terracotta-conservation/ earth-brick-terracotta-marketing-spread/. accessed Jun 16, 2020.

9

Historic England Conservation of Earth Buildings. https://historicengland. org.uk/images-books/publications/earth-brick-terracotta-conservation/ earth-brick-terracotta-marketing-spread/. accessed Jun 16, 2020.

10

Devon Live. “Cob cottage collapses moments after earthquake.” Feb 19, 2018

11-12

Photographs taken at Hooke Park, Mar 2020.

13-18 Photographs taken at Cobbauge Symposium, University of Plymouth, Jan 2020 19

Cobbauge Facebook Page. https://www.facebook.com/pg/ CobBaugeProject/photos/?ref=page_internal. accessed June 16, 2020.

20

Map adapted from UK Ordnance Survey.

21

LILAC Gallery. http://www.lilac.coop/image-gallery/. accessed Jun 16, 2020.




Reusing Waste Concrete A Joint Research Project During our 4th Year at the AA we have collaborated and developed a communal project which investigates the concrete industry in the UK, specifically the waste management in concrete plants. We developed our research starting with interviews and visits to concrete plants across the UK. Our investigation revealed that there is a gap in the waste management system. We identified this as an opportunity to plug-in to the concrete waste on plants and use the surplus material. We propose a system of classifying ‘unusable concrete’ on plants and cast it into our own building modules. We have explored the potential of small surplus batches in physical models and tests and successfully developed our own concrete block formwork. We propose integrating this system in the concrete industry in order to create a new building method and product while minimizing waste costs of the concrete plants and encouraging a new method

04

of building with a reclaimed material. Although we explored different methods to make the surplus concrete lightweight, adding different natural aggregates in the concrete mix. Our investigation revealed that in order for our proposal to be successful we need to use ‘pure’ concrete. Our proposal is meant to integrate seamlessly in the concrete plant without increasing the workload of the staff on site. That is why we decided not to add any new aggregates into the mix. We conclude our collaborative research with the development of the concrete waste osteomorphic block and testing it physically. The model was an investigation of the potential of this waste concrete. it even explores the aesthetic quality using different concrete batches can have. From this final investigation stem our own individual projects which continue exploring waste concrete in two very different ways which are going to be illustrated in the following chapters.

Alice Nobel & Sorana-Stefana Mazilu




168

Cemex

Reusing Waste Concrete


Reusing Waste Concrete

169

Type: Ready-mixed concrete plant yard Location: Wembley, London Waste management: If the timing between jobs allows for it, the preferred option is to dump their waste at a O’Hara Bros. Aggregates Ltd, a crushing plant in close vicinity to the concrete plant. It is very rare that their schedule allows for this though, so what usually happens it that the waste between jobs it poured on the concrete plant in allocated pits. Once those pits are full and the waste is dried another contractor is called on site and the waste is crushed, removed from the pits and transported to O’Hara. In addition to the waste between batches there is added end-ofday wash out waste and rejected orders, so the quantity of surplus material increases significantly faster. This waste management system is extremely inefficient and expensive. Taking the waste out of the plant not only involves multiple contractors, increases air and sound pollution but is also extremely costly for the plant.


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Cemex

171

“We keep the waste here and then it they crush it and send it to O’Hara (concrete crushing plant). This happens once per month.” - Alex Z, Plant Manager at Cemex


Laing O’Rourke


Laing O’Rourke

Type: Prefabrication factory Location: Nottinghamshire Waste management: They have a machine that separates the cementitious from the sand and the aggregates. Once it has dried, they crush it and reuse it. One of the recycling challenges in the UK is that you can’t put a lot of reused aggregates into the mixers, only 15%. Architectural concrete is sometimes coloured, the waste from these projects is unusable due to wrong colour matches, therefore they cast traffic barriers with formworks that are placed next to the casting machines.


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Laing O’Rourke

175

“We can’t recycle coloured mixes so they have to go into road barriers” - Alan, Laing O’Rourke


Mixamate


Type: All-in-one concrete pumping trucks Location: London Waste management: Zero waste policy. They are a unique company that has fabricated all of their own trucks. They provide an ‘all-in-one’ service, delivery, mixing and pumping on site. Their trucks are particularly designed to be able to carry the dry components and mix them on site according to the need of the project. They can mix accurate batches as small as 1/2 m3. Having developed this extremely precise and highly designed trucks their waste is practically zero. Although, their services are very desirable in the city, where space is limited, by the design of the trucks, having to basically be a mini concrete plant on wheels, their maximum capacity of batches is also limited.


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Reusing Waste Concrete


Mixamate

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“We make our own trucks and there is no waste... These trucks are concrete factories on wheels.” - Christopher Smith, Director of Mixamate


Hanson


Type: Ready-mixed concrete plant yard Location: Yeovil Waste management: When Hanson Yeovil gets back rejected concrete they have two hours to get it out of the truck, before it damages the drum. The first option is to try to sell it to another customer. If that doesn’t work they will try giving it away to a farmer in the area. Sometimes, especially in the early mornings, it is impossible to find someone who wants it - then the next option is to give it to recycling stations/ landfill sites and pay a fee. However, worst case scenario, the waste centre isn’t open and the driver has to take it back to the yard and dump it there.


182

Reusing Waste Concrete


Hanson

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“The concrete itself costs 500 pounds but bringing that back costed about 2000 pounds... the best way to reuse the concrete is before it becomes a waste product.� - Hanson Yeovil


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Reusing Waste Concrete


Reusing Waste Concrete

Concrete truck in process of loading, while the dry components are poured into the drum the entire truck is continuously sprayed with water to keep the dust down.

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Reusing Waste Concrete

The Concrete Waste Flow: Plug-in

Concrete plant

Surplus Concrete Washout drum

This is the moment where rejected or leftover concrete could be rescued and cast onto blocks instead of going to landfill.


Concrete Waste Flow

187

Rejected concrete

Loaded truck

Construction site

Truck with leftovers / rejected concrete


188

Reusing Waste Concrete

Waste Generated by Ready-Mix Concrete Yards

TYPE OF WASTE

WASTE PROCESS Wet concrete

FREQUENT

Daily wash-out

End of day waste

Reclaimer

The concrete waste goes into a tank to be separated into aggregates for recycling. (very expensive machine)

1st Option

Re-direct : Find Another Client

IRREGULAR

Rejected concrete waste

Concrete rejected

2nd Option

Waste Centre

- Pump doesn’t work - Miss-calculation - Miss communication

Last Option

Back to concrete yard and tipped to cure (5x the price to get rid of it)

Max. 2 h to empty the drum


Waste from Ready-Mix Concrete Yards

WASTE END FORM Dried concrete

Recycled Concrete Aggregate (RCA)

Only 15% RCA can go into a new mix No quality proof which makes secondary use very limited. Most commonly used in roadwork.

Used by a client for reduced price

Landfill

Crushed to aggregates and transported away

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Reusing Waste Concrete

Section through model showing the dispersion of the chosen aggregates with minimal vibration of the cast.

Lightweight concrete tests: expanded clay, pumice and wood-chip.


Natural Aggregates

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Testing Natural Aggregates We continued our research with physical tests adding different natural aggregates to the concrete mix. The aim of this investigation was to determine the possibility of achieving high performance lightweight concrete blocks while keeping the process as simple as possible. Keeping true to the aim of our project, our decision of using only natural minerals was made in order to maintain the purity of the concrete. We considered that any material that would be added should not impact the environment or quality of the material if it should ever be crushed and used again. This exploration culminated with the decision of not adding any aggregates. Any new addition to the process hinders the possibility of achieving it on site. This decision was made keeping in mind that the formworks with the wasted material should be as easy to use as possible without disturbing the work-flow of the plant.


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Reusing Waste Concrete

VERMICULITE

EXPANDED PERLITE

Raw Material: hydrous phyllosilicate mineral

Raw Material: Amorphous volcanic glass

Origin: Russia, South Africa, China, and Brazil.

Origin: China, Turkey, Greece, USA, Armenia, Northern Ireland and Hungary.

Production: needs to be crushed and flash-heated to about 1000°C so that the water inclusion between the layers of rock vaporise and expand the vermiculite size to 15-20 times bigger.

Production: Perlite rock doesn’t have the physical pours characteristics naturally and needs to be crushed and flash-heated to about 1800°C.

Use: Concrete Roof tiles, fire protection products, loosening soils

Use: In USA it has been used for concrete aggregate, in the UK more commonly used as aggregate for wall plaster

Similar properties: expanded mica

Similar properties: Similar to pumice but without the physical structure

Density: 70-160 Kg/m3

Density: 90-490 Kg/m3 (loose fill condition)

Thermal conductivity: 0.046-0.070 W(mK)

Thermal conductivity: 0.045-0.070 W(mK)

Comparison between possible natural aggregates. Source: Extract from Insulating Concrete Booklet, Alice Nobel


Natural Aggregates

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WATER WATER

SAND SAND

LIGHT LIGHT WEIGHT WEIGHT AGGREGATES AGGREGATES

CEMENT CEMENT

The The recipe recipe on on the the cement cement bag bag can can easily easily be be used used by by replacing replacing the the regular regular aggregate aggregate to to the the lightweight lightweight aggregates. aggregates. Vibrating Vibrating the the form-work form-work after after the the concrete concrete isis poured poured should should be be carfully carfully done done as as the the porous porous aggregates aggregates will will move move towards towards the the surface surface with with too too much much vibration. vibration.


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Reusing Waste Concrete

PUMICE AGGREGATE

WOOD CHIP / SAW DUST

E

Raw Material: Volcanic Rock

Raw Material: Wood

R

Origin: Volcanic rock mineral found around the world, in Europe it can be found on Island, Italy, Germany, Greece.

Origin: Wood chip available as waste material from the timber industry. Hook Park produce wood chip waste regularly.

O o

Production: Naturally created during explosive volcanic eruptions which makes it inherently environmentally friendly. The boiling lava contains air and gases which creates bubbles that gives spongy, porous mass to the cold lava stones.

Production: Natural by-product from timber industry.

P m 1 e o c

Use: As it is very lightweight it is commonly used to reduce dead loads in high buildings.

Use: Typically used in pulp production, as biomass fuel and mulch.

U o a

Similar properties: Scoria, Tuff, perlite

Similar properties: also called sawdust cement

S e

Density: 175-285 Kg/m3

Density: 90-140 kg/m3

D

Thermal conductivity: 0.06-0.08 W(mK)

Thermal conductivity: 0.05 W(mK)

T

Comparison between possible natural aggregates. Source: Extract from Insulating Concrete Booklet, Alice Nobel


Lightweight Concrete Booklet

EXPANDED CLAY

EXPANDED SHALE

Raw Material : Mud

Raw Material: sedimentary rock/ mud

Origin: Produced from small pieces of clay.

Origin: Find-grained sedimentary rock of clay minerals.

Production: The aggregates is made by heating clay to around 1,200 °C in a rotary kiln. The gases expand the material by thousand of air bubbles creating an honeycomb structure.

Production: It has to be heated to get its cellular and porous structure. When fired in a rotary kiln to 1100C, it becomes 7 times bigger than in raw form.

Use: Used in concrete mixes, geotechnical fillings water treatment and hydro-culture.

Use: Used in concrete mixes, hydro-culture, in construction of green roofs,

Similar properties: LecaÂŽ, Gravelite and Rocklite, Aglite

Similar properties: Rocklite, Haydite, Gravelite, Granulex, Liapor

Density: 260-500 Kg/m3 Thermal conductivity: 0.027-42 W(mK)

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Reusing Waste Concrete


Osteomorphic Block

Interlocking Osteomorphic Blocks

InterlockingDeveloping Osteomorphic Blocks Block the Osteomorphic We developed the shape of our blocks taking in consideration a few parameters which we wanted to achieve:

Interlocking Osteomorphic Blocks

1. The form should allow the block to be lightweight 2. The blocks should be able dry-stack 3. The shape of the blocks should allow for easy manipulation (lifting, moving, etc) 4. The form should allow flexibility in the design of the space 5. It should be easy to cast Keeping in mind the characteristics listed above our research and testing lead us to the isomorphic shape. We propose this particular shape especially because it can be dry-stacked easily and once in position the different sides of the block seal the gaps and breaks any potential outside airflow into the wall. Osteomorphic blocks are identical blocks locked within the assembly by virtue of their special geometry and mutual arrangement.

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Reusing Waste Concrete

Method of Stacking 1


Osteomorphic Block

Method of Stacking 2

We proposed and designed the isomorphic block as a first physical test of the concrete waste used as a new material. This particular form allows the blocks to be dry stacked in separate methods which also accentuate the aesthetic quality and texture, being cast from different concrete batches.

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Reusing Waste Concrete

Potential exterior view of structure made out of concrete waste blocks


Reusing Waste Concrete

Potential interior view of structure made out of concrete waste blocks

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Sources

Special thanks to Jason W, Plant Manager, Hanson Yeovil Alex Z, Plant Manager at Cemex, London Juliet Haysom, Artist, Purbeck Alan C, Laing O’Rourke, Retford Christopher J Smith, Managing Director at Mixmate Terry, Concrete truck driver at Mixmate, London

Texts 1

Dyskin A.V., Estrin Y., Pasternak E. (2019) Topological Interlocking Materials. In: Estrin Y., BrĂŠchet Y., Dunlop J., Fratzl P. (eds) Architectured Materials in Nature and Engineering. Springer Series in Materials Science, vol 282. Springer, p 23-49

2

Clarke, J. L. (1993) Structural Lightweight aggregate concrete, Glasgow: Blackie Academic & Professional Images

1

Mixamate - All in-One Concrete Pumping Truck, Mixamate, https://mixamate.co.uk/gallery/all-in-one-concrete-pumpingtruck/, (Accessed: 21 June 2020).




Modern Pilgrimage Concrete Chapels Borders and travel restrictions have become ever more pronounced in order to stop the global pandemic. The only ones who never stopped travelling across countries, without constraints, are truckers. The project proposes a new typology for highway architecture built out of surplus concrete. During the year-long studio work I have explored the material and its potential and investigated the trucker’s routes, specifically the resting-stops and the existing highway architecture. These structures have become totems for drivers. They are more than often highly designed, and they are seen as monuments along motorways.

The programme focuses on proposing a practical and needed architectural intervention in a context seemingly unimportant. The concrete chapels aim to stand as a proof of concept for the potential of waste materials and accentuate the necessity of a global typology that proves to be a vital component in supporting our day to day life, especially in the current climate.

This project is focused on using waste concrete in a different way. The fact that this concrete is a reused waste product opens a gateway for experimenting with casting as long as what can be done with it would have a long life span.

05

Sorana-Stefana Mazilu




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Modern Pilgrimage


Monuments on the Highway

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“The architectural artefact for drivers is very minimal but has huge ambitions of going across Europe. There is something very moving in that, a map of Europe without borders. This is striking because the borders solidify. It is wonderfully utopian but it is realistic because lorry drivers and deliveries are crossing borders. These roads are what Europe should be.� - Maria Giudici


Image 1 View inside the cabin of a long distance truck


“Companies have their own routes, you can’t modify it a lot so you get to know the rest stops very well. They begin to measure time. I have my favourite ones, from a normal driver you want different things from them.”

211

“Companiile au rutele lor sau aplicatia care trebuie folosita, de la care nu poti modifica mult asa ca ajungi sa stii bine locurile de odihna. Popasurile incep sa masoare timpul. Am popasurile mele preferate, unde au o facilittate care imi place, dar incepi sa te uiti diferit la ele fata de soferi normali (...) - M Popescu



Monuments on the Highway

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These structures have become totems for drivers, being highly designed, they are monuments across motorways.

Image 2 Pavesi Highway Restaurant of Lainate Milan


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Modern Pilgrimage

Image 3 Exterior of Asphaltkapelle


Monuments on the Highway

Image 4 Interior of Asphaltkapelle showing integrated street light

“It is also almost a motorway chapel.� - Wilhelm Koch Inventor of the Asphaltkapelle, 1

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Modern Pilgrimage

Site 1 Menzies Road, Port Zone, Dover CT16 2HQ


Site

Site 2 Menzies Road, Port Zone, Dover CT16 2HQ

I selected two existing break stops on the truckers route. The first one is in Dover next to the boarder crossing and the second one is in Wembley. These two locations were chosen specifically for their importance on the truckers route and their relatively close connection to the concrete yard. The chapels would be poured on the yard and then moved and assembled on site, forming the new marques for the UK motorway.

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Modern Pilgrimage

Cemex Wembley, the selected site for casting the surplus concrete The dimensions of the proposed building are in direct relationship with the space available on the platform of a lorry truck, as the elements would be casted on the plant and moved to site.


Casting in the Concrete Plant

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Modern Pilgrimage


Casting in the Concrete Yard

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Proposed site for moulds on site


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Modern Pilgrimage

2m

6m


Formwork

Defining the Limits of the Proposal I chose this concrete plant specifically because of its proximity to London and ‘topography’ on the plant allows for casting a larger segment, depending on the truck. Without the a pump a concrete truck can only pour concrete at an average of 1.5 m depending on truck. The plant has 2 different levels which would be ideal to set the formwork on the lower level and use the entire height available. In addition to that the form work has rebar through out and integrating lift fixings which make it possible to lift and move from plant to moving truck. Those attachments already exist in prefabricated elements.

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Image 5 Concrete finish using fabric casting technique once the fabric is removed


Fabric Casting

Image 6 Proposed method of fabric casting.

Fabric Casting Using a formwork which combines the use of fabric and solid walls creates particular finishes. The folds of the fabric and the imprints of the weight of the concrete on it would give the interior wall a soft irregular finish. The straight edge of the exterior wall, made using traditional formwork, would accentuate the contrast between the interior and exterior and define the characteristc aesthetics of this proposed new typology.

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Modern Pilgrimage


Inside the Formwork

Making the Formwork The proposed formwork combines 2 different methods of casting concrete: traditional box casting and fabric casting. The exterior wall of the mold is made out of reclaimed wood creating a solid wall to attach steel rods needed for the fabric. The rods are filleted and have a nut and bolt system attached to the ends which supports

the fabric and forms the interior wall of the cast. The simple fixings which support the fabric make it easy to manipulate it by hand without needing special equipment. The last element of the formwork is inserting the rebar between the fabric and the wood walls of the formwork.

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Modern Pilgrimage

Diagrams illustrating the possible elevation finish if the fabric is slack and the fixings are left in.


Possible Concrete Finishes

Diagrams illustrating the possible elevation finish if the fabric is tensed further.

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Modern Pilgrimage

Galvanized steel filleted rod with nut and washer fixing

Possible lighting fixture installation - using the existing rods from the formwork as a ‘path’ for the circuit

Section showing water drainage for sink using ‘U‘ shape pipe, installation has to be prefabricated and situated in mould before casting.


Constructing the Interior interior

Section showing water drainage for sink using straight pipe, installation has to be prefabricated and situated in mould before casting.

231

Section showing possible bench design made using fabric formwork, proposed finishes for seating is wood (integrating second material).



The Sequence of the Chapel

The Sequence of the Chapel The structure is built out of a system of interlocking elements which are cast individually and slotted in together to form rooms. This technique of forming seals and slotting in large concrete elements can be found in prefabricated elements (pipes, tunnels etc) In the formwork the rooms are essentially being casted upside down (in the cast the floor becomes the ceiling). This makes it essential for the elements to be relatively small so they can be moved in position.

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Modern Pilgrimage

Stage 1

Stage 2

Stage 3

Stage 4

The most simple combination. The room has the basic dimensions of the truck platform 4.5 x 2.1 x 1.5 m. Two elements are slotted together one on top of the other.

The height of the room is increased by adding one more element and openings sizes increase.

The building size increases, the width of the space become twice the size, 4.2 m.

The building size increases. Developing the shape further the room gains the potential to integrate multiple elements. This is the moment where the programme can also be transformed and accentuated within the space.


The Sequence of the Chapel

Stage 5 The interior elements are expanded. Surfaces like benches are cast within the fabric and other a water basin is moulded manipulating the fabric on the wall (please refer to above pages to see details of integrated sewage).

235



Inside the chapel

237


238

Sources

Texts 1

Unger, Heike, “Ein Erlebnisraum: Die Asphaltkapelle Etsdorf “, https://www.onetz.de/oberpfalz/etsdorf-freudenberg/ erlebnisraum-asphaltkapelle-etsdorf-id2915699.html, (Accessed May 2020)

Images 1

Simpson, Joshua, “Photos from Inside the Cabs of LongDistance Truckers “, https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/xd77gq/ photos-from-inside-the-cabs-of-long-distance-truckers-001, (Accessed May 2020)

2

Design is fine, “Design is fine. History is mine.” , https:// www.design-is-fine.org/post/141249613009/pavesi-highwayrestaurant-of-lainatemilan, (Accessed May 2020)

3

Asphaltkapelle, “Asphaltkapelle Etsdorf - 10 Jahre: Startseite”, https://www.asphaltkapelle.de/index.php?id=59, (Accessed May 2020)

4

Asphaltkapelle, “Asphaltkapelle Etsdorf - 10 Jahre: Startseite”, https://www.asphaltkapelle.de/index.php?id=59, (Accessed May 2020)

5

Arro Design, “Cast in place concrete” , https://www.arrodesign. org/fabric-formed-concrete/f-f-concrete-for-architecture/ , (Accessed May 2020)

6

Arro Design, “Cast in place concrete” , https://www.arrodesign. org/fabric-formed-concrete/f-f-concrete-for-architecture/ , (Accessed May 2020)




Surplus Concrete Saving Waste Concrete in Wet Form At the beginning of this year, I visited several concrete plants around London and Dorset. I have learnt that concrete waste can result in significant costs and problems for smaller concrete plants. One of the plants had a full truck of concrete rejected the week before I got there, so instead of making ÂŁ500 by delivering the concrete, they lost ÂŁ2000 in waste expenses. However, the most devastating effect of wasting this amount of concrete is the impact it has on the environment. 1260 kg CO2 was emitted due to this one truck. Massive amounts of concrete go to landfill each year without ever reaching the final purpose it is intended for. The waste comes in two forms, it is either as fully loaded trucks that have been rejected, or it is leftovers from jobs. This can be the result of clients ordering too

06

much, issues on-site, weather conditions, misunderstandings or broken pumps. The challenge with redirecting the concrete is the irregularity and time constraint. You never know when it comes back, and the truck’s drum has to be discharged within two hours after it has been poured as it will otherwise destroy the drum. This project investigates the properties of concrete waste and how a business model could make the material become a viable source on a local scale. It also looks into sustainable applications for food storage and how farmers could make use of the materials inherent properties such as its weight mass and durability.

Alice Nobel


242

Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin


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244

Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin


Island: salvaging a landscape

245

“The best way to reuse the concrete is before it becomes a waste product� Plant manager Hanson Yeovil, Jason W.


Rejected concrete from one full truck

246

Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin

+1260 kg Co2 was emitted


Island: salvaging a landscape

+ ÂŁ500 income became - ÂŁ2000 in waste costs

247


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Surplus Concrete

Waste Mechanism Type of Waste

Waste Process Wet concrete

Daily drum wash-out

Frequent Waste

Reclaimer

The concrete waste goes into a tank to be separated into aggregates for recycling. (very expensive machine)

1st Option

Re-direct : Find Another Client

Irregular Waste - Pump doesn’t work - Miss-calculation - Miss communication

Rejected or leftover concrete

2nd Option

Waste Centre

Last Option

Back to concrete plant yard and tipped to cure (5x the price to get rid of it)


Waste Mechanism

249

Hanson Yeovil

Leftovers from jobs

0.5-4m3

6m3 Fully loaded Rejected trucks

8m3

Hanson has 178 static concrete plants in the UK.

* Interview 02/2020, “we had 2 rejected trucks last month which is a good month for in terms of waste“


250

Surplus Concrete

Hanson FastTrack Hanson Duracrete Hanson Easyflow Hanson Colourcrete® Steel Reinforced Concrete Polypropylene Fibre Reinforced Concrete Plastic Fibre Rienforced concrete Underwater concrete Hanson Watertight concrete Bespoke concrete Powercrete® CableCem® Hanson Easy Pile®CFA Hanson Easy Pile® SP Hanson EcoPlus® Mix 8 Hanson EcoPlus® Mix 7 Hanson EcoPlus® Mix 6

Early strength concrete High performance concrete Easy pour concrete Coloured concrete Reinforced concrete Underwater concrete Waterproof concrete systems Special concretes Heat-conducting concrete Concrete for piling

Hanson EcoPlus® Mix 5 Hanson EcoPlus® Mix 4

Sustainable concrete

Hanson EcoPlus® Mix 3 Hanson EcoPlus® Mix 2 Hanson EcoPlus® Mix 1 Hanson FarmYard®

Farming concrete

Hanson FarmTank® Hanson FarmFloor®

Home use concrete

Hanson FarmFloor Plus® Hanson Farm Store® EasyWay® EasyGround® EasyGround Plus® EasyFound®

Product Range : Proprietary Concrete Hanson UK


Specifying Concrete

251

Structural

C25 +

Other

varies

Non-structural

can be above C25

There are five ways of specifying concrete in the UK. Hanson specifies concrete the proprietary way, which means that they provide over thirty different products within the ready-mixed product range. There are various important parameters that are classified within each mix, such as strength class, consistence class and exposure class. To be able to make, for example, blocks or walls, the concrete does not have to be structural but it should be above C25 in strength class. The standards that have to be considered to supply concrete are BSEN206, BS8500 part 1 and BS8500 part 2. (Ready-Mixed Concrete, 2020)


252

Surplus Concrete

Low cost material Concrete is a low cost building material, and we looked into the cheapest versions of it. Manufacturing on the other hand, is an expensive process. Too small objects would not make sense, we would land on almost the same price as using high standard quality proved concrete. Reusing material has to be economically viable otherwise few people would be interested in working with it.

Concrete ~ ÂŁ100/1m3

Volume: 0,036m3

Volume: 0,064m3

ÂŁ3.6

ÂŁ64

Amounts in elements (6 m3)

300 pcs.

4 pcs.


Surplus Concrete

253

Mass rather than details Some large prefabrication plants have efficient waste management; they cast simple, non-fuss elements such as traffic barriers out of their leftover concrete. What is successful with this process is that it is simple and adapted for the material at hand - it makes use of the concretes weight and mass rather than details.

Image from my visit at Laing O’Rourke Feb 2020


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Surplus Concrete

Thermal mass and energy balance Peak temperature delayed by up to six hours

30°C

up to 6-8c difference between peak external and internal temperature

15°C

External temperature Internal temperature / wood Internal temperature / concrete

Bennett, David. 2010. Sustainable Cncrete Architecture. London: RIBA Enterprises.


Thermal Mass

How can the unused concrete get a new meaningful use taking advantage of mass, weight and durability?

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Surplus Concrete

Farming Sector 0101213201

456789 Ăż 978 Ăż 5 8 Ăż 67Ăż 65856Ăż976 7 Ăż2Ăż 87 7 Ăż

Small scale farms can loose yield due to lack of storage facilities. Our farm food surplus and waste are surprisingly big in the UK (see diagram), with potatoes "#$%ÿ'($)*+ ÿ-.ÿ/012034ÿ56-7 being the most thrown away vegetable. Storing food in balanced temperature is the key to supply food on local scale which is important ensure a longer market period and minimize losses. Many farms can’t afford artificially refrigerated storage houses, this is both due to running cost and also because of the initial cost. Some D:1E><1F<ÿ@1ÿ9G<ÿ=:909:ÿ?<F9:3ÿ@?ÿA:Cÿ01>ÿG0?ÿA<>ÿ9:ÿ0ÿA0FHÿ:Bÿ3<@1I<?9J<19ÿ@1ÿ?9:30;< send food to a cold store warehouse @1B30?932F923<ÿ@1ÿ3<F<19ÿ4<03?K which makes them loses the local L29ÿ;3:C<3?ÿF:JJ@99<>ÿ9:ÿ9G<ÿF3:=ÿ@1ÿ9G<ÿA:1;ÿ9<3Jÿ03<ÿ23;<>ÿ9:ÿ=A2FHÿ2=ÿ9G<ÿF:230;<ÿ01> scale and also brings in a costly F0=@90Aÿ9:ÿ@J=3:I<ÿ9G<@3ÿB0F@A@9@<?ÿ9:ÿ3<>2F<ÿA:??<?MÿF29ÿF:?9?ÿ01>ÿJ0N@J@?<ÿ3<9231?K

89:30;<Ăż2=;30><Ăż<??<19@0A?ĂżB:3Ăż=:909: ;3:C<3?

TOTAL ESTIMATED FOOD SURPLUS & Waste AT FARM LEVEL (000’S TONNES)

OPQ(R)+Ăż%R)+

The most wasted vegetables in the UK at farm level

868

S@?@9Ăż:23ĂżT1:CĂżU:CĂżF<193<ĂżB:3Ăż=30F9@F0AĂżB03J@1;Ăż0>I@F< _R`$`R+aĂżb$)c+a`Ăż$d#Ăże)RQĂża`R)$f+ VW:29ĂżXK5YJĂż9:11<?Ăż:BĂż=:909:<?Ăż;:Ăż@19:Ăż?9:30;<Ăż<0FGĂż4<03Ăż01>ĂżVUZLĂż[:446 909:<?Ăż<?9@J09<? \2?9Ăż56]Ăż;:Ăż@1Ăż9:ĂżCG09Ăż03<ĂżF:1?@><3<>Ăż?909<^:B^9G<^039MĂżJ:><31Ăż?9:3<?K 55 6 878 52 658562 56789 2 6 2 7 2 7 9 52 5 7

319 ! !

66 33 POTATOES

SUGAR BEETS

CARROTS

VEGETABLES

1. “WRAP - Food Waste in Primary Production UK, 2017 2. Clarke, Adam. 2018. “Storage Upgrade Essentials For Potato Growers�. Farmers Weekly, 2018. 3. Potato Store. 2019. Image. http://growyourmint.com/ how-to-harvest-potatoes/.

ONIONS PARSNIP


Island: salvaging a landscape

257

Small farms can’t afford artificially refrigerated storage buildings


258

(Jessica Fecteau 2018)

Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin


259

During the coronavirus lockdown, our vulnerability and reliance on food storage has been exposed, together with our reliance on constant daily supplies.


260

Surplus Concrete

Surplus Concrete Blocks®

Business model The business model is based on a co-operation with a group of local concrete plants to cast blocks out of their waste. The idea is that Surplus Concrete Blocks ® is allowed to leave it’s formworks on the plant yard and in return, the truck drivers will get rid of the waste by discharging it into the formworks. Surplus concrete will empty the formworks and prepare for next fill up. They will also have a catalogue of building application for the end-client, and they are responsible for sales and logistics. The blocks can be used and reused in various energy efficient applications for cold storage for small to middle sized companies.


Business Model

Casting area on the plant yard

Casting instruction + catalogue of applications

Formworks

261


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Surplus Concrete

Surplus Concrete Blocks Work process

SURPLUS CONCRETE

Surplus Concrete Blocks leaves formworks on the concrete plant yard with an instruction

Reaches clients through collaborations and advertisement with a catalogue of

Open old forms and prepare new forms

The plant yard store empty formworks waiting for concrete waste.

CONCRETE PLANT

CLIENT

Client orders an application from the catalogue.


Work Process

263

Small crane truck pick up blocks and deliver them to site.

Installation on site if the client wish.

If possible client can pick up blocks themselves.

Installation on site. Should require not more than a day.

The concrete plant cast blocks as rejected concrete comes in and store ready blocks until a project is ready.

Client prepares site for delivery.


264

Surplus Concrete

CASTING INSTRUCTION How to cast in surplus blocks

REJECTED ORDER Driver call the plant to inform that a batch has been rejected or that there are residuals form construction site. The concrete will be there within 2 h.

1 minutes

PREPARE Spray the inside of the empty formworks with oil based shutter release agent.

2 minutes / cast


Casting Instruction

POUR Follow Surplus Concrete Blocks chart and make sure that the batch is allowed in the form-work. Concrete strength class below C25 is not accepted.

4 minutes

COVER Cover the filled formwork with reusable impervious sheeting covers, should be in close contact to the surface. This is to keep it protected from hot sun, dry air, drying winds and frost.

2 minutes

Da te: Bat 30 ch: / Typ Sc 4 20 e:

CURE Fill in information for Surplus team: • • •

Date Rejected order information Concrete type

1 minutes

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Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin

Rejected concrete is a bit like found stones. Whatever amount is available has to find its place.


Island: salvaging a landscape

267

image: European masonry 2020


268

Surplus Concrete

Formwork

> 0.1m3

(A few wheel barrows)

> 0,3m3

(Leftovers)

Medium

> 0,7m3

Large > 6-8m3

Fully loaded truck more (irregular)


Formwork

Block Outcome

Small

269


270

Surplus Concrete

Surplus Concrete : potential wall application Each concrete block preserve a historical record of the environment at the time of their formation, just like found stones.

Private garage floor West Cocker, 27.04.20

Coldharbour business park flats Sherborne 05.04.20


Wall

Lidl car park floor Yeovil, 05.05.20

271

Sherborne Abbey primary school extension Sherborne, 20.04.20

*Hypothetical concrete sources


272

Surplus Concrete

Interlocking system The blocks are half a story high and the width is based on even numbers, 400, 800 and 1600. The blocks have a cross in the bottom and a stripe on top to allow strong corners and easy stacking.

Axonometric view

400


Interlocking System

400

400

400

400

Block wood wall connection

Front view

400

Block hipped roof connection

Flat roof structure

Side view

400

400

400

400

273


274

Surplus Concrete

Make waste neutral for the plant

- £400 / m3

~ £7 / m3

Cost per cubic meter of rejected concrete1

Price/ block to become neutral

Hansons average cost to cast one cubic metere Parameters

Costs

Casting time/block for Hanson in min Average salary worker/ h

3

Social Costs etc 4 Actual cost per/h + social cost Working cost per Block Average volume CBM/Block Cost to cast / CBM

2

10 £12,00 15% £13,80 £2,30 0,32 £7,19

1. One rejected truck costed Hanson £2000 to dispose (interview Feb 2020) 2. Assumption 3. Labour cost /hour 8 - 15 GBP, www.payscale.com 4. Assumption Employers National Insurance, current minimum Pension Contributions, Employee’s Gross Pay


Economy

275

Economic possibilities for Surplus Concrete

~ £49.25

£98.50

Surplus concretes block price

Average competitors price

Surplus Concrete product cost Hanson charge their working cost for one block No cost for the storage Formwork costs/ block 1 Development cost Production related costs, assumed 1 hours work Salvage Salavge Concrete's profit and margin Surplus Concrete's price on the block Competitors price for equal block

2

1. Based on 1/3 of the cost of steel formwork blocks www.betonblock.com 2. Based on blocks from

£2,30 0 £0,40 £2,00 £15,00 £29,55 (60% 60% Margin) margin £49,25 £98,50


276

Surplus Concrete potential casting and storage area in Yeovil.


277


278

Surplus Concrete

Potential applications of the blocks Historical Root cellars

Natural cold storage is a somewhat lost typology. Historical evidence of root cellar and potato storage proves both small and larger structures. What is fascinating with a structure like this, is that because it is partly buried, it can hold the temperature of 2-8 degrees all year round just by the cold energy from the earth and the thickness of a material with high thermal mass such as stone or concrete. The simple stacking techniques would also allow clients that have a tractor or a small crane to construct the storage themselves easily.


Typologies

Historical Potato storages

Cold storage applications

279


280

CATALOGUE Surplus Concrete Block’s catalogue illustrates various cold storage buildings that are designed in different combinations using the six types of blocks provided by the company.The round blocks become useful for the small structures that should fit into slopes and hills, whereas the big blocks are mainly used in the larger applications for farmers.

SMALL FOOD STORAGE APPLICATIONS ROOT CELLAR Block A : Block B : Block C :

4X 0 X 14 X

ROOT CELLAR Block A : Block B : Block C : Block C :

20 X 4 X 12 X 4X

WINE CELLAR Block A : Block B : Block C : Block C :

34 X 10 X 0X 0X


281


282

EXTRA APPLICATIONS

STAIR Block A :

4X

OUTDOOR BASIN Block A : 2X

STORAGE AREA

GENERAL STORAGE Block A : 73 X Block B : 10 X


283


284

LARGER FARMING APPLICATIONS

POTATO ONION STORAGE Block A : 6X Block B : 6X Block E : 95 X Block F : 1 X

GRAIN STORAGE Block A : 5X Block F : 89 X


285


286

Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin


Island: salvaging a landscape

287

First potential client : Hooke Park


288

Surplus Concrete

Root Cellar Hooke Park is imagined as a first client for Surplus Concrete Blocks. The Design + Make programme is currently developing an extension of the kitchen garden and a Root cellar would be the perfect addition. What is fascinating with a structure like this, is that because it is partly buried, it can hold the temperature of 2-8 degrees all year round just by the cold energy from the earth and the thickness of the blocks. The simple block stacking also allows clients like Hooke Park, to construct it themselves, with a tractor or a small crane.


Hooke Park Proposal

Kitchen garden expansion

Existing Speculative plan of garden extension

289

N


290

Surplus Concrete

2-8°C 274 kJ/m²K 10cm 1-11°C 1m

2-4°C


Hooke Park proposal

4

291

6

5 3

1

2

1. Vapour Barrier All exterior surfaces that will face the earth needs cover of vapour barrier. 2. Foundation Level should be damp but above ground water. The lower layer is gravel covered with concrete pads and concrete tile slabs as this situation in clay soil. Usually it is better without the slab. Drainage pipes are also around the footings of the building. 3. Truck Small size crane truck for delivery. 4. Ventilation As fruits and vegetables gives ethylene gas ventilation is crucial and should be placed lower next to the entrance and up in the ceiling. Humidity 80-90 : degrees.1

5. Interlock Walls should be minimum 200mm and thicker gives more thermal mass and therefore also better temperature balance. Indoor temperature : 2-8C2 5. Drainage Drainage tile installed around foundation pads to avoid flooding. 6. Roof Warm roof construction in wood, with insulation above the rafters. There is a small slope for drainage. 7. Soil The depth of the construction decides the temperature inside. The temperatures in soil are based on yearly average UK temperature but it depends on the site of the cellar. The deeper the more steady temperature.

1. Hajdu-Rafis, et al. 2015. Ta Hand Om Din Jordkällare. Ebook. Malmö: Länsstyrelsen Västra Götalands län. 2. Horn, Kirsti. 2016. Handbook For Building A Root Cellar—Ebook. Vasa: Novia.


292

Surplus Concrete

Food storage duration December

Ja n

ua

ry

bru Fe

Oc tob er

b er em v No

SP R IN

UM R

A UT

March

R

September

a ry

WIN TE

N

G

M E

t gu s

SU M

il

Au

Apr

Ma

Jul y

y

June Benefits of a root cellar Store seasonal food longer Less travels to the supermarket Possibility to store large quantities Energy saving


Hooke Park proposal

Proposed Hooke Park root cellar

293


294

Island: salvaging a landscape of ruin

Potential client : organic farm sector

Bridgewater Taunton

Yeovil Bournemouth

Concrete Plants Organic Farms

PRODUCED BY AN AUTODESK STUDENT VERSION

PRODUCED BY AN AUTODESK STUDENT VERSION

Storage alternatives

Primitive methods

Refrigerated storage on farm

Central cold storage facility

Natural in ground storage where the farmer cover the yield with hay.

On farm cold store facility with precast concrete panels is expensive to buy and run.

Third party alternative is to send the vegetables to a central cold storage facility.

PRODUCED BY AN AUTODESK STUDENT VERSION


Farmers proposal

Farmers as contractors

Surplus Concrete Blocks grain storage Surplus Concrete Blocks is an alternative where farmers could, with their own machinery, construct storage facilities with surplus blocks at a good price.

295


296

Surplus Concrete

Even the leftovers that nobody wants can be saved as long as somebody gives them a new path

Image: Oddbox (2020)


Farmers proposal

297


298

Sources

Texts 1

Hanson “Ready-Mixed Concrete”. 2020. hanson.co.uk. https://www. hanson.co.uk/en/ready-mixed-concrete. (Accessed: 08 May 2020).

2

Bennett, David. 2010. Sustainable Concrete Architecture. London: RIBA Enterprises.

3

“WRAP - Food Waste in Primary Production UK, 2017

4

Clarke, Adam. 2018. “Storage Upgrade Essentials For Potato Growers”. Farmers Weekly, 2018.

5

Hajdu-Rafis, Ann-Charlott, and Joakim Lilja. 2020. Ta Hand Om Din Jordkällare. Ebook. Malmö: Länsstyrelsen i Västra Götalands län. https://www.lansstyrelsen.se/ download/18.4da86a5a16488a299bc65da/1531728954521/2015-20. pdf.

6

Horn, Kirsti. 2016. Handbook For Building A Root Cellar— Sustainable Heritage Report No. 8. Ebook. Vasa: Yrkeshögskolan Novia.

1

Images

2

Potato Store. 2019. Image. http://growyourmint.com/how-toharvest-potatoes/. (Accessed: 05 June 2020).

3

Jessica Fecteau. 2018. Refrigerator. Image. “Pioneer Woman Ree Drummond Shows Off Her Stunning Post-Holiday Refrigerator Transformation”. 2018. people.com. https://people.com/food/ pioneer-woman-ree-drummond-home-refrigerator-organized/. (Accessed: 05 June 2020).

4

Stone Wall. 2020. Image. https://www.europeanstonemasonry.com/ portfolio. Oddbox (2020) Image. Surplus Vegetables, https://www.oddbox. co.uk/ (Accessed: 26 May 2020).


Island: salvaging a landscape

299



Matchmade on the Web A Resource Exchange Platform for Roof Tiles The roof tile’s many varieties must now be met with suspicion. At a closer look, this often celebrated quality is detrimental to the roof tile’s reuse process. After the roof’s undoing, these volumes are scattered all throughout the landscape - sometimes, they make it into one of the many reclamation yards in the UK, albeit in small, disparate batches. The project started (and had in many ways ended) in these literal fields of roof tiles - seemingly incompatible interlocking components are forced together, a number of them released from the curse of having to work only with its own kind. Could a resource exchange platform (a Tinder for tiles, let’s say) introduce a much needed convenience and help dissolve the bottlenecks in its reuse process? An interface that confirms to roofers and material resellers alike a matrix of compatibility across all

07

previously encountered roof tiles in the region is proposed. This new interface seeks opportunities in the unique pedagogical territory that Hooke Park occupies by establishing a new research wing. A new 1 to 1 laboratory is introduced, the very building of which will test and officialise new compatibilities, sets of instructions developed in parallel for the interface. The many disparate batches of roof tiles strewn throughout the UK have been given a central node as a reference point – not geographically but in the cloud. The act of sourcing becomes, ever more than before, the act of designing. ​

Ele Mun




304

Matchmade on the Web

BE = Beech

1 BE

Felled

BE

2

Sawmill

3

Material Flows in Hooke Park Hooke Park succeeds in being, all at once, a home, a unique educational environment, a satellite testing ground as well as a place of respite. Even before the AA’s tenure, it has had a generosity in the giving and the receiving of ideas through the forming of alliances. ​

Drying


Material Flows in Hooke Park

305

60 - 75 m

100 m

24 - 35 m

35 - 55 m

~ 40 m

BE ~ 27 m

30 - 40 m

20 - 25 m

20 - 30 m

BE

2

50 - 60 m

Oak

Norway Spruce

Red Cedar

23 - 37 m Sycamore

Sweet Chestnut

30 - 37 m

40 - 50 m Sitka Spruce

28 - 43 m Red Oak

Poplar

Larch

Douglas Fir

Corsican Pine

Beech

Ash 40 - 50 m

Alder 24 - 35 m Oak

Norway Spruce

~ 40 m

35 - 55 m

Perhaps the main liaison of these relationships is currently the Design & Make course. Permanently based in the campus, the students are surrounded by the very materials with which they work ; they are vigorous in their probes at timber construction technology.

Poplar

3

10 m

Larch

40 - 50 m

1


306

Matchmade on the Web

20 20

19

18

19

18

11 11 4 4

5 5

6 6

Material Resellers

11

Chris's Crackers Junkshop

1

Material Resellers

Jurassic Reclamation

12 11 13 12

Boatbreakers Chris's Crackers Junkshop Andrews Paint Stripping Boatbreakers

2 1 3 2

Glastonbury Reclamation Jurassic Reclamation Wells Reclamation Glastonbury Reclamation

14 13 15 14

Bristol Wood Andrews PaintRecycling StrippingProject Rose Green and Reclamation Bristol WoodTiles Recycling Project

4 3 5 4

South West Reclamation Wells Reclamation Browns Antiques & Reclamation South West Reclamation

16 15 17 16

Wessex Reclamation Rose Green Tiles and Reclamation Bristol Reclamation Wessex Reclamation

6 5 7 6

Tobys Reclamation Browns Antiques & Reclamation Dorset Reclamation Tobys Reclamation

18 17 19 18

Cardiff Reclamation Bristol Reclamation Theodore S&D Reclamation Cardiff Reclamation

8 7 9 8

John Roofing DorsetJames Reclamation FromeJames Reclamation John Roofing

20 19

Torfaen Salvage Theodore S&D Reclamation

20

Torfaen Salvage

10 9

Bath Reclamation Frome Reclamation

Hooke Park

10

Bath Reclamation

Hooke Park


Potential Material Flows

17

307

16 15

13

2

3

14 10

9

12 1

7

8

Could this willingness to collaborate extend beyond the current arsenal of just one material ? We had started by seeing a similar diagram of material flows at another scale. Lying in wait in the campus’ vicinity is a line of expertise to engage with​- material resellers, as well as the long - term relationships they have formed with local builders and contractors. ​

Out of the many possible outcomes of these potential collaborations, the project will offer one instance. T ​ he literal fields of roof tiles scattered throughout the country will be project’s protagonists.


Image 3 Photograph taken at John James Roofing, Mar 2020.




Production

311

In 2018 alone, the production of concrete roof tiles in the UK had an estimated total coverage of 27 million squared meters, equivalent to 7000 football fields.1 This give us an estimated 1.3 million tons of concrete every year that are, sooner or later, destined to be crushed (downcycled) or buried in landfills. Because of its clearly defined manufacturing process, they were predestined for a changeover to industrial production.2 The production process of the common roof tile is very similar to that of the brick. It follows the same procedures where the marching of raw materials culminate in the kiln. The more frost resistant the product has to be, the higher the firing temperature, hence, the higher energy consumption and CO2 emissions the process produces.3 In other words, the better the tile is expected to perform as it should, the higher its embodied energy - a fact especially relevant to the cold, moist conditions of the UK.

From flat elements to the more complex interlocking components, the roof tile would evolve and spurt into the myriad of different systems and components that these volumes come in. In their many peculiarities, they had managed to keep at least one thing in common – dismountability. ​Unlike bricks, floor tiles or indeed many other building elements that are cemented into place, the roof tile is assembled, to be disassembled at a time often sooner than necessary. It is said that the energy needed to remove and clean these materials after use only represents 0.5% of the energy required for manufacture.4

1 Office for National Statistics, “Monthly Statistics of Building Materials and Components.” 2 Eberhard Schunk et al., Roof Construction Manual. 3 Ecofys, et al., “Methodology for the Free Allocation of Emission Allowances in the EU.” 4 Bjørn Berge, The Ecology of Building Materials. Image 2 Greg Evans, Roof Tiles Stacked on Roof, 2015, photograph, London.


Image 3 Photograph taken at Glastonbury Reclamation, Feb 2020.


Salvage

It is no wonder that literal fields of salvaged roof tiles are so recurrent a sight upon visits to reclamation yards across the UK. It is still however an industry who’s inflows and outflows remain elusive. Perhaps not so much to the very people who manage these transactions ; Diploma 18’s pilgrimage in search of an ecosystem of knowledge hidden throughout South West England tells us this. Full transcipts of these conversations with material resellers about not just the industry but the very materials themselves can be found in Volume 1 ; we were quite fortunate that just 20 minutes away from Hooke Park sits Jurassic Reclamation – a yard who’s wealth of experiences has been crucial in the coming together of the book as well as the rest of the project. To every tile its own tale ; each documented and compiled into the catalogue - a book of tiles.

313


314

Matchmade on the Web

Clay Plain Tile

2 . 1 . 01

Clay Plain Tile

2 . 1 . 02

Triple Delta

2 . 1 . 03

Clay Triple Roman

2 . 1 . 04

Redland Stonewold

2 . 2 . 01

Stonewold Mini

2 . 2 . 02

Concrete Double Roman

2 . 2 . 03

Concrete Plain Tile

1 . 1 . 08

Marley Mendip

2 . 2 . 05

Marley Ludlow Plus

2 . 2 . 11

Clay Pantile

1 . 1 . 01

Redland Delta

2 . 2 . 09

To every tile its own tale

Some of the many tiles celebrated in the Book of Tiles.


Sourcing

315

Marley Modern

2 . 2 . 12

Redland 49

2 . 2 . 13

Redland 49

2 . 2 . 14

Marley Ludlow Plus

2 . 2 . 15

Concrete Interlocking

2 . 2 . 16

Concrete Interlocking

2 . 2 . 17

Concrete Interlocking

2 . 2 . 18

Marley Anglia

2 . 2 . 19

Clay Interlocking

2 . 2 . 25

Marley Ludlow Major

2 . 2 . 24

Clay Double Roman

2 . 2 . 25

Marley Wessex

2 . 2 . 23

Image 4 Photographs of samples collected from Jurassic Reclamation in Bridport and John James Roofing in Ringwood.


Image 5 Kendal Swart, Close up view of damanged roof, 2018, photograph.


The main bottleneck is that they only arrive in small, disparate batches. Each barely enough coverage for a ‘typical’ roof. This doesn’t allow the reuse market to access larger construction projects that require more coverage. Only small amounts of reclaimed roof tiles are sold at a time, most often for :

Repatching

This includes replacing small patches of tiles that have been damaged in a storm, or in a chimney replacement/ removal job.

Small Extensions

Small extensions, that require a smaller roof coverage, to already existing buildings.

Re-Roofing

Where possible, reclaimed roof tiles are used to re-roof older buildings to preserve its original appearance. This applies especially to listed buildings where guidelines restrict the use of a different roof tile. These three main uses entail the often tedious task of sourcing for specific roof tiles that matches the batch already at hand.


The exercise in sourcing become in a market who’s products are l unrecorded, a market who’s tran are decentralised.


Post-Salvage

While it is perhaps much easier to chart the geographies of the newly manufactured roof tile, the same cannot be said after the roof’s undoing. The tiles, if salvaged at all, do not always end up in the reclamation yard closest to its previous host. They end up in a yard that the re-roofer is in contact with, a yard that has the space and is willing to take the tiles up.

es impeded largely nsactions

319

Manufacturer

Distributor Roofer's Yards

Building ~ 10 years

~ 20 years

~ 30 years

~ 40 years

~ 50 years

Reclamation Yards

Prospective Re-User

Re-Used


320

Matchmade on the Web

Two cases, recorded in visits to Jurassic Reclamation in Bridport and John James Roofing in Ringwood, should suffice to illustrate the dilemmas for which the roof tile’s many variations can be held accountable.

1

The Somerset 13s ( Five Different Ones ) On the head-lap of both samples shown, the same manufacturer’s stamp. While the two samples shown had been intended to be the same exact model, they had turned out to be two out of five known variations of the Somerset 13. A series of logistical errors had caused five different production plants to use five different moulds - there are five different known variants of the Somerset 13s. Here was a mistake who’s consequential confusion would tick roofing contractors off until this day, roughly 70 years after the peak of the manufacturer’s operations. To quote Neil from Jurassic Reclamation,

“You could get one batch in and the next five customers walking in would be looking for the other four types.”


The Somerset 13s

Image 6 Photographs of samples collected from Jurassic Reclamation in Bridport.

321


322

Matchmade on the Web

2

The Redland Delta and a gentleman from Cornwall No less than 1600 units of the Redland Deltas had been sitting in Jurassic Reclamation for a while. Neil Forte, who owns the yard, describes the concrete roof tile as one of a good number of deadstocks - batches of roof tiles that he will probably never sell. Because of the limited space in his yard, all 11.2 tons of concrete were slated to be crushed, until a man who’s driven two and a half hours from Cornwall had bought 200 units a couple of days before Diploma 18’s visit to the yard. Prior to his arrival to Jurassic Reclamation, the man had brought a sample of the Delta ( which he had on his roof ) to three other reclamation yards in search of a small number of them for a small extension. Because they had been discontinued by Redland for a long


The Redland Deltas

323

time, and because the name of the tile was not stamped onto the back of the tile as they usually are, the man had no way of sourcing for the tile other than to bring a sample into yards and to look for a match. Neil has since decided to keep the rest of the Redland Deltas.

“ There are people out there who want them, it’s just a matter of us finding them, or them finding us.� Image 7 Photograph of a sample collected from Jurassic Reclamation in Bridport.


324

Matchmade on the Web

Extraction

Production

The moment that the roof tiles arrive into the reclamation yard, their movement becomes significantly deterred.

Industrial Waste Distributor Contractors

New Buildings

Re-Roofing

Small Extension

Re-patching


Material Flows

325

And what happens when no client is found? These batches are sent to the landfills or crushed and used, for example, to level pathways on a farmer’s gateway. Here is a form of downcycling where the roof tile looses a lot of its value for use.

Landfill

Surplus

Building

Crushed

Dismantled

Compatible

Incompatible

Matchmaking Sourcing

Salvaged


326

Matchmade on the Web

Quantity Chart for Jurassic Reclamation

Clay Pantile

1.02

Marley Plain Tile

1.03

Half Eaves Tile

1.04

Clay Plain Tile

1.05

Hawkins Plain Tile

1.06

Tile-and-a-Half

1.07

Minster Plain Tile

1.08

Redland Plain Tile

1.09

Triple Delta

2.01

Redland Delta

2.02

Marley Ludlow Plus

2.03

Marley Ludlow Major

2.04

Redland 49

2.05

Russell Double Roman

2.06

Redland 50

2.07

Redland Renown

2.08

Redland Stoneweld

3.01

Spanish Slate

3.02

Brazilian Slate

400

24 m² 600

50

10 m²

< 1 m² 200

3 m² 500

50

1500

500

Tile 1.01

1000

Figures as of late February 2020

8 m²

1 m² 1000

400

16 m²

6 m²

50

1600

800

600

300

150

34 m²

31 m²

14 m² 750

600

200

150

82 m²

10 m² 7 m²

71 m²

73 m²


327

3500

3000

2500

2000

Quantities

Combined Coverage

5050 m² m2

combined 3200

195 m² 3000

191 m²

This however does not actually apply to every tile ; plain tiles are a lot more flexible and are therefore easier to re-use. It has long been common practice to combine different batches to deploy on a larger roof.


possible

tests to be carried out

328

Compatibility

1.06

a b c d

Matchmade on the Web1.07

Minster Plain Tile

1.08

Redland Plain Tile

1.09

Triple Delta

2.01

Redland Delta

2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05

e f g

Tile-and-a-Half

2.06

Plain Tiles 1.02 - 1.08

Matchmaking plain tiles from different batches is Marley Ludlow Plus simple as they are mostly quite similar, with variations of upLudlow to onlyMajor around 6mm Marley in length and width.

Redland 49

Plain tiles are laid such that the seam lines from one Russell Double Roman row to another do not line up ; there is leeway to leave a gap 50 to make room for Redland these small variations.

2.07

Redland Renown Matching different coloured

3.01

Spanish muchSlate of a problem.If

3.02

plain roof tiles is not that

anything, its aesthetics are quite desirable. The key is to Brazilian Slate lay them randomly. Bottom tile gives overlapping tile some leeway for differing sizes.

1 : 10 1 : 10

1 : 10


Image 8 Photograph taken at Jurassic Reclamation in Bridport.


330

Matchmade on the Web

compatible compatible compatible

w/ w/ placement specific placement w/ specific specific placement

a

a

b

b

hypothesised

hypothesised

c speedc dating A kind of exercise can be carried out to see whether or not the more complex d dinterlocking tiles can learn from the plain tiles in this sense and it turns out thatesome eof them can actually be made compatible​. The flexibility of the plain tiles f into the becomes ftranslated anomaly towards the top-right corner of the compatibility chart. Thisgmatchmaking g is at this point, largely ad hoc - interlocks are matched together by eye and potential compatibilities hypothesised. h h In the following pages, a set of specific instructions to force i i these compatibilities.

1.01

1.01

1.01 1.01 Clay

Pantile Clay Clay Pantile Pantile

1.02

1.02 1.02 Marley

1.03

1.03 1.03 Half

Eaves Half Tile Eaves Tile Tile Half Eaves

1.04

1.04 1.04 Clay

Clay Plain Tile Plain Clay Tile Plain Tile

1.05

1.05 1.05 Hawkins Plain Tile HawkinsHawkins Plain Tile Plain Tile

1.06

1.06 1.06 Tile-and-a-Half Tile-and-a-Half Tile-and-a-Half

1.07

1.07 1.07 Minster

1.08

1.08 1.08 Redland Plain Tile Plain Tile Redland Redland Plain Tile

1.09

1.09 1.09 Triple

2.01

2.01 Redland Delta 2.01 Redland Redland Delta Delta

2.02

2.02 2.02 Marley

Marley Ludlow Ludlow Marley Plus Ludlow Plus Plus

2.03

2.03 2.03 Marley

Marley Major Ludlow Major Major Marley Ludlow Ludlow

2.04

2.04 Redland 49 2.04 49 Redland Redland 49

2.05

2.05 2.05 Russell

2.06

2.06 Redland 50 2.06 Redland Redland 50 50

2.07

2.07 Redland Renown 2.07 Redland Redland Renown Renown

3.01

3.01 3.01 Spanish

3.02

3.02 Brazillian Slate 3.02 BrazilianBrazilian Slate Slate

Plain Marley Tile Plain Tile Marley Plain Tile

Minster Plain Tile Plain Minster Tile Plain Tile

Triple Delta Triple Delta Delta

RussellRoman DoubleRoman Roman Russell Double Double

SpanishSlate Slate Slate Spanish

Half Eaves Tiles

compatible compatible compatible

Compatibility Compatibility Compatibility

Marley Plain Tile

Clay Pantile

incompatible incompatible incompatible

1.01 1.03 1.02 1.03 1.02 1.01 1.02 1.04 1.03


Clay Plain Tile

Hawkins Plain Tile

Tile-and-a-Half

Minster Plain Tile

Redland Plain Tile

Triple Delta

Redland Delta

Ludlow Plus

Ludlow Major

Redland 49

Russell DR

Redland 50

Renowns

Spanish Slate

Brazillian Slate

b

h

e

i

g

f

c

331 Matrix of Compatibilities

1.04 1.04

1.05 1.05

1.06 1.06

1.07 1.07

1.08 1.08

1.09 1.09

2.01 2.01

2.02 2.02

2.03 2.03

2.04 2.04

2.05 2.05

2.06 2.06

2.07 2.07

3.01 3.01

3.02 3.02

b a

c

f d

g e

d

i

h


2.07

f

332

Matchmade on the Web

3.01

Compatibility

Redland Renown Spanish Slate

Marley Ludlow Major + Redland Renown

g

3.02

Redland Renown

Marley Ludlow Major

6 mm

Without processing, the channels on the Marley Ludlow Major are too wide, leaving a 6mm gap exposed on the top.

Brazilian 2.03

Slate

2.07

Redland Renown

6 mm


333

6 mm grinded off

6 mm grinded off

Matrix of Compatibilities

pin gP

Redland Renown

Ov erl ap

90°

itch

-3

to

90

°

Marley Ludlow Major

Marley Ludlow Major Redland Renown °

30

°

22.5

0

Figures given are for a headlap of 100 mm. The overlapping pitch shows that the mixed roof covering is compatible with roofs with a pitch of 30° to 90 °


334

f

2.07 Matchmade on the Web

3.01

Compatibility

g

Redland Renown Spanish Slate

Marley Ludlow Major + Redland Renown 3.02

Brazilian 2.03

Slate

2.07

Gaps close when 6mm is grinded off of the Marley Ludlow Major; the tiles have now been made compatible.



3.01

Re Redland 5 3.01 Sp Redland R 3.02 Br Spanish Sl

3.02

Brazilian S

2.07 336

g

Matchmade on the Web

h

2.06 2.07

Compatibility

h i

The three tiles all interlock well on all sides and are very similar in dimensions. Their profiles however differ quite a bit ; when used together they mostly have to be laid in vertical strips. The two Double Roman tiles however (Redland 50 and the Russell) may sit well atop one another.

The same can be said with some others - each with a very specific set of instructions.

+

i


2.05

e

Matrix of Compatibilities

Compatibility

337 2.06

2.07

f

3.01

g

3.02

30 mm grinded off new nail hole

These two tiles have compatible interlocks - the Redland Renowns are however a bit too long. This surplus of 30mm has to be grinded off of the top, for doing the same on the bottom would mean the loss of its weather check lugs. A new nail hole can be introduced to make up for the loss of its batten lugs.


338

Matchmade on the Web

Material Resellers Redland

Material Resellers Material Resellers Marley Redland Redland Russell

Marley Marley Dreadnaught

+

Russell Russell Sandtoft Dreadnaught Dreadnaught Plants

+ +

Sandtoft Sandtoft

+

Plants Plants


Matrix of Compatibilities Abacus Stone Sales Ainscough Metals Andrews Paint Stripping Architectural Salvage Source Ashwells Reclaimed Tropical Timber Bath Reclamation Blackheath Demolition & Trading Boatbreakers Brighton Rock & Reclamation Bristol Reclamation Bristol Wood Recycling Project Browns Antiques & Reclamation Cardiff Reclamation Cawarden Brick & Tile Company Cheshire Demolition & Excavation Chris's Crackers Junkshop Cleveland Steel & Tubes Latd Colchester Reclaim Community Wood Recycling Containers Direct D. Boswell & Son Daddyoaker Timber Yard DDS Demolition & Reclamation Dorset Reclamation Dulwich Reclamation English Salvage Epping Reclaim Limited Essex Stoves & Chimneys Forest Recycling Project Frome Reclamation Gallops Architectural Salvage Gary's Got It Glastonbury Reclamation Gower Reclamation Granton Trading Harvey Stone Jamb Jim Wise Demolition and Reclamation John and James Roofing JS Buyers and Sellers Jurassic Reclamation LASSCO Brunswisk House Lassco Ropewalk Liverpool Reclamation & Demolition London Reclaimed Brick Merchants Martin Edwards Reclamation Merthyr Salvage Reclamation Nostalgia & New Oldfield Reclamation Limited Portal Power Premier Reclaimed Brick Merchants ReciproCity Wirral Reclaimed Ltd. Ren-new: Materials for Renovation Retrouvius Ribble Reclamation Robert Young Antiques Ronson Reclaim Rose Green Tiles and Reclamation Rugged London Solo Wood Recycling South West Reclamation Steptoe's Yard Sure Build Timber Ltd. Symonds Salvage Limited

339 The Old Bath House The Old Slate Yard The Reclaimed Company The Vintage Floor Tile Company Theodore Sons & Daughters Reclamation Tobys Reclamation Torfaen Salvage Warehouse 701 Wells Reclamation Wessex Reclamation West 7 Reclamation West One Wood Flooring Company Ltd. West Wales Reclamation & Salvage Westland London Antiques Whitford Group Woodlands Farm Reclamation with Roof Tiles present

The Possibility of a Regional Matrix of Compatibilities Shown in the preceding pages were compatibilities that two people had managed to find in one relatively small sized yard. One could start to imagine a similar gesture exercised with all idle roof tiles, across as reclamation yards in the UK.


Home | Roof Source

"Echoes" - Live at Pompeii

roofsource.co.uk

Roof Source

Upload New Tile

? Roof Source : a Matchmaker for Roof Tiles A Resource Exchange Platform for roof tiles is proposed, where resellers, roofers and just those looking to get rid of their roof tiles responsibly alike are assigned their very own Virtual Yards.

To register a tile into the user’s Virtual Yard, one would upload a number of photos of the tile taken from various angles. Similar to many existing photogrammetric processes, the interface stitches together these 2D images to extract a 3D Model of the tile.


F

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Activity Your Virtual Yard

Oops ! It looks like you have nothing in your virtual yard yet... ): Upload a new tile to start one !

The tile’s profile, its dimensions, interlocks, weather check lugs analysed and potentially compatible tiles searched from previous uploaded tiles across all registered virtual yards. Specifications where available are made available to the user ; one can start to refer to the tiles my name.


d with

Billy Paul - Me and Mrs Jones

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?

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Nick Hakim - I Don't Know

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Model Successfully Extracted !

75%

Please wait... Searching for Compatibilities from :

678 Roof Tiles, across 43 Virtual Yards

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Architectural Assocaition


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Tear The Roof Off The Sucke

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Roof Source

12 . 2 . 08

Russell Settle

£ 1.30 per unit 2600 units

RUSSELL Clay interlocking tiles (dark shaded colour) in good condition. Bulk Buying price can be arranged. This Yard is 249km ( 2 h 55 m ) away

Directions

Contact

Browse Yard Compatibility Our system shows that your roof tile is compatible with the Russell Settle Clay Interlocking Tile. Note : This combination has yet to be tested as previous combinations have been, as per CE standards. I agree to all terms and conditions

Explore New Compatibility Russell Settle + Sandtoft Astley

? You’ve Got a Match ! The best case scenario would be that the same tile is found elsewhere not too far away. Small batches could now get in touch with one another and are ready to be combined, deployed onto larger construction projects.

If not the same ones, potentially compatible tiles are suggested to the user. This would come with, as was seen previously, a very specific set of instructions for the user to ‘force’ this compatibility. What is needed to initiate the interface is then an initial volume


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Activity Your Virtual Yard 34 . 2 . 01

1

Sandtoft Astley

06/2018

ÂŁ 1.20 per tile 850 units

9 confirmed matches 12 potential compatibilities

Specifications Projects

of compatibilities for users to refer to - testing, preferably on site, on a roof, has to be done to officialise these compatibilities and to produce the instructions.


Matchmade on the Web

Yards Notified

346

Tiles Uploaded

Roof Source

1

Models Extracted

2

Compatibilities Found

0

Reclamation Yards

3

Samples Dispatched

Hooke Park

75%

4

Tested on Small Shed

5

Combination Officialised Instructions

6

Documents Uploaded

Technical Specifications Report ( Declaration of Performance )


Roof Source BETA RoofSource will establish a new research wing in Hooke Park. 10 Material Resellers in its vicinity identified - we will work first with officialising compatibilities found across these 10 yards. This would of course largely be a back and forth process.

Forming a close connection with these resellers, the people most familiar with the materials themselves, will help in setting a baseline of standards from which new combinations have to be assessed by.



Adjacent to the big shed there will be a new small shed to host these new relationships. The very building of this small shed will be the testbed for these initial combinations ; a small library of instructions built in parallel to commence the interface. The roof, pitched at a number of different angles to accomodate the different tiles.


RoofSource Lab


RoofSource Lab + Storage

After its building, parts deliberately left unfinished will be used as a continual 1 to 1 laboratory. Other parts of this small shed, more permanently enclosed, will become firstly, a small warehouse, as there is currently an urgent need for an interior storage space in Hooke Park. In between the Big Shed and this new warehouse, an extension to the currently existing robot cell – a new robot lab for Hooke Park. The Small Shed stands on perhaps too privileged a site for it to be used as a warehouse indefinitely, of course. As such, it is open ended - a roof to be used as the campus sees fit. Here is a strategy not unfamiliar to the Hooke Park ethos.


352

Matchmade on the Web

Matchmade on the Web Here is a possibility that I find hard to imagine unfolding elsewhere. In the UK if not beyond, Hooke Park occupies a unique pedagogical territory - one that might risk mis-opportunity. On the part of the interface, this 1 to 1 laboratory will establish a precedent – much

like how the many existing structures in the campus has done so for timber. ​ Perhaps what is ideal would be a kind of universal interlock for all tiles, but this might do for now. The many disparate batches of


1 to 1 Laboratory

roof tiles strewn throughout the UK have been given a central node as a reference point – not geographically but in the cloud. ​ ​

353


At Last - Etta James

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Only after working on some of these images did I really realise how much a roof affects the building’s appearance. The appearance of a roof becomes informed by happenstance – the act of sourcing becomes, even more than before, the act of designing. ​

While not every combination will be for everyone, I’d like to believe that there is at least one for everyone, as well as at least one compatible tile for every roof tile. ​



358

Sources

Texts 1

Office for National Startistics. “Monthly Statistics of Building Materials and Components.” Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Energy, January 2019.

2

Eberhard Schunk, Hans Jochen Oster, Rainer Barthel, and Kurt Kießl. Roof Construction Manual. 1st ed. Birkhäuser Architecture, 2003.

3

Ecofys, Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research, and Öko-Institut. “Methodology for the Free Allocation of Emission Allowances in the EU ETS Post 2012.” European Commission, November 2009.

4

Bjørn Berge. The Ecology of Building Materials. Second Edition. Taylor & Francis, 2009.

Images 1

Photograph taken at John James Roofing, Mar 2020.

2

Evans, Greg. Roof tiles stacked on roof. 3 July 2015. Photograph. Park Lane, Cheam Village, London.

3

Photograph taken at Glastonbury Reclamation, Feb 2020.

4

Photographs of samples collected from Jurassic Reclamation in Bridport and John James Roofing in Ringwood. Swart, Kendal. A close up view of the damaged and broken roof tiles of a abandoned building. 8 November 2018. Photograph.

5 6

Photographs of samples collected from Jurassic Reclamation in Bridport.

7

Photograph of a sample collected from Jurassic Reclamation in Bridport.

8

Photograph taken at Jurassic Reclamation, Feb 2020.


Footnote



Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture Carving Out Spaces for Protected Bats The intent of this project is to bring awareness and to gain a better understanding of why it is important to include ‘buildingreliant species’, such as bats, within the early stages of architectural practice. The exploration begins in Hooke Park as an initial site of exploration. Hooke Park is a part of the two percent of ancient woodland that still exists in the United Kingdom today. It provides a crucial habitat for a range of wildlife such as fungi, insects, bats, birds, and more. However, due to the nature of Hooke Park being both an ancient woodland and a managed one, it was revealed that the lack of natural features such as woodpecker holes and tree splits have affected the way in which bats inhabit the woodland. Bats are biodiversity indicators and are crucial for pollination, seed dispersal and pest control. They are opportunistic mammals that do

not build their own roosts. They rely on cracks, crevices and holes for shelter. With the lack of natural features, they have had to adapt by roosting within Hooke Park’s campus buildings. The relationship between bats and the Hooke Park’s architecture led to more questions about where bats choose to live within built structures, how they navigate and use the surrounding greenery. The study of the campus unravels an intricate system that seems to extend beyond Hooke Park itself. In fact, as more natural landscapes such as unmanaged, aged woodlands continue to disappear, ‘building-reliant species’ have emerged and been forced to migrate and adapt to man-made architecture in order to survive. So, how does man-made architecture today consider ‘building-reliant species’ and what more can be done to accommodate them?

Joyce Ka Kei Ng


If bats were considered in the early stages with great importance, how would the buildings differ in the way they are built? How can the unused spaces of a building serve the vulnerable building-reliant species for biodiversity gain?


363


364

A View of Hooke Park

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture


Hooke Park: A Site of Exploration

365

Following the transition of ownership of Hooke Park to The Architectural Association in 2002, the woodland campus has become the place for timber design and construction. Hooke Park covers 150 hectares of land, listed both as an ancient woodland and a managed one but more often than not, students arrive at Hooke Park with the intention to create and build, making full use of the high-end facilities that are on the campus. Consequently, the rest of the woodland remains rather unexplored and undervalued. It led to the question: What is Hooke Park’s pedagogical role at the AA? And what can we learn from Hooke Park’s woodlands? Souce: Image from http://hookepark. aaschool.ac.uk/.



The students of the AA come and go, but hardly notice the wide range of inhabitants that share the woodland landscape of Hooke Park. Using a camera trap, Hooke Park’s wildlife that roam the woods day and night were revealed.

367

Video footage of Hooke Park’s wildlife captured by Joyce Ng in December 2019.


368

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

“At one point, it was a royal deer park owned by the king. It moved to a succession of owners then the Forest Commission took over for 25 years and replanted the whole woodland.” - Christopher Sadd, Hooke Park’s Forester “Wild boar was a big issue for farmers around that’s why we don’t see them anymore.” - Charles Corrywright, Hooke Park’s Workshop Manager “I peeked out of the tent in the middle of the night and I noticed a glow on the ground. It must have been bioluminescent mushrooms!” - James Westcott, AA Tutor


Hooke Park: A Site of Exploration

369

“One of the experimental units were here recently and they found a bat in their room whilst staying at Westminster Lodge” - Charlie Wright, Hooke Park’s Workshop Manager “We put nest boxes in the late 90s. It was a very young forest and there were no birds! So they put nest boxes round and now that the trees are bigger and are slowly rotting, the birds may be able find a hole. ” - Stephen Hales, Wildlife Expert “There was a lot more wildlife in Hooke Park 20 years ago: deer and wild boar would roam into the campus.” - Miraj Ahmed, AA Tutor

Selected quotes from Interviews with Charlie Wright, Christopher Sadd, Miraj Ahmed and Stephen Hales.


370

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

The Wildlife of Hooke Park


Hooke Park: A Site of Exploration

371

0m

1m

The hidden side of Hooke Park is filled with wildlife from small organisms such as fungi and insects, birds and bats, to larger animals such as fox and deer. Since there has never been any formal study of Hooke Park’s wildlife, a collection of testimonies from Hooke Park staff, AA tutors and students were used to paint a more wholistic picture of this hidden world.


372

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

A Meeting with Stephen Hales


Learning from the Experts

373

Stephen Hales, a wildlife expert, has been independently monitoring the moths of Hooke Park for the last 30 years. In his lecture, he described some of the rare species that exist in Hooke Park. He also mentioned a way to measure the biodiversity of a given area by monitoring any of the three species: 1

Insects

2

Bats

3

Birds. Source: Photo taken by Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, Hooke Park Visitor.


374

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture Share knowledge on bats and improving biodiversity in the woodland

Share knowledge on Hooke Park’s moths and birds

Christopher Sadd

Share knowledge on moths, bat’s prey

Stephen Hales

Architectural Association, Hooke Park’s Forester

Wildlife Expert and Hooke Park’s Moth Expert Share knowledge on woodland management

Nigel Fisher

Wytham Woods Conservationist, University of Oxford

The Network of Shared Knowledge


Learning from the Experts

375

Share knowledge on bats in buildings

Nick Tomlinson

Bat Expert and Ecological Consultant

Jo Ferguson

Built Environment Manager of the Bat Conservation Trust

Share knowledge on bat research

Danielle Linton

Bat Researcher, University of Oxford

The research project began in conversation with Christopher Sadd about the interest in wildlife at Hooke Park. Shortly after, he introduced Stephen Hales who invited Nick Tomlinson to Hooke Park. Nick Tomlinson then advised to contact Jo Ferguson who worked at the Bat Conservation Trust. Meanwhile, Diploma 18 visited Wytham Woods and met with the woodland conservationist, Nigel Fisher. Through his introduction, Danielle Linton was able to assist with specific questions about bat behaviors. Learning and gathering information from all the experts created the basis of my research in this topic. However, Nick Tomlinson became the leading figure as I continued to investigate bats’ relationship with architecture. Source: Network Diagram created by Joyce Ng. Photos from the Bat Conservation Trust, University of Oxford (Wytham Woods) and Hooke Park.


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Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

This interview was intended to gain knowledge on bats and its relation to the woodlands and architecture. In total, there were six participants in this interview: NT

Nick Tomlinson, Bat Expert

CS

Christopher Sadd, Hooke Park Forester

SH

Stephen Hales, Wildlife Expert

ZM

Zachary Mollica, Hooke Park Warden

AL

Aude-Line Duliere (Diploma 18 Tutor)

JN

Joyce Ng (Diploma 18 Student)

NT

So if you imagine these are planks basically down as a box fixed to a tree and then you can put a cavity over there. And they are meant to simulate essentially lighting strikes in wood where the branches split a part because that’s the kind of thing that Barbastelle’s like. And you can make those comparatively small scale or the big bat box that you are talking about. The difficulty is going to be whether you get the results you need in the time scales you’ve got. Say you’ve put the bat box tomorrow, the bats would have started to come out of hibernation. And you took twenty bats in a colony, they would probably hibernate in maybe a dozen, fifteen, even as many as twenty different places and they will all come back together again. When they come back together, it’s all in the early stages now, but when you come back in six weeks or so they will find your box and known it’s there, with out a shadow of a doubt. Whether they will start to use it straight away is.. that’s the bit we won’t know yet.

CS

And it’s possible that it may not be used at all.

NT

It’s really difficult to say. If you could design it so it’s got a bit of heat in it (solar heating), it’s got a number of different orientations, so you are not just coming in one way but you have created it so there iss air going through it. But you don’t want air moving through particularly in when they are in hibernation. Hibernation, is a special case of what we call daily torpid so that’s a bat reducing its energy by bringing its body temperature down to ambient.

Nick Tomlinson is the Principal Ecologist at Nick Tomlinson Ecology. He has worked in the environmental sector for more than 20 years, specialising in bats and carrying out bat surveys for planning applications. Nick has previously worked with the Somerset Wildlife Trust, Dorset Wildlife Trust and the Bat Conservation Trust.


Learning from the Experts

Hibernation is just an extended version of that where it goes even lower as a temperature. So during the year, if its a cold day, they’ll lower their body temperature because otherwise they are wasting heat. So if you’ve got air blowing through somewhere, that air is going to cool you further and takes heat away so they don’t like drafty places. It needs to reasonably air tight. You want a bit of humidity in there so that stops the drying out. Good flight lines and no lights or anything so we could have a look around to see what good siting might be but the difficulty is that you won’t necessarily know by the end of your project whether it’s been successful or not. JN

I have realised that and I think I’ve been seeing my project as more of a process. I don’t see the bat structure as an end result.

NT

Ok.

JN

Because I think I’m going to build and leave the structure here but if it is unsuccessful, there will be different places within Hooke Park where it can be placed. I’m going to pick the best site that could give it the best chance but if it doesn’t work we could try move the structure elsewhere. And there was even talk of… if it doesn’t work here then we could move the structure to the campus in London. But if I am designing for a specific species… then maybe that would change a bit (the structure)?

NT

No, any crevice-dweller will like a crevice wherever you put it. So if you designed it along those lines, it could in theory go anywhere. It might go in straight away. You just don’t know. The way I usually describe bat boxes to people, if you imagine you live in a house and I came along and put a garden shed at the bottom of your garden, so you move out your house and into the back garden. You are not going to because your house is nicer. Bats, where they are, generally speaking, tend to stay because that’s the place that works for them ecologically speaking. That’s why bat boxes can be a bit of challenge because they have kind of found somewhere that is already good. So you need to build somewhere that is better if you see where I am

377

coming from? So we would like to think that we know a lot about bats but we don’t. And trying to say, this is how you build a box for a Barbastelle, that’s based on the fact that somebody has built that and in a few occasions it has been used by a Barbastelle but we don’t know if there is something better that would be even more useful if you see what I mean? So we know what we know but there is a lot we kid ourselves that we know. CS

Question, so I am picking up on straws here but you mentioned about moving the structure possibly. I suppose where we have got to be careful. If a bat or bats decide.. they met the structure and decide they like it there, but once a bat has gone in there and there is evidence of it, we are committed to following the law then are we?

NT

Technically speaking, yes. If it’s been used and its a bat roost, then bat roosts are protected and you can’t just move it. But pragmatically, it would depend on the nature of that use. So if we have gone and checked it and we found one bat in there in one night, my personal Share know bat social view would be take more of a pragmatic in the wo view of it and say “Ok, its been used by a bat for one night, but actually putting it wherever somewhere else that might be would be better for bats overall” and therefore the fact that very technically speaking we are breaking the law, we would move it. On the other hand, if we found what would look like a maternity colony in there, then we wouldn’t move it because then that is the place that they want to breed. And sometimes boxes can be picked up quite quickly. The bats would know that it’s there, the challenge will be knowing whether it’s been used and how long you would want to leave past the day its in until you make that decision (to move it). Perhaps they won’t use it this year, but they could use it next year. Do you want to leave it a year to see? There is also if you look a bat’s year. For example, let’s start now. They are just coming out of hibernation now and they are in lots of individual This interview was conducted on March 4th, 2020 at Hooke Park, AA Woodland Campus. The following pages show selected excerpts from the full interview (1/11).



In the UK, there are 17 bat species and they play a crucial role in the ecosystem.

379

Bats are biodiversity indicators. Bats are pollinators. Bats are seed dispersers. Bats are pest control.

The image (from top) shows a Serotine Bat, Common pipistrelle, Soprano pipistrelle and a Nathusius pipistrelle. Source: Nottinghamshire Bat Group.


380

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

“In Britain all bat species and their roosts are legally protected by two legislations: The Wildlife Countryside Act 1981 (WCA) and The Conservation (Natural Habitats &c.) Regulations 1994


An Introduction to Bats

381

This means you may be committing a criminal offence if you: 1. Deliberately take , injure or kill a wild bat 2. Intentionally or recklessly disturb a bat in its roost or deliberately disturb a group of bats. 3. Damage or destroy a place used by bats for breeding or resting (roosts) (even if bats are not occupying the roost at the time) 4. Possess or advertise/sell/exchange a bat of a species found in the wild in the EU (dead or alive) or any part of a bat. 5. Intentionally or recklessly obstruct access to a bat roost.

Source: Bat Conservation Trust.


382

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

1

1

2 2 3 2 4 5

Bat Roost in Caves

Bat Roost in Trees

Bat Roost i

1

Cracks in rocks

1

Navigational aid

1

Sto

2

Dark tunnels

2

Crack in tree

2

Slat

3

Rotten hole

4

Behind the ivy plant

5

Under the tree bark

Bat Roost Typologies


An Introduction to Bats

te tiles

1

1

2 3

2

3 4 4 1

5

6

5

in Bridges

one pieces

383

Bat Roost in Houses

Bat Roost in Buildings

1

Barge board and roof felt

1

Space between downpipe

2

Broken tiles

2

Metal elements on balconies

3

Eaves

3

Quoins

4

Hanging tiles

4

Loose mortar between bricks

5

Porch

5

Wood cladding

6

Cellar

Bats do not build their own roosts. Instead, they are opportunistic mammals that rely on already built structures. They roost in cracks, crevice and holes of structures such as caves or quarries, trees, bridges, houses and buildings.

Source: Bat Conservation Trust.


384

Crevice-dwelling Bats (that tend to be hidden from view)

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Access Dimensions

Roosting/Nesting Dimensions

Height of Entry

20 - 50mm (w) x 15 - 20mm (h)

Any size as long as some components of the area are crevices in the region of 20 - 30mm

2 - 7m

Greater total areas of about 1sq m would be useful for nursery (summer) roosts Male roosts contain smaller numbers of bats or even individual bats Roof dwelling bats need timber joists to roost

Crevice-dwelling Bats (that may be visible on roof timbers)

20 - 50mm (w) x 15 - 20mm (h)

Any size as long as some components of the area are crevices in the region of 20 - 30mm

Over 2m

Greater total areas of about 1sq m would be useful for nursery (summer) roosts Male roosts contain smaller numbers of bats or even individual bats Roof dwelling bats need timber joists to roost

Crevice-dwelling Bats (require flight space in certain types of roost)

20 - 50mm (w) x 15 - 20mm (h)

5m (w) x 2.8m (h) x 5m (d)

Over 2m

Not trussed, to allow flight Ideally 2.8m height, but a height of 2m may be acceptable in some circumstances To incorporate roost crevices, dimensions as above for crevice-dwelling bats

Bats that need flight space and flying access (Horseshoe bats)

Lesser horseshoe bats: 300 (w) x 200mm (h) Greater horseshoe bats: 400mm (w) x 300mm (h)

Bat Roost Preferences

5m (w) x 2.8m (h) x 5m (d) Not trussed, to allow flight Ideally 2.8m height, but a height of 2m may be acceptable in some circumstances

Above 5m abo ground and a from obstruct and creepers


ove away tions

An Introduction to Bats

Aspect of Roost

Temperature °C Summer

Winter

Summer nursery roosts on most southerly side or westerly aspect for solar heating. However, the risk of overheating should be considered. A location that provides a stable microclimate/regime may work better than one that heats up quickly and loses heat quickly

30 - 40 °C 0 - 6 °C (day time)

The crevice-roosting provision within the roost to be located on the south or west side for solar heating. or in the most thermally stable condition

30 - 40 °C

Rough (for grip), natural materials such as untreated timber, stone or masonary is preferred

Suitable thermal properties (reducing 24-hour fluctuations), but allowing suitable thermal gain for summer roosts

0 - 6 °C

Rough (for grip), natural materials such as untreated timber, stone or masonary is preferred Not toxic or corrosive and no risk of entanglement Suitable thermal properties (reducing 24-hour fluctuations), but allowing suitable thermal gain for summer roosts

30 - 40 °C

0 - 6 °C

Rough (for grip), natural materials such as untreated timber, stone or masonary is preferred Not toxic or corrosive and no risk of entanglement Suitable thermal properties (reducing 24-hour fluctuations), but allowing suitable thermal gain for summer roosts

The location of the flight area is not as important

The roost is most likely to be in a roof space; this should have an orientation that allows a southfacing solar gain or an L-shape to allow temperature-range choice

Materials and Other Comments

Not toxic or corrosive and no risk of entanglement

The location of the flight area is not as important

The crevice-roosting provision within the roost to be located on the south or west side for solar heating. or in the most thermally stable condition

385

30 - 40 °C

6 - 10 °C

Rough (for grip), natural materials such as untreated timber, stone or masonary is preferred Not toxic or corrosive and no risk of entanglement Suitable thermal properties (reducing 24-hour fluctuations), but allowing suitable thermal gain for summer roosts

All UK bat species fall into four different categories of bat roost preferences: There are crevice-dwelling bats like prefer to be hidden from view, crevicedwelling bats that may be visible on roof timbers, crevice-dwelling bats that require interior flight space, and bats that need flying access and interior flight space. Most speces fall into the categories of crevice-dwelling bats, apart from Horseshoe bats that need flying access and interior flight space.

Source: Designing for Biodiversity: A technical Guide for new and existing buildings by K. Gunnell, B. Murphy and Dr. C. Willamas.


386

The Case of Hooke Park

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture


Bats in Hooke Park

387

Although bats are drawn to woodland landscapes, it is believed that the bats of Hooke Park forage in the woods but do not live in it. In the interview with Nick Tomlinson, he explains: “I can’t see much evidence of woodpecker holes or natural splits in these trees. Bats rely on either woodpeckers excavating holes, tree splits due to lightning strikes, trees fall, whatever it might be, natural features that are created by the way the woodland ages… heavily managed woodlands can be quite a challenge from a bat perspective for a living, which is why it is quite intriguing with the campus buildings here.”

Source: Photo taken by Ke Yang, Diploma 18 student.


388

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

GP

GP

GP

GP

GP

Existing Roosts in Hooke Park


GP

389

GP

Bats in Hooke Park

GP

GP

1

2

3

N PIPE

Through conversations with Christopher Sadd and Charlie Wright, it was revealed that there are currently three known bat roosts in Hooke Park:

1

The Big Shed (2012)

2

The Caretaker’s House (2009-2010)

3

Westmister Lodge (1996)


390

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Bat Roost

Stone

Slate

Source: Photo taken by Joyce Ng.

The Big Shed was designed by students of Design and Make and Diploma Unit 19 in 2012. The installation of the bat box was arranged by Christopher Sadd in 2018. There is currently no evidence of bat inhabiting the roost.


Bats in Hooke Park

391

2 3

1

4

in Bridges

pieces

e tiles

1

Restricted vertical distance

Placement of bat box: no optimized warmth

2

Perching spots for predatory birds

3

4

Appropriate height for bat roost


392

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Source: Photo from DesignBoom.

The Caretaker’s House at Hooke Park was designed and built by Intermediate 2 from 2009-2010. According to Charlie Wright, bats could be found flying out of the roof most summers.


Bats in Hooke Park

393

1

2

5

4

1

3

Corrogated metal roof sheet PTimber beam

2

Insulation

3

4

5

Dry Wall Interior Space


394

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Source: AA Archive

The Westminster Lodge was designed and built by Edward Cullinan Architects in 1996. There is currently evidence that a maternity colony lives under the floorboards, accessed through the boiler cupboard.


Bats in Hooke Park

4

3

2

1

Boiler Cupboard

1

Timber beam

2 3

Waterproofing sheet 4

Floorboard

395


396

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

In the 1600s, 8-10% of England’s land cover was ancient woodland

Decrease in natural habitats (such as unmanaged ancient woodlands)

The Emergence of Building-Reliant Species


Beyond Hooke Park

397

Massive deforestation due to demand in timber production after WWII Resulting in fragmented woodlands, loss of habitat connectivity for bats Only 2% of ancient woodland

Historical decline in UK bat populations prior Start of recorded to 1999 historical decline in UK bat population Only 2% of ancient 1970 woodland

Increase in built structure

Historically, bats lived in natural habitats such as woodlands, caves and quarries. However, UK bat populations have declined considerably over the last century. Today, they are under threat from building and development work that affects roosts, loss of habitat, the severing of commuting routes by roads and threats in the home including cat attacks, flypaper and some chemical treatments of building materials.


k

y

398

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

The RIBA Plan of Work organises the process of briefing, designing, delivering, maintaining, operating and using a building into eight stages. It is a framework for all disciplines on construction projects and should be used solely as guidance for the preparation of detailed professional services and building contracts.

0

1

2

3

Strategic Definition

Preparation and Briefing

Concept Design

Spatial Coordinati

Stage Outcome

The best means of achieving the Client Requirements confirmed

at the end of the stage

If the outcome determines that a building is the best means of achieving the Client Requirements, the client proceeds to Stage 1

ap me

es

to fter nd e

ntly or

d d ld has

e d am ables

– for

e ate

Projects span from Stage 1 to Stage 6; the outcome of Stag Project Brief approved by the client and confirmed that it can be accommodated on the site

Architectural Concept approved by the client and aligned to the Project Brief

Architectural and information Spa Coordinated

The brief remains “live” during Stage 2 and is derogated in response to the Architectural Concept

Photograph 4 Loose bricks above the window on the northern elevation which may provide roosting opportunities for crevice-dwelling species.

Photograph 1

Core Tasks

Prepare Client Requirements

Frontage of 1-2 Lincolns Inn’s Field.

during the stage

Develop Business Case for feasible options including review of Project Risks and Project Budget

Photograph 5

Missing and broken slate roof tiles providing potential roosting opportunities for crevice-dwelling bat species.

Photograph 2 Slate tile pitched roof and chimney breasts.

Project Strategies might include: – Conservation (if applicable) – Cost – Fire Safety – Health and Safety Photograph 3 – Inclusive Design Underground vaults at the level. Gaps were evident –basement Planning in the concrete above the wooden – Plan for Use doors. – Procurement – Sustainability See RIBA Plan of Work 2020 Overview for detailed guidance on Project Strategies

Ratify option that best delivers Client Requirements Review Feedback from previous projects Undertake Site Appraisals

Missing brick at the base of the chimney providing potential roosting opportunities for crevicedwelling bat species.

Photograph 7

Prepare Architectural Concept incorporating Strategic Engineering requirements and aligned to Cost Plan, Project Strategies and Outline Specification

Slipped ridge tile on western elevation of 1 Lincolns Inn Fields providing potential access for bats into the roof void.

Undertake Feasibility Studies

Photograph 8

View inside roof void of 1 Lincolns Inn Fields with king post roof formation.

Agree Project Brief Derogations

Agree Project Budget Source Site Information including Site Surveys

Photograph 6

Undertake Design Reviews with client and Project Stakeholders

Prepare Project Programme Prepare Project Execution Plan

23

Strategic appraisal of Planning considerations

during the stage:

Planning Building Regulations Health and Safety (CDM)

Initiate Change C Procedures

Photograph 9

Prepare stage De Programme

View inside roof void of 1 Lincolns Inn Fields.

Prepare stage Design Programme

The loft space was lined with bitumen felt which was lifted in places, providing potential roosting opportunities for crevice-dwelling bat species.

23

The Ecology Consultancy 1-2 Lincolns Inn Field, London /Preliminary Roost Assessment / David Chipperfield Architects

24

24

The Ecology Consultancy 1-2 Lincolns Inn Field, London /Preliminary Roost Assessment / David Chipperfield Architects

25

Source pre-application Planning Advice

Obtain pre-application Planning Advice

Review design ag Building Regulat

Initiate collation of health and safety Pre-construction Information

Agree route to Building Regulations compliance

Prepare and sub Planning Applic

Option: submit outline Planning Application

See Planning Note f submitting a Plannin earlier than at end o

RIBA Plan of Work: Bat Surveys Procurement Route

Undertake Desig Engineering Ana Cost Exercises to Architectural Co resulting in Spat Coordinated des to updated Cost Strategies and O Specification

No design team required for Stages 0 and 1. Client advisers may be appointed to the client team to provide strategic advice and design thinking before Stage 2 commences.

The Ecology Consultancy 1-2 Lincolns Inn Field, London /Preliminary Roost Assessment / David Chipperfield Architects

Core Statutory Processes

Prepare Project Brief including Project Outcomes and Sustainability Outcomes, Quality Aspirations and Spatial Requirements

Traditional

Design & Build 1 Stage Design & Build 2 Stage

Appoint client team

Appoint design team

ER

Management Contract Construction Management

Appoint contractor

Contractor-led

Information Exchanges

at the end of the stage

Pre-contract se

ER

Preferr

Client Requirements

Project Brief

Project Brief Derogations

Signed off Stage

Business Case

Feasibility Studies

Signed off Stage Report

Project Strategie

Site Information

Project Strategies

Project Budget

Outline Specification

Updated Outline Specification


ion

Beyond Hooke Park

4

5

6

Technical Design

Manufacturing and Construction Handover

399

7 Use

ge 0 may be the decision to initiate a project and Stage 7 covers the ongoing use of the building.

d engineering atially

gn Studies, alysis and o test oncept tially sign aligned Plan, Project Outline

Control

esign

gainst tions

bmit cation

for guidance on ng Application of Stage 3

All design information required to manufacture and construct the project completed Stage 4 will overlap with Stage 5 on most projects

Develop architectural and engineering technical design Prepare and coordinate design team Building Systems information Prepare and integrate specialist subcontractor Building Systems information Prepare stage Design Programme

Manufacturing, construction and Commissioning completed

Building handed over, Aftercare initiated and Building Contract concluded

Stage 7 starts concurrently with Stage 6 and lasts for the life of the building

There is no design work in Stage 5 other than responding to Site Queries

Finalise Site Logistics Manufacture Building Systems and construct building

Hand over building in line with Plan for Use Strategy Undertake review of Project Performance

Monitor progress against Construction Programme

Undertake seasonal Commissioning

Inspect Construction Quality

Rectify defects

Resolve Site Queries as required

Complete initial Aftercare tasks including light touch Post Occupancy Evaluation

Undertake Commissioning of building

Building used, operated and maintained efficiently

Implement Facilities Management and Asset Management Undertake Post Occupancy Evaluation of building performance in use Verify Project Outcomes including Sustainability Outcomes

Prepare Building Manual Specialist subcontractor designs are prepared and reviewed during Stage 4

Building handover tasks bridge Stages 5 and 6 as set out in the Plan for Use Strategy

Submit Building Regulations Application

Carry out Construction Phase Plan

Discharge precommencement Planning Conditions

Comply with Planning Conditions related to construction

Comply with Planning Conditions as required

Adaptation of a building (at the end of its useful life) triggers a new Stage 0

Comply with Planning Conditions as required

Prepare Construction Phase Plan

Since bats became protected by the ‘The Wildlife Countryside Act 1981

Submit form F10 to HSE if (WCA)’, it has been required by law to obtain bat survey reports as part applicable Tender ER CP

Appoint contractor

ervices agreement

CP

Appoint contractor

red bidder

CP

Appoint contractor

of getting planning permission. Surveys need to show whether protected Appoint species are present in the area or nearby, and how they use the site. contractor

e Report

Manufacturing Information

es

Construction Information

e

Final Specifications Residual Project Strategies

Appoint Facilities Management and Asset Management teams, and strategic advisers as needed

Building Manual including Health and Safety File and Fire Safety Information Practical Completion certificate including

Feedback on Project Performance

Feedback from Post Occupancy Evaluation

Final Certificate

Updated Building Manual Trust. Bat Conservation including Health and Safety File and Fire Safety

Feedback from light touch Post Occupancy Evaluation

Source: RIBA Plan of Work.


400

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Source: Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government.

Threat to bats: Permitted Development 2012 With the approved Premitted Development of 2012, homeowners are now allowed to renovate parts of their home without a planning permission. This could greatly affect existing roosts in the building or in the area.


Beyond Hooke Park

Source: Passivhaus Institut.

Threat to bats: ‘Passive’ House Building developments today aim to be a compact, air-sealed structure for energy efficiency. This decreases roosting opportunities for bats to find warm roosts.

401


402

The Biodiversity Net Gain

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture


Biodiversity Gain in Architectural Practice

403

As recent as 2018, a new revised National Planning Policy Framework was published, in which it highlights a new proposal for all developments to have a biodiversity net gain (in both flora and fauna). This is a relatively new idea and protected species and building-reliant species are currently under revision to be included in the calculation of biodiversity net gain.

Source: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.


404

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Playing with the Ru with Tempora

Playing with the Ru with Exteri

Playing with the Ru with Interi

Playing with the Rules of Architecture


Biodiversity Gain in Architectural Practice

405

ules of Architecture ary Structures

ules of Architecture ior Spaces

ules of Architecture ior Spaces

Bats are protected species and it is true that one can see building a bat roost as a way for wildlife conservation. However, the status of bat species in the UK could be used to play with the rules or architecture and turn something temporary to permanent due to bats’ protected status. The drawing above illustrates three different approaches.


406

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Slanted surfaces for rain runoff and sun exposure

Height of entry point at least 2m or more

Tunnel for visitors to walk through structure

Project X: A Stand-Alone Bat Roost (Proposal)


Biodiversity Gain in Architectural Practice

Tiles with max. sun exposure (South facing)

407

Roof openings

Textured surface for crawling

Interior Flight Space

Entry/Exit Point (North facing)

Human access for bat monitoring

Pale, Scented flowers

Stand alone bat structures can be built anywhere in any size. It can also play with the rule of permanence. Once a structure is built with evidence of bat inhabitation, it is illegal to disturb, harm or obstruct the bats or bat roosts. This rule can be used beyond the bat roost itself. It could be used to intervene or protect a site or an environment.


408

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Void (stretches along structure)

0m

Project Y: A Residence (Under Construction)

5m


Biodiversity Gain in Architectural Practice

409

South facing Roof Void

0m

5m

A four storey residence can also be considered to host a bat roost, especially if is closer to the ground near a garden. Bats are often unseen (as they come out only in the summer nights) and eat insects in the garden. They are good indicators of the well-being of a garden or environment. This project is one of the many contemporary homes which could improve on welcoming bats within the structure. **The nature of giving the anonymity to the project is to bring focus to the overall idea, rather than the design intervention itself.


410

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Farncombe Street (Existing) Temperature Variation

Farncombe Street (Existing) Heat Flux

Exterior temperature (winter): 1 째C Interior temperature (winter): 21 째C

Exterior temperature (winter): 1 째C Interior temperature (winter): 21 째C

The Void: A Study of Temperature Variation


Biodiversity Gain in Architectural Practice

Farncombe Street (Existing) Temperature Variation

Farncombe Street (Existing) Heat Flux

Exterior temperature (summer): 30 째C Interior temperature (summer): 21 째C

Exterior temperature (summer): 30 째C Interior temperature (summer): 21 째C

411

Temperature variation in a bat roost is very important. It allows for the bat to crawl into the most comfortable and ideal space. In the winter time, bats will seek warm roosts. Therefore, voids used for bat roosts can also be studied. Is it possible to share the heat and energy used in the interior living spaces to become shared with the bat roost?


412

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Insulation

Insu

Timber beam

T

Fibre cement Timber beam tile

Window

Interior flig space

The Void: A Bat Roost


Biodiversity Gain in Architectural Practice

ulation

413

Insulation

Timber beam

Interior flight space

Fibre cement tile

Fibre cement tile

Roof plant

Roof plant

Window

Window

ght

0m

2m

The void highlighted in the section of the residential project can be designed into a roost by simply creating an access point on the South facing roof. The side of this particular void is substantially larger than a typical bat box which means it could cater to species that require interior flight space.


414

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Void in the vault arch

Project Z: An Apartment Building (Completed 2018)


Biodiversity Gain in Architectural Practice

415

Void in the vault arch (above carpark)

0m

5m

Taller buildings may have larger voids as part of their structure or design. This would be ideal for crevice-dwelling bats that like to fly into or fly inside their roost. In this particular project, a vault arch was designed for the lobby area. This vault is a large void of about 3 meters. This project is one of the many contemporary apartment buildings which could improve on welcoming bats within the structure. During the discussion with the lead architect about the proposed idea, he responded positively: “I’m totally for it. It is a very clever use. It is a void, it is not used for anything so we should find a positive use for it”. And when asked if a brick could be taken out as a start of a guerllia project, he said “I am fine with that. No problem”. **The nature of giving the anonymity to the project is to bring focus to the overall idea, rather than the design intervention itself.


416

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

Concrete panel Concrete panel

Void in vault arch

In-situ concrete

Concrete To Carpark

0m

The Void in the Vault Arch: A Bat Roost

3m


Biodiversity Gain in Architectural Practice

417

Concrete panel Concrete panel

Void in vault arch

In-situ concrete

Concrete To Carpark

0m

3m

As shown in the section, with a tunnel access of about 3m, the bats would be able to crawl into the vault arch to roost. Since the void is situated at the core of the building, the bat roost will fit the criteria of pitch darkness and high level of warmth. Upon speaking to the leading architect for this particular project, he was delighted to learn that actually more could have been done for bat roosts in his building.


This is the story of a bat.

Finding its way through the destroyed woodlands,

looking for a place to roost.

With a lack of woodpecker holes, the bat finds itself competing with other And when the bat finds a roost in an old wildlife. building,

human intrusion forces it to leave the roost.

So what if...

there was a bat roost in the park?

Or...

living with us,

in a roost designed within a new residential home?

Or...

even a roost

designed within the void of a tall buliding?


What more can we do with our architectural knowledge to cater to the vulnerable building-reliant creatures of the natural world?

419

Source: Animation film by Joyce Ng.


420

Embracing the Wildlife within Architecture

The Cultural and Procedural Interventions for the Integration of Building-Relient Species within Architecture Implementation of Roosts for Building-Reliant Species: Document S

PROCEDURAL BASED APPROACH

Outcome

1

1A

Building Regulations

Review design against building regulations

National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF): Biodiversity Net Gain

Policy

Submit building regulations application

Revision of ‘Susta Outcome Guide’,sp on ‘Sustainable La and Biodiversity’, on work stages 2

RIBA Work Stages

0

Strategic Definition

1

Preparation and Briefing

2

Concept Design

3

Spatial Coordination

4

Technical Design 1B

2A

Outcome

Client Awareness of Environmental and Ecological Importance in Building Projects

New Building Projects Client Request (ie. developer, homeowner)

Development

Adjustment in Practice. Bat consultant, Architect and Client involvement.

3

Client Approved: Building Design

4

Required Bat surveys

3A

4A

Outcome

Project Timeline

This diagram illustrates the interventions required in the procedural realm and the cultural realm of a new building project in order to shift the attitude in architectural design, an attitude that push architects and designers to practice inclusivity for building-reliant species.

1

1A

1

Intervention Outcome

1A

Implementation of Roosts for Building-Reliant Species: Document S. An additonal ‘approved document’ as part of the building regulations should be implemented. The document will require projects to take into account voids or considered ‘useless’ spaces to become roosts for building-reliant species. The document would also include appropriate materials use and environmental conditions. Outcome. An additional

1B

2

document in the building regulations means all projects going through the building regulation application process must consider how the building design caters to buildingreliant species. Outcome. An approved building regulation application proposing the implementation of roosts for building-reliant species means that the proposed ideas must be implemented in all work stages 3 and onwards. Revision of ‘Sustainability Outcome Guide’,

Start of Project

CULTURAL BASED APPROACH

specifically on the Chapter of ‘Sustainable Land Use Biodiversity’, applied on work stages 1 - 7. Every work stage has sustainability outcomes which is extracted from the ‘Sustainability Outcome Guide’. However, not every work stage includes key points from the ‘Sustainable Land Use and Biodiversity’ chapter which it should. It is important that the guide is revised to highlight the importance of long term planning, fauna (which must explicitly mention building-reliant species),

Duration of Work Stages Dependent on Project

2A

3

and also the need for green connectivity even if the project site show no presence of buildingreliant species. Outcome. The improved requirements for sustainable outcomes means each work stage will be improved to better building-reliant species from the start to end of a building project. Client Awareness of Environmental and Ecological Importance in Building Projects. The environmental and


s

Biodiversity Gain in Architectural Practice

421

Submit building regulations application

ainability pecifically and Use applied s 1 - 7.

5

6

7

Manufacturing Handover and Construction

Use

3B

Outcome Building structure foundation, load bearing elements): 50 - 60 years

4B

Outcome

Building skin (exterior surfaces): average 20 years

4C

Outcome

End of Construction Start of Building Use

Bat Roost (Variation for bat species): 100+ years without disturbance

3A

ecological awareness in the early stages of a building project is one method to help clients get on board the need to cater to building-reliant species. It would also be a chance to discuss fears and potential risks (such as legal obligations and maintenance) in order to reach a design solution that benefits the client and the local habitat. Outcome. Awareness of the importance for catering to buildingreliant species will result in a change in attitude and

Building in Use 25 years

3B

4

conversation within the design process. It would seek for a balance to reach human and wildlife needs. Outcome. The completed building in use would be able to fulfil the need of the client but also have acquired knowledge and responsibility of what it means to contribute, maintain and enhance biodiversity. Adjustment in Practice. Bat Consultant, Architect, and Client Involvement. Typically client and bat consultants are most involved in the early

4D

Outcome

Building in Use 50 years

Building in Use 75 years

stages of the work whilst the architect continue to materialize the building work. However, it is important to shift this work ethic to include both the client and the bat expert throughout the the work stages. It is not enough to call for the bat expert in stage 1 for surveying and one more meeting later to install a bat box. Bats (and other building-reliant species) require more than a bat box and any voids in buildings should be consider of use to thevulnerable wildlife.

Bat consultants could offer their insight on bat roost locations, orientations, materiality, and connectivity. Wheras clients could be reassured that bats and bat roosts would not directly interfere with day-to-day lifestyles and will have very different access and navigational routes from humans using the building. Outcome. Decision making in all parts of the work stages will directly impact the final design for building-reliant species.

4A

Building in Use 100 years

4B

4C

4D

Outcome. Strategically chosen strutural elements with longer life spans. could protect bat roosts Outcome. Strategically chosen building skin elements with longer life spans could protect bat roosts for longer. Outcome. Intricate design solutions every step of the way could protect bat roosts for longer. Bats tend to roost in the same place for generations, any loss of bat roosts is detrimental to the wellbeing of bat populations in the UK.


422

Bibliography

BCT. (2018) Bats and Artificial Lighting in the UK: Bats and the Built Environment Series. Bat Conservation Trust. BCT. (2015) Bats and Buildings. Bat Conservation Trust (BCT). BCT (2006) Commissioned Report No. 160. A review of the success of bat boxes in houses. Bat Conservation Trust & Scottish Natural Heritage. Christian C. Voigt, Tigga Kingston. (2016) Bats in the Anthropocene: Conservation of Bats in a Changing World. Springers. Dorset Bat Group. (2019) Dorset Bat Group: Bat Distribution in Dorset. Dorset Bat Group & Dorset Wildlife Trust. Dorset Bat Group. (2019) Dorset Bat Group: Bat Information Leaflet 1 & 2. Dorset Bat Group & Dorset Wildlife Trust. Garland, L., Wells, M., Markham. S. (2017) Performance of maternity bat roost structures near Bath, UK. Conservation Evidence 14, 44-45. Gunnell, K., Grant, G., Williams, C. (2012) Landscape and urban Design for bats and biodiversity. Bat Conservation Trust (BCT). Nature-Smart Cities. (2018) Nature-Smart Cities: Urban Bat Life. Avaliable at: https://naturesmartcities.com/. (Accessed 3 March 2020). Schilthuizen, M. (2018) Darwin Comes to Town: How the Urban Jungle Drives Evolution. Macmillan. Tree, I. (2019) Wilding: The Return of Nature to a British Farm. Picador. Tuttle, M., Kiser, M., Kiser, S. (2013) The Bat House Builder’s Handbook. Bat Conservation International. Wild West End. (2017) Wild West End. Avaliable at: http://www. wildwestend.london/about. (Accessed 3 March 2020).




The Possibility of an Island at the AA or How to Deschool Ourselves Agency is at the heart of being an architect. And architecture school is a critical environment for students to not only find their own agency, but to practice it. We argue for the importance of schools to translate this pedagogical need into spaces that explicitly invite actions of immediacy and intuition. Let students grow a sense of agency by having the freedom to alter, intervene and restructure their major tool of learning – that is their physical learning environment. An isolated and unmanaged woodland site in Hooke Park, nicknamed the “Island”, offers itself as a potent environment where students can test, fail and negotiate with their own thoughts. Agency is cultivated from within, rather than without. The “Island”, therefore becomes a training ground to practice agency and to sit with the consequences of what you do. No one can decide for you how you should act, and therefore live.

The forest also becomes a metaphor for our world today – increasingly unstable and indeterminant. In the “Island”, people see freedom in responding to their environment with small, immediate and meaningful gestures. New forms of engagement with each other and with the environment reveal an alternative community of learners who engage with means of mutuality and collaborative survival. We invite you to our first squat to inaugurate this space where we will assemble and celebrate the establishment of a platform. Please keep in touch @hookeisland via email connie.tang@aaschool.ac.uk, nicole-hui-min.ng@aaschool. ac.uk.

Please watch our video: https://youtu.be/rmZQynQt788

09

Connie Lynn Tang & Nicole Ng


426

CHAPTERS PART I AA as a pedagogical project A diagnosis of engagement in Hooke Park An anti-manifesto for the “Island� Radical pedagogies in architectural education The Island of Hooke Park

PART II An island as a space of counterculture Making an island away from institutional liabilities The Island as a legitimate facility of the AA Future: A new learning culture in the Island Now: Squat our own school

Please watch our video: https://youtu.be/rmZQynQt788



428

The Possibility of an Island in the AA

A need to re-evaluate architectural education today

Source: Photograph of an open letter in a studio in Bartlett

The architectural profession is realising that our pedagogical methodologies are becoming increasingly irrelevant. In a petition with more than 2000 signatures of students and educators, it declares that the profession is in crisis. The daily practice of architecture is at the frontlines of capital accumulation, in contrast to our social and environmental preoccupations in school.


429

In 2019, an open letter called for institutions to diversify collaborative modes of learning, re-evaluate the aesthetic dimension of our practice and decolonise our discipline.

Source: architecturaleducationdeclares.com


430

The Possibility of an Island in the AA

Slides from Hooke Park Futures workshop held between May to July 2020


431

AA School as a Pedagogical Project

EN

D

FI

N

O

C

Architectural Association 2020–25 Strategic Plan

Strategic Plan AA School of Architecture

L

1

Architec Associa 2020–25 Strategic Plan

TI A

Architectural Association 2020–25 Strategic Plan

Architec Associa 2020–25 Strategic Plan

Source: Screenshot of Teams discussion with AA director, Eva Franch, with 80+ AA members

School-wide conversations about pedagogy

The AA Strategic Plan series was launched in Term 3 2020 to open the dialogue to the entire community about how we envision ourselves in the next 5 years. In parallel, a workshop about the future of Hooke Park was launched for interested students to brainstorm how to make Hooke Park a financially sustainable venture.


432

The Possibility of an Island in the AA

“Islands” of pedagogical experimentation in AA’s history “A band of friends” The objective of the association was for architects to form as a band of friends. Their first meetings in the inns of Chanery, they had an experimental nature of a system of mutual aid and an advocancy for the end of self-education. Source: AA archives

Unit trips When they were first introduced, students would travel to architecturally significant sites like Rome or Athens. Less popular (but maybe more adventurous) were road trips, motorbike trips, camping trips around UK and Europe. Source: AA archives and photo library, accessed April 2020

“Soft Technologies” At the same time that Archigram was prominent, there were architects from the AA who advocated for the profession’s attention to ecological and environmental issues and “soft” technology. Architects like Colin Moorcraft and Martin Pawley resisted the dominant narratives of Archigram’s cybernetic avant-garde. Left: Recycling column by Moorcraft, September 1971 Right: Architectural Design magazine July 1972 issue guest edited by Colin Moorcraft on the issue of “Designing for Survival”.


433

AA School as a Pedagogical Project

Mount House 1944 The school evacuated to Barnet during the war. Students lived communal for once, at a time that it was usual for males and females to co-habit. Source: AA archives and photo library, accessed April 2020 384

390

International Institute of Design 1970-72 Alvin Boyarsky developed his pedagogy of international diversity in his independent summer school sessions. The pedagogical experimentation influenced Boyarsky’s implementation of the unit system at the AA when he became director.

Figure 2.27

Figure 2.21

Alvin Boyarsky, “In Progress IV,” Architectural Design (April 1971)

Source: Sunwoo, Irene. Between the ‘Well-Laid Table’ and the ‘Marketplace’: Alvin Boyarsky’s 415 Experiments in Architectural Pedagogy, 2013

In Progress V, International Institute of Design Summer Session, 1971 (part 1)

Rational Technology Unit 73-4 The establishment of the Rational Technology Unit in 1973 therefore reinstated environmental design pedagogy at the AA. They conducted a wide-range of studies on the energy consumption of buildings, both historical and 421 contemporary, as well as studies of traditional and “alternative” technologies. Unit tutors Godfrey Boyle and Peter Harper. Editors of the British magazine Undercurrents, Boyle and Harper in their book championed “the growth of small-scale techniques suitable for use by individuals and communities in a wider social context of humanized production under workers’ and consumers’ control

416

Figure 3.29

Derek Taylor, windmill report, Rational Technology Unit, 73-4 (1974)

Figure 3.28

Figure 3.30

Source: Sunwoo, Irene. Between the ‘Well-Laid Table’ and the ‘Marketplace’: Alvin Boyarsky’s Experiments in Architectural Pedagogy, 2013

Rational Technology Unit 73-4, AA unit publication (1974)

Wind generator, AA Windmill Workshop, 1975-76 (AA Projects Review)


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AA School as a Pedagogical Project

A tremendous capacity for engagement with Hooke Park’s workshop facilities Hooke Park has a tremendous capacity for students to engage within the campus and workshops freely. With a staff team consisting of a workshop manager, technical coordinator and robotics developer, the workshops have an established system to accommodate student projects. On the other hand, we argue that it lacks that same capacity for students to engage with its woodlands. With a forester now only working 2 days a week, it is more difficult for engagement with the woodland context. Source: Pictures from Hooke Park’s instagram account


20 min

10 min

2 min

campus


The further one goes from the campus, the more difficult it is for the staff at Hooke Park to supervise and accommodate any activities.

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Any activities that are conducted in Hooke Park needs to be supervised by the staff, to ensure compliance with Health and Safety regulations. As Hooke Park is lacking in manpower capacity, most of the activity is limited within the boundaries of the campus. Approximate walking duration starting from the campus Source: Accessed October 2019, https://osmaps.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/

Source


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Handle & Switch

Emergency Stop

Clamps

Adjustment

Handle Handle Adjustment

Adjustment Clamp

Emergency Stop

Emergency Stop (Behind)

Handle

Material insert Emergency Stop Emergency Stop

Adjustment

Foot Brake

Foot Switch Angle Adjustment

Spindle Power Blade Feed Unit

Material Insert

Adjustment Emergency Stop

Emergency Stop

Extractor

Foot Brake

Emergency Stop Adjustment

Digital Fabrication

Emergency Stop

Emergency Stop

Adjustment

Emergency Stop

Emergency Stop

Metal Workshop Adjustment

Emergency Stop

Switch

Handles

Handles

Speed Adjustment

A catalogue of workshop equipment prepared by Ele, Sorana and Nicole

The well equipped and very spacious workshop is the main facility that AA students use during their stay here.

Live centre (Spindle)

Dead centre

Angle adjustment

Switch


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A Diagnosis of Engagement in Hooke Park

It costs £24* per night to stay at Hooke Park. This includes per night accommodation in Westminster Lodge, a scheduled meal service as well as a room cleaning service This is the only way to stay and be at Hooke Park now. Hooke Park can sometimes feel like a resort. We are “tourists” who pay per night accommodation come to utilize the workshop and enjoy the woodland scenery.

*Information accessed in 2019. Please check updated prices.



Diploma 18’s activities in Hooke Park were a test for the elasticity of Hooke Park as a place to accommodate diverse forms of engagement and experimentation for both AA’s students and tutors

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Diploma 18 engaging with the woodlands Source: Various photographers of Diploma 18


The Possibility of an Island in the AA

Diploma 18 as a test of Hooke Park’s elasticity


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Circled are things we faced difficulty and restriction in doing. Striked out are things we were not allowed The real experiences of our unit have been an opportunity to interrogate, be a litmus test for the elasticity and realities of Hooke Park as a place to accommodate experimentation for all students. Throughout the year, both students and tutors of Diploma 18 went to Hooke Park with an aspiration to be able to test our ideas. We did not only want to visit and build but to be a part of the life here.

We started the first term with the brief of designing a temporary settlement for our unit. Unable to accommodate the brief, we took more individual routes in our projects. This timeline maps how both our tutors and students were excited with ideas and an expectation of immediacy to start testing and doing, but were faced with obstacles time and time again. Image: A timeline of Diploma 18’s activities in Hooke Park


Photograph by Aude-line Dulière


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Question 1

Question 2

Can we move some of the wood under pole barn to a place in the forest just 5 min away?

Can we do the brick barbecue next to the pole barn?

Locations

Barbecue (prototype of our prototype) the final version will be more stable and safe to grill on.

Pole barn / Barbecue loc

Lunch location

The idea is to bring the food from the pole barn barbecue to a lunch meal in the forest 5 min away.

Reconstructed from request document made by Alice and Clara

A barbecue with the unit in the woods In Term 1, we had a hard time to get approval to have a barbeque fire for our jury day. Initially, we wanted it to happen in the woods. We eventually agreed on a location along the dirt track.


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Hooke Park’s internal “planning permission”

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This form is an “internal planning permission” that was created in February 2020 as a response to facilitate the conversation and negotiation with the myriad of projects from our unit. It revealed to us that Hooke Park’s capacity is heavily dependent on constant staff supervision, and hence limited by the staff-student ratio and office hours. One of our colleagues who was designing a bat roost structure was told that the structure had to go through approval in order to ensure that it fits “with the image and aesthetic of Hooke Park”. Who decides this, I would assume it should be the students? Building in Hooke Park proposal form. This form still remains confidential and not for wider circulation within the AA school community. Source: Hooke Park Management, February 2020.


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Source: Email by Connie to the warden

Pruning branches in the woods InTerm 2, we wanted to go prune some branches for a test in the “Island”. We were instructed to be at a site nearer the campus. This is the email we sent to the warden to update him that we are safe in the woods. If we were to go to the “island” the next time, it was adviced that we update him every hour.



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Source: AA Strategic Plan 2020 Vision and Mission

The school vision has a lot to do with empowering students to create their own agency. We feel that there is a contradiction in what is being said and what we can do. The ground zero of agency is to be able have a campfire, or to cut a branch.


An anti-manifesto for the “Island”

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Agency *ag-

“to drive, draw forth or out, move”, a proto-Indo-European root meaning

agentia

“a mode of exerting power or producing effect”, from Medieval Latin

agentem

“effective, powerful”

agere

“to set in motion, drive forward; to do, perform”

sense of agency “the sense that I am the one who is causing or generating an action” (Gallagher, 2000);

“the bodily experience of initiating and controlling an action” (Moore, 2016)


The Possibility of an Island in the AA

A rejection of all the n in Hooke Park led us knocked over a tree a needed permission to


Institutional liability of the AA

negotiations needed to do anything deep into the woodlands, where we and started digging, even though we o do so.



What Hooke Park is not, the “Island” can be. The “Island” can exists as a counterpoint to Hooke Park.


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Design Principles of Sea Ranch, a coastal residential development in California Source: The Sea Ranch Archives

A reference of an anti-manifesto that helped us be critical about Hooke Park and list contrapunctal principles to the existing Hooke Park experience. The Sea Ranch Principles were published by landscape architect Lawrence Halprin together with other graphic representations, summarizing the process and concept behind the design of the Sea Ranch community that distinguished it from other residential developments during the 1960s.


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An anti-manifesto for the “Island”, inspired by Sea Ranch Principles


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In April, we sat down with Kristin and Jessica, 1st and 2nd year masters students at Taliesin School of Architecture

CLT

What is the history of Taliesin school and what is it like living and studying there now?

J

In the 1930s, Frank Lloyd Wright moved here and he established a fellowship that had an educational program to it, so you were an apprentice. But it wasn’t only about architecture, it was about being part of the community. So it was about cooking and harvesting and being part of theater and dance and music. When you signed up to live here and study here, you were laying bricks and you were singing in the fire. It was very multidisciplinary. Now, we have in a master’s program that is accredited. It shares some of the ethos that was established there. For example, we have this thing called the Joy List in which every week you have a different task, whether that is preparing food or cleaning the dishes. We still eat together twice a day. So there is this big community involved and we live like a big family in a way. There’s not many of us. It’s about like twenty four or so. But I would say that the community involvement is a really big part of it.

NN

[On the topic of the potential closure of Taliesin school] I think societally, we see that all around the world - schools are also slowly becoming mechanisms of profit making.

K

Yeah, aspects of education is missing in a lot of those scenarios, and that’s why we’ve been fighting so hard to save it. You know, it’s not only about us and our immediate futures, but we feel that we’re fighting for something. Something that is deeper, that has a heritage and that should be available to people in the future. It’s really sad to see something like this cease to be an option because there are so few opportunities to get alternative educations. It wasn’t until I discovered Taliesin, that I made this major life shift to come here and learn by doing and learn by being in nature and responding to nature and doing things in a communal setting and embracing it as this holistic lifestyle


Radical Pedagogies in Architectural Education

“AS OUR PROFESSOR CHRIS LASH SAID TO US JOKINGLY, IDEAS DON’T KEEP YOU WARM. IT’S TRUE”

that I feel like I really understood why I wanted to work. We don’t have to aspire to be starchitects. And we don’t have to be competing to make the craziest looking drawings. That’s not the point. The point is the human experience and the connections you gain and how you can interact with the natural environment in a way that isn’t destructive and really elevates the human experience of architecture while still honoring the resources that we use to create it. And, you know, I feel like it’s a whole mentality that is so rare in our global society but it is critical if we’re going to solve major issues. And, you know, it’s goes deep - what we feel that it is we’re fighting for here. It’s about what’s happening to us as individuals. But I think we all recognize that it’s about way more than that. And we wouldn’t be here if we didn’t feel that way. J

I remember a reading about Black Mountain. Education was a means and the end was the actual individual. I feel like that actually carries out very similar to how we learn here. Everything that happens in that time actually shapes you into the designer, architect or individual that you’re going to become. And, you know, it is very experiential. It’s hard to ignore the things that you are, the things that are right in front of you. Oftentimes we visit architecture like going to a cathedral or going to a church, and you’re only there for a liminal period of time. You only get to be in awe. But you don’t get to actually experience the intimacy of the architecture. Like, what does it smell like? What does it creak like? How does my high relate to the building? And,by living in an architecture, you get to experience it in this intimate way that you realize leaks everywhere. Of course, that impression is important. But personally, I’ve learned that the qualities of a building are not the first impression that is really sexy, but it’s actually the qualitative interior.

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Picnic and musical performance at the main campus building. Source: Taliesin School of Architecture.

After building completion. Source: Taliesin School of Architecture.

NN

K

It is incredible that you can speak so passionately about your education and really believe deeply in your experience. We feel very grateful to be here. We’re experiencing firsthand a lot of what’s going wrong with culture in general, where other economic interests are driving the soul out of things. And we see it in our government, we see it on all these levels of society. And we’re just having this experience of it in a very personal way.

This interview was conducted online Zoom 04 May 2020.


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“We have been incredibly fortunate to experience an education which transcends the classroom. We live in shelters in the Sonoran Desert built by our colleagues and predecessors. We wake with the sun beaming over the mountain and the choir of the quails. We cook meals for each other, enjoying the bonds of communal living which have united humans throughout history and which are increasingly rare in our culture today. The experience of living fundamentally with nature and with each other, literally building the roofs over our own heads while learning current software and design methodologies, is profound and represents what it means to be a student here.” - From the statement by Taliesin students address the school’s closure

In their open letter addressing the School of Architecture at Taliesin’s closure, the student body quoted Wright’s wife, Olgivanna: “It is not enough to leave behind you monuments of buildings, you owe it to future generations to leave monuments of human beings.” Source: Photo courtesy the School of Architecture at Taliesin


Radical Pedagogies in Architectural Education

J

NN

K

Our day-to-day experience in the Sonoran desert is kind of a form of education. I mean, yeah, it is weird to say that to someone that’s not here, but it’s part of your subconscious especially when you’re living out in the shelter. I remember I would sense time through temperature shifts, like we have this crazy temperature shift at night. It’s like a 30 degree temperature shift. So in my sleep, I knew what time it was because I was a little colder. Oh, it’s by 1:00 in the morning and I’m still in sleep. But anyhow, I would start hearing all these insects go crazy at 5:00 in the morning and I just knew, OK its 5:00 in the morning. But this sense of like physically experiencing your surroundings through the sounds of ecology are like beyond just the building. It’s kind of like osmosis, right, where like this thing is happening around you and inevitably is becoming part of the learning process without the overriding intention. It wasn’t until I read this book called Biophilia this semester that I realized, oh, there’s things that a biologist does for a living is what I’ve been unofficially doing just because it’s around me. And so, you know, when you’re in graduate school, you’re studying that doesn’t stop in the books or in the computer. And so you’re kind of like in this headspace of research and observation. And I think its mindfulness in a way.

I have a practical question about how a building project is initiated in Taliesin school. How do your projects fit with construction regulations? There is an approval process where they do analyze for safety within the school. We are in a zoning that allows experiments in the architectural zone. So the normal codes don’t apply here. We are actually in a unique situation in terms of our flexibility to do this, because we have a zoning that allows for it. I don’t think you can do what we’re doing in the middle of Phoenix. Of course, we still do

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“I FEEL LIKE IT’S A WHOLE MENTALITY THAT IS SO RARE IN OUR GLOBAL SOCIETY, BUT IT IS CRITICAL IF WE’RE GOING TO SOLVE MAJOR ISSUES. IT GOES DEEP WHAT WE FEEL THAT IT IS WE’RE FIGHTING FOR HERE.” have to adhere through the process of creating construction documents to save construction protocols NN

J

Could you tell us about how the school’s Shelter program came about in the Sonoran desert landscape? The appeal of the program in the 30s was for young architects. It was during the time of the depression in America. So it was like to entice young architects with this idea that they too can build architecture. The kind of idea of the dwelling unit is that they would study here and they would design their way they live. When you go to your shelter process, you either you choose a site and it’s either an empty pod or it’s an existing one. You either choose to renovate an existing shelter, demolish an existing shelter or you choose an empty slate.

K

Another interesting point to make is that there is some kind of natural selection happening that determines how shelters are preserved. So the ones that are the most successful as living environments are the ones that are the best maintained. There is some kind of trial by fire in terms of success of shelter as a living dwelling. Some might be more sculptural and maybe less geared towards comfort but nonetheless some really stand out in terms of desirability. Those are the ones people really improve and maintain.

This interview was conducted online Zoom 04 May 2020.


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Celebrating the completion of a new shelter “Icarus” with a meal. Source: Taliesin School of Architecture.

J

Yeah, they’re kind of interesting thing is that through the years there’s always the favorites and they’re the ones that are a little bit more comfortable and have more semblance of a home. Those are liked more than the ones that are a little bit more exposed or to expose.

J

I think there’s a lot to actually learn from the decisions you make and how they affect immediately the quality of life. And I think that’s something that’s so removed from architecture is this kind of responsibility that you are responsible for the quality of life of the person who was inhabiting the space or passing through that space. And that’s a huge responsibility to consider. And it’s a really beautiful responsibility to have. And it’s often one that you don’t get to experience, right?

For example, in the last few years, there’s been some that were built in the last few years. And never to this day occupied and like, they look cool, but people have tried living in them and they just couldn’t. NN

It feels like the shelters in this landscape capture the wealth of knowledge, throughout the history of Taliesin education. And I think it’s nice because, it’s not like transferring knowledge through a book, through words or through a Dezeen article, but I think it’s a really nuanced way of sharing architectural wisdom. You both described it really beautifully also. We like the shelters very much, but then the way you guys are describing it, it’s like, oh wow, actually it’s way more valuable than a showcase of shelters in the desert.

The thesis program is also designed in a way that you live in it for two months after you construct it. But I think in a way that’s the most profound part of the process. Our professor Chris Lash said jokingly, that ideas won’t keep you warm. Its true.

J

I think is a relationship that would be beneficial to so many architects to have had earlier in their careers and also what you learn about building and construction by actually doing


Radical Pedagogies in Architectural Education

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“LEARNING HERE IS LIKE OSMOSIS. YOU’RE KIND OF IN THIS HEADSPACE OF RESEARCH AND OBSERVATION. AND I THINK ITS MINDFULNESS IN A WAY.”

Students and staff are responsible for the preparation of meals. Photo source: Taliesin School of Architecture.

something, it kind of provides an opportunity for young architects to have these like critical experiences early on. So it’s formative and you’re not, you know, 20 or 30 years in your career before you get to actually see something, realized that you conceived of. NN

A lot of the projects done in schools are mainly focus about the idea or the argument. About how convincing you are and how much you can problematize something and solve it. It becomes a problem-solution situation. But architecture could be more simple that that.

J

You can make these forms that are really nice to look at and have these projects represent them in a way, that’s great. But at the end of the day, architecture in my opinion is in the field of tectonics. It’s about how the materials interact and how they come together and how the structure is made that actually gives value to that. And that needs to be considered like first and foremost with the ideas. It’s not like you can post rationalize a structure into something. I think we’re all guilty of that. I do that all the time. But like it’s kind of like catching yourself in that moment.

NN

Yeah, exactly. The learning is in being mindful of making certain decisions and self-evaluating whether you are okay with whatever actions you’re trying to do.

K

I think that an architecture school especially, but also in the practice at large, there’s become such like a circular drive to intellectualize everything. And I mean the first school I went to I felt like I was involved in a kind of a competition to come up with the craziest idea. And it was all about the concept and that’s arguably fine in an academic setting. But I felt like we were having conversations that didn’t matter outside the walls of the classroom and we were putting aside the actual human experience of what it means to be in a space and the need to have some sort of like competitive academic agenda compromise the simplicity of just trying to make the best space for the best use in the most responsible and ethical way. And I think one of the things that I’ve really reconnected with here is the idea being humble is not bad. There’s nothing wrong with just simply wanting to make a space that is nice to be in and that interacts well with its surroundings. In terms of like where we’re going, I don’t feel like driving farther into that sort of like over intellectualized conceptual realm is actually going to help us solve the real problems that we’re facing and elevate the human experience of what we’re building. So, I feel like liberated in a sense through having had this education to say like, I don’t need this to be about my ego. Well, you can’t separate ego with design. [everyone laughs]

This interview was conducted online Zoom 04 May 2020.


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“Learning by Doing” pedagogies

Outlaw Builders Studio, 1971 The “living-learning experience” began with a crash course in foraging for mushrooms, collecting mussels at a nearby beach, and scavenging redwood from disused Petaluma chicken coops. With the recycled building material, students built sleeping platforms and tree houses, a kitchen, a collective meeting and drafting studio, and a shower and composting toilet. A design unit building in the woods Source: UC Berkeley Environmental Design Archives

Valparaiso School: Open City Group Open City was founded in 1971 and was inspired by a radical approach to architectural research, teaching and practice that used poetry as an inspiration to build, by lifelong collaboration between Chilean architect Alberto Cruz and Argentinian poet Godofredo Iommi. A ‘brief’ is determined by a poem composed on site, then teachers and students work collaboratively to give structural form to the poem. Structures and performances inspired by poetry. Source: Pérez, Fernando Oyarzún and Perez de Arce, Rodrigo. Valparaíso School: Open City Group.


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Center for Alternative Technology Adapted a disused quarry to form an experimental community working towards self-sufficiency. CAT has researched experimental construction and energy generation techniques, constructing a number of windmills, and utilising active and passive solar systems. Activities in CAT when it first started in 1973 Source: Center for Alternative Technology website

Black Mountain College 1933-1957 BMC was ideologically organized around John Dewey’s principles of education, which emphasized holistic learning and the study of art as central to a liberal arts education. It revolved around 20th-century ideals about the value and importance of balancing education, art, and cooperative labor, students were required to participate in farm work, construction projects, and kitchen duty as part of their holistic education. Theatre Piece No.1 by John Cage Source: Molesworth, Helen. Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College, 1933-1957


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A site model hangs in the Refectory. Source: AA Photo Library

In the refectory, a site model of Hooke Park hangs on the wall, reflecting our common understanding of Hooke Park, as a 350 acre working woodland with the campus at the heart of it.


The “Island” of Hooke Park

20 min walk

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The “Island”

20 acre

Hooke Park

330 acre

campus

Woodland Compartment Plan (Hooke Park) 2014-2024. Prepared by Christopher Sadd.



However, Hooke Park has a bit of a lost brother...


A site nicknamed, the “Island”


An isolated 20 acre plot that has been named the “island” because firstly it bears the physical characteristics of an “island”. It is separated from Hooke Park’s woodland campus and surrounded by a sea of privately owned grazing fields. We have a right of access through this field.

Image source: Ke Yang


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Image source: Ke Yang

The woodlands in Hooke Park are managed and cared for to ensure that quality timber is produced at its economic maturity.


The “Island” of Hooke Park

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Image source: Shreya Kochatta

Compared to the timber plantations of Hooke Park, the “island” is really left to its own devices of overgrowth and decay because it hasn’t been managed since 60 years ago. What is most

interesting is that the human is not the driving force. Instead, weather occurrences are the forces that undo the initial plantations which has left it in a state of ruin.


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The reason why the “Island” is in this particular condition is that many of the planned operations haven’t been executed. It is mainly due to a backlog of operations and a lack of manpower on the main campus. This map indicates the areas planned for felling in the next 5 years where the “Island” is not a part of. Map of forestry operations for the next 5 years. Source: Andrew Robertson, interview with Chris Sadd


The increased frequency of wet seasons in Hooke Park means that many forestry operations are delayed. Nothing is planned in the “Island� for the next five years, at the very least.



PART II


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CHAPTERS PART I AA as a pedagogical project A diagnosis of engagement in Hooke Park An anti-manifesto for the “Island� Radical pedagogies in architectural education The Island of Hooke Park

PART II An island as a space of counterculture Making an island away from institutional liabilities The Island as a legitimate facility of the AA Future: A new learning culture in the Island Now: Squat our own school

Please watch our video: https://youtu.be/rmZQynQt788





AN ISLAND IS

Utopia by Thomas More

Island by Aldous Huxley

Always Coming Home by Ursula K. Le Guin

The Tempest by William Shakespeare

Slave Island by Pierre de Marivaux

Desert Island by Gilles Deleuze

Walden Two by B.F Skinner

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Walden or Life in the Woods by Henry David Thoreau

The Possibility of an Island by Michel Houellebecq


A WASTELAND A MARGINALIZED SPACE HAS NO ECONOMIC VALUE A DISUSED PLANTATION HIDDEN FROM SURVEILLANCE FALLOW LAND UNCLAIMED AN OUTLAW AREA A STATE OF EXCEPTION A PLACE OF NEW RULES UTOPIA

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An Island as a Space of Counterculture

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1. Breaking the barricades of an abandoned military base 2. Homes are built by hands and with whatever material within reach. 3. Meeting festival held about minority rights

In 1971, a brigade of young squatters and artists took over a 84-acre abandoned military base on the edge of town and proclaimed it a “free zone� beyond the reach of Danish law. Around 900 individuals who inhabit the area are a self governing community who refuse to pay taxes to the Danish government, run their own businesses and schools, live without cars on unpaved roads, build their own houses, restaurants and civil buildings and even have their own currency.


An Island as a Space of Counterculture

CHRISTIANIA Image source: Google Earth Satellite, accessed December 2019

Christiania’s citizens and businesses are divided into 14 self-governing districts. Decision making is primarily organised through monthly meetings – a General Meeting, which includes all residents, and Area Meetings, which include those who live in a particular district. All decisions are made according to direct, consensus democracy, meaning they have to be agreed upon by everyone.

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“Think about it that I am ultim lamp suddenly falls down and Suddenly then, they would ch done the health and safety tes my Senior Management team that.

And if they could show that if proper documentation, then I liable and maybe I’ll end up in - Eva Franch i Gilabert, School Director, during an open tutorial


An Island as a Space of Counterculture

489

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Source: Transcribed from a tutorial with Eva in January


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Making an Island Away from Institutional Liabilities

Higher education quality assurances Health and safety assurances

Looking beyond the institution, there is a possible criticism of society in general – that we are increasingly becoming more bureaucratic or more professional. That really translates into the way people and organisations hold accountability to one another through liability policies and compliances. This really translates to a society of people taking less risks or being extra safe for the sake of it.

Another point is that many of these compliances originates from the context of being an educational institution in London. They have been extended to the operations of Hooke Park and further into its woodlands. But really, the woodlands have quite different protocols already in place, mainly about enjoyment, use and protection.

Timeline of the many obligations we complied to as a Higher Ed institution


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The Possibility of an Island in the AA


Making an Island Away from Institutional Liabilities

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Subsection (6)

No duty is owed by virtue of this section to any person in respect of risks willingly accepted as his by that person Subsection (6A)

No duty by virtue of this section to any person in respect of—a risk resulting from the existence of any natural feature of the landscape, or any river, stream, ditch or pond whether or not a natural feature Subsection (6B)

For the purposes of subsection (6A) above, any plant, shrub or tree, of whatever origin, is to be regarded as a natural feature of the landscape. Image: Occupier’s Liability Act 1984: Duty of care to visitors outlined in legislation


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UK Law

such as Occupier’s Liability Act

Bedford Estates

The act does not impose any obligation on an occupier to a visitor who willingly accepts risks on natural features

Architectural Association UK Law

such as Occupier’s Liability

Users do things through a process of permission and risk assessment

Architectura Association

Individual

Existing situation (Bedford Square)

Users could be made aware of potential dangers and risks through warnings by the school

Proposed liability framework

In Bedford Square, our liberties are li with Bedford Estates and being in th a stricter duty of care to users of the than the woodland landscape in Dor


Making an Island Away from Institutional Liabilities

495

Ski Operator Immunity (State Law)

as skiing is an inherent and obvious risk

Ski slope operator

y Act

Individual

al n

Release of Liability Case study: Extreme sport operators

Individual

Release of Liability for the “Island�

imited by our lease he city. The school has ese building premises rset.

Case study: Extreme sport operators

Take ski slope operators as an example. Both the operator and the skier recognize the inherent risks involved in the sport and hence have legal mechanisms that clarify the liabilities. In some countries, the state provides immunity to extreme sport operators.


496

The Possibility of an Island in the AA

A declaration of personal responsibility and liability


Making an Island Away from Institutional Liabilities

Students and educators would be relieved from the institution’s liability by writing up and signing a self-declared personal responsibility and liability waiver form.

497

Image: Release of liability waiver form



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“To the degree that he masters his tools, he can invest the world with his meaning; To the degree that he is mastered by his tools, the shape of the tool determines his own self−image. Convivial tools are those which give each person who uses them the greatest opportunity to enrich the environment with the fruits of his or her vision. Industrial tools deny this possibility to those who use them and they allow their designers to determine the meaning and expectations of others.” - Ivan Illich, Tools of Conviviality

Source: goodreads.com

Inspired by Ivan Illich’s proposition of convivial tools, the “Island” is an open tool that allows for more experiential engagement than the current skill-based learning in Hooke park

Illich criticised the institution of education as a system of bureaucracy and the cult of professionalism. He argued against the institutionalisation of learning and believed that schooling meant a monopoly over social control. He also put forward a vision of a society of convivality.


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The Possibility of an Island in the AA

DIGITAL

Academic Events ↓ Core studies

↓ Final Tables

↓ External

Examination

HTS Writing Prizes and Dennis Sharp Award

Final Tables Foundation

Third Year ARB/RIBA Part 1 Closed Door

ETS Exhibition

Final Tables First Year

Third Year ARB/RIBA Part 1 Staff + Examiners

Final Tables Second Year

Third Year ARB/RIBA Part 1 Examinations

Final Tables Third Year

Fifth Year ARB/RIBA Part 1 Closed Door

↓ Jury Week Foundation Final Juries

Experimental Final Jury Week

Diploma Final Jury Week

Final Tables Fourth Year

Final Tables Fifth Year

↓ Honours

Presentations Diploma Honours Presentations

Fifth Year ARB/RIBA Part 1 Staff + Examiners

Laboratories

↓ Technical Support

↓ Student Support

DPL

AV Department

Writing Centre

Membership/Alumni

Wood and Metal Workshop

IT Support

Student Care Centre

Human Resources

Model Making Shop

Computer Lab

Open Tutorials

Directors Office

Digital Photo Studio

Communications and Media

↓ AA Collections

XR

Print Centre

Library

↓ How to How To Series

Architectural Association School of Architecture

VIRTUAL MAP V.2

AA Bar

LAWuN

Experimental Committee

Hooke Park

↓ Students

Academic Forum

Diploma Committee

Student Forum

Admin Forum

PhD Committee

A space for students to meet during tables

Director Academic Breakfast

↓ Public Programme Public Programme

↓ Initiatives

↘ Committees

↘ Resources

Robot Arm (Hooke Park)

Ethics Committee

AA Virtual Secure Hall, Competition Launch

School Community Webinar 01

The AA is online. This map is for staff and students to navigate the digital worlds that have been created for the School Community in order to continue our academic ambitions, social gatherings and spontaneous experiments. Visit the Library or Archives, have a coffee in the Bar, attend events in the Lecture Hall, meet with Student Affairs and access your unit, programme and courses by clicking on the links. Forthcoming worlds will be added at a later date, so please check the map on a regular basis.

EX11

DIP3

DIP14

ETS

DRL

EX1

EX12

DIP4

DIP15

HTS

D+M

EX2

EX13

DIP5

DIP16

PP

EmTech

EX3

EX14

DIP6

DIP17

EX4

EX15

DIP7

DIP18

EX5

EX16

DIP8

DIP19

EX6

EX17

DIP9

DIP20

EX18

DIP10

DIP21

DIP11

↓ Core Studies

↓ Postgraduate

Programmes

Postgraduate Programme

SS

HCT

PhD

LU

↓ PhD

H&U

↓ Visiting School

AAIS

Visiting School

SED

Little Architect

Projective Cities

AA Global Community ↘ Local Forums

Bejing

Istanbul

Moscow

Singapore

S WORLD Teaching and Learning Committee

School Community Webinar 03

First Year

EX8

Assembly Workshop (Hooke Park)

School Community Webinar 02

CMS

EX7

A Walk in the Forest

AA and its Future: 2020-25 Strategic Plan

DIP13

Student Representatives

Academic Committee

Forum: Projects Review and Graduation

DIP12

DIP2

Staff Representatives

Sawmill (Hooke Park)

Term 3 Launch: An Online World

↓ Representatives

DIP1

EX10

Academic Board

Fabrication Workshop (Hooke Park)

School-Wide Community Meetings

AA Residence

EX9

Foundation

Senior Management Team

AA Dorset – Futures

↘ Meetings

↓ AA Residence

Academic Governance

AA Dorset ↓ AA Life

Staff and Students ↘ Staff

Coming Soon: Film Club AA Coffee / Tea AA Meals AA Terrace AA Playlist AA Football AA Karaoke AA Pub Quiz AA Tea Ceremony Book Club

Careers Office

Spring Open Jury

A A

AA Lecture Hall

Student Affairs

Postgraduate Exemplary Work Presentations

Archives

↓ AA Life

Key Contacts ↓ Offices

Fifth Year ARB/RIBA Part 1 Examinations

Resources ↓ Making

AA Research

AA Public Programme and Life

Academic ↘ Units/Programmes

Athens

Hong Kong

London

Mumbai

Internal Assessment Committee

Communications Resource Team

Academic Resource Team

Four existing contexts of the AA. Source: aaschool.ac.uk = Private room

Coloured Square = Teams Icon

We have the privilege to have different physical contexts under its one umbrella. Bedford Square is at the heart of London, Bedford Square gardens is a private area of greenery, the campus of Hooke Park in Dorset and now the evermore present digital realm during this time of lockdown.


Making an Island Away from Institutional Liabilities

501

A new and unique context for the school. Source: Shreya Kochatta

The “island” is an additional, less tangible tool that feeds into the AA’s pedagogical project by diversifying its means of engagement

Each of the contexts have the capability to incur a unique pedagogical experience to its students. The “island” offers its own pedagogical value.


502

In a state of exception, the “island� is unaccommodating and has little perceived value. The island can be reimagined.


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504

The Possibility of an Island in the AA

“Island� is a multi-dimensional classroom where its structure is driven by climate, decay and inter-species relations.


Future : A New Learning Culture in the AA

The space of the “Island” sits in contrast to the extremely measured and demarcated Georgian architecture of Bedford Square, Instead, it is an interior driven by processes of decay, rich in its ecological interdependencies. The island has a pedagogical value that cannot be measured through any programme.

An unmanaged landscape is a space set aside, and left alone. It is not a space submitted to the control by humans but a privileged area of receptivity to biodiversity1. The experience of being in this unmanaged landscape is a conditioning of ourselves of the aesthetics of nature - a ruin, a wasteland and full of weeds.

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1 Clement, Gilles Manifesto of the Third Landscape


“Death makes the forest feel natural in a way that a plantation of same aged trees in neat rows does not� Overheard in Hooke Park



508

“Island” values

The Possibility of an Island in the AA


Future : A New Learning Culture in the AA

The “Island” map gives minimal instructions and set out a framwork for the use of the “Island”. Students have certain freedoms that would not be accepted normally in Hooke Park, such as camping, using trees and starting a campfire; here, they make personal judgments for their actions.

509

A map guide for the “Island” outlining rules and its values





The shed is an entrance into the island, sitting on the edge of the woodlands: an outpost for students to access the woodland as a place of living and studying.

513

Image: Film stills of the approach across the field and into the “Island”


514

The Possibility of an Island in the AA

Summer: Perhaps the island will be more crowded

Winter: For the strong-willed individuals

The calendar for using the island is a shared drawing board that belongs to multiple people, solo visitors or groups coming in for camping trips. The island is a classroom that changes by the weather, by the season, with most of the crowds coming in the summer for example.


Future : A New Learning Culture in the AA

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The entrance shed is the only point where all paths intersect. It becomes a place to communicate and share information and tools

Film still of entrance shed interior

On the wall, a calendar hangs with names and events around the next few weeks. The shed becomes a point of exchange between users in space and across time. The entrance is also the place where the protocols and values of the “Island� is communicated to newcomers. The shed stores tools. Saws, camping equipment and firewood are a shared asset. A communal firewood stack requires users to replace ones they have taken with freshly chopped ones, to ensure that future users can make a fire too.





In Bedford Square, the AA public programme is vibrant with more conventional forms of knowledge sharing such as lectures, debates and seminars.

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The “Island� offers a setting for camping. It is a more intimate way of connecting with each other by living and eating together

Image: A poster about funding for camping trips at the AA bar. Source: Reconstructed from AAlife image collection


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The Possibility of an Island in the AA

Platform design and assembly instructions, extracted from the handbook

The platform is designed with a UPE 80 profile. It is designed such that 2 people can carry a single part comfortably into the “Island� by foot. We have identified potential reseller to supply reclaimed steel profiles within two hours drive of Hooke Park.


Future : A New Learning Culture in the AA

521

The platform is a bench, a table, a fireplace and a sleeping surface for more than two people, always.

Film still of platform at a distance

The platform is a place for gathering in the heart of the woodlands, a place of fellowship and debate. With the intention of initiating a tradition, we propose for the school to set up a funding/grant scheme that encourages students to self-organise and invite their own guest speakers to camp with small groups. A range of people can come to share this with the AA community – not only architects but also musicians, philosophers, activists. This suggests what the public programme in Hooke Park can be, something that has always been discussed, without any actions yet.


Scenarios in the “Island�: Film still of a bathing scene. See video url on front page.

I find more relevance in adapting things for my present comfort rather than over-intellectualizing my work 522


Scenarios in the “Island�: Film still of scene where someone is working with hunted animal parts

I wonder if the Island has or should have an aesthetic, to be honest? 523


Scenarios in the “Island�: Film still of a final jury happening in the

The landscape celebrates a nuanced way of sharing architectural wisdom and means of collaborative 524


Scenarios in the “Island�: Film still of a junkyard or garden, who knows?

Not only architects but also musicians, philosophers and activists 525


Scenarios in the “Island�: Film still of people building a structure with boats

To be here is to practice living in a world with our values reimagined. 526


Scenarios in the “Island�: Film still of people building amongst trees

A set of trees are likely to be overthrown by another storm soon. A group of us will try to brace them 527


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Squatting as a means of generating an idea of the “Island” without compromise

The Possibility of an Island in the AA

Purchase

Will cost approximately £200,000 for a woodland of that size

Negotiate

Will be subject to institutional health and safety protocol of Hooke Park

Squat

Something we can do within a limited timeframe and our means to generate an idea of the “island”


Now : Squat our own School

Why squat? Squatting is the occupation of a property without the permission of the owner. Squatting often occurs where the need for space coexists with vacancy. In this case, squatting the “Island” offers us the opportunity to establish an ideal for the “Island” without consideration for negotiations and inherent compromises. We hope that post occupancy, we would use the experiences generated as a way to activate a negotiation about what the “Island” can be for the AA.

529

Our recent trip into the “Island” revealed to us a couple of things. By working directly and immediately with a context means that new ways of representations and new tools are necessary to collaborate and make decisions. Above is a photograph of us drawing a possible design of a platform with string. In the foreground are tools and equipments we brought to conduct a pruning and lighting test. Left: Drawing a platform design with string. Right: Outfits and equipment for the “Island”



Now : Squat our own School

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An instruction handbook on details to execute the first squatting event in the “island”

We created this handbook that contains fabrication drawings for the construction of the platform, team roles, schedules and trip advice.

Left: A handbook to organise trips in the “Island” Right: A letter to introduce the first squatting event


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Handbook for squatting the “Island� with ten friends

The Possibility of an Island in the AA


Now : Squat our own School

533

Selected pages from the handbook

We planned the first squatting event as a way to claim this space as a site that explicitly invites such actions. In this first event, we would build the platform and to celebrate it with an invited speaker. The handbook details advice necessary to execute this event and other possible future ones.


534

The Possibility of an Island in the AA

Hello Eva, A bunch of us were talking after the feedback session with you today, and we would really like to organise a session with you to properly share the work of our unit with regards to Hooke Park. Would you be interested and if so, when would be a good time for you, probably a 2-3 hour session depends on how many of us want to share? We are flexible with the dates, so perhaps when the school is less busy after these weeks.

Thank you and look forward to your reply! Best Regards, Nicole

Reconstructed email to the Director dated 13 June 2020

We felt that the projects in the unit this year were very much in line with the Strategic Plan proposed by the Director, especially in terms of “Expand Horizons by New Terms of Engagement and New Pedagogies�. In hope to take some of these ideas forward, we invited the Director to come listen to our thoughts. We hope that this session can help to push the pedagogical agenda of the school forward. We, as students, can be co-creators of future architectural education.


Now : Squat our own School

535

The “Island” is a space that untangles the institution’s relationship between its ownership of land, its duty of liabilities and care for its students. But it also poses a broader question of what educational institutions should strive to provide its students in a world where our access to knowledge is drastically different. Our reflection is that schools can support the access and means of engagement to a diversity of contexts. And so supporting both its students and educators to take action and to shape our environments. This starts within the school as the most potent place that can invite this practice of agency.




538

Bibliography Awan, Nishat, Tatjana Schneider, and Jeremy Till. 2011. Spatial Agency : Other Ways of Doing Architecture. London: Routledge. Boer, René, Marina Otero Verzier, and Katía Truijen, eds. 2019. Architecture of Appropriation: On Squatting as Spatial Practice. Rotterdam: Het Nieuwe Instituut. Borgonuovo, Valerio, and Silvia Franceschini, eds. 2019. Global Tools 1973 1975. When Education Coincides with Life. NERO. https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=dEgJ84Ty8dM. Castillo, Greg, and Esther Choi. 2015. Hippie Modernism: The Struggle for Utopia. Walker Art Center. Castillo, Greg, and Kent Wilson. n.d. “Design Radicals: Creativity & Protest.” UC Berkeley Environmental Design Archives. http://exhibits.ced.berkeley.edu/exhibits/ show/designradicals. Colomina, Beatriz, Britt Eversole, Ignacio G. Galán, Evangelos Kotsioris, AnnaMaria Meister, and Federica Vannucchi. n.d. “Radical Pedagogies.” Research Project. Radical Pedagogies. https://radical-pedagogies.com/. Daniels, Maja. 2009. Christiania. Photography. majadaniels.com. Franch i Gilabert, Eva. 2020. “Architectural Association 2020-25 Strategic Plan.” Architectural Association School. Gallagher, Shaun. 2012. “Multiple Aspects in the Sense of Agency.” New Ideas in Psychology 30 (1): 15–31. Illich, Ivan. 1973. Tools for Conviviality. New York: Harper & Row. Ivan, Illich. 1983. Deschooling Society. New York: Harper Colophon. Molesworth, Helen. 2015. Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College 1933-1957. New Haven: Yale University Press. Moore, James W. 2016. “What Is the Sense of Agency and Why Does It Matter?” Frontiers in Psychology 7. https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2016-42936-001. Occupiers Liability Act 1984. Chapter 6. http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ ukpga/1984/3#commentary-key-9f63a361af98d6ee7a801bf16424f25d. “Open Letter to the Architectural Community: A Call for Curriculum Change.” 2019. Manifesto. ARCHITECTURE EDUCATION DECLARES. 2019. https://www. architectureeducationdeclares.com/. Parnell, Steve. 2011. “Architectural Design, 1954-1972: The Architectural Magazine’s Contribution to the Writing of Architectural History.” Doctor of Philosophy in Architectural History, Sheffield: University of Sheffield School of Architecture. Servier, Jean. 1991. Histoire de l’utopie. Gallimard. Student Body of the School of Architecture at Taliesin. 2020. “Statement,” 2020. https://www.archdaily.com/933161/students-respond-to-the-school-of-architectureat-taliesins-closure. Sunwoo, Irene. 2013. “From the ‘Well-Laid Table’ to the ‘Market Place:’ The Architectural Association Unit System.” Princeton, NJ: Princeton University. https:// dataspace.princeton.edu/jspui/handle/88435/dsp01th83kz46m. Tiphaine, De Rocquigny. n.d. “Le Lieu des Utopies.” Les possibilités d’une île. https:// www.franceculture.fr/emissions/entendez-vous-leco/les-possibilites-dune-ile-44utopies-insulaires. Vigor, Emily, William Whitaker, Allison Olsen, and Heather Isbell Schumacher. 2017. “Journey to The Sea Ranch.” Online Exhibition. September 1, 2017. https://searanch. ced.berkeley.edu/s/sea-ranch/page/Intro.




New Grounds An Invitation for Settlement At this time of mounting environmental concern, should concrete and its carbon emissions really be the only foundation solution considered in the unique context of Hooke Park? Or should the AA be looking into alternative solutions that are not only less destructive ecologically, but more affordable? Underlying Hooke Park’s projects is the desire to create resources from waste products. This is best illustrated by the first two projects - the refectory and the workshop. In both Norway Spruce thinnings, a waste product of forestry management, is the main source of timber. Returning to the issue of the ground, I propose for Hooke Park to look into another waste product of forestry management, one that is produced regularly and abundantly - the tree stump. With the structural qualities of the tree already explored, adopting the stump as a foundation opens

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the door to finding the spatial potential that exist in a managed forest. This search for inherent form resonates with the ideas of 18th century architect Charles Ribart. In his essays Ribart recounts how the French order could be found growing at the bottom of his garden. Where trees were clustered in such a way that they formed a natural room, and that all that was needed was the intervention of a creative gardener, to trim the tops to an equal height and build a roof. With harvesting a regular occurrence, this proposal takes Hooke Park’s unique blend of forestry and architecture one step further. The project adopts the role of the creative gardener, where design does not begin in the workshop.

Andrew Robertson




544

New Grounds

The Value of the Unused Parnham Foundation of 1999 Laid for the construction of the Park House student accomodation block these foundations were never used as the project was cancelled when the AA acquired Hooke Park.


Parnham Foundations

545

Temporary structures built on the unused Parnham foundations, 2020.

Temporary structures built on the unused Parnham foundations, 2014. Aerial Photograph of Hooke Park Campus in 2001.


546

New Grounds

Green Waste Adhocism, Architecture of Inherent Forms.

Construction of the Hooke Park Workshop, 1989, Frei Otto Complete Works.


Green Waste Adhocism

547

Underlying Hooke Park’s projects is the desire to create resources from waste products. This is best illustrated by the first two projects - the refectory and the workshop. In both Norway Spruce thinning’s, a waste product of forestry management, is the main source of timber. Similarly, the 2016 woodchip barn demonstrates the latent structural abilities of the tree fork, a product that has no value in typical commercial timber harvesting.

Hooke Park, Refectory Construction, 1983, Frei Otto Complete Works.

Tree Fork Truss, AA Design & Make, 2016, Zachary Mollica.


548

New Grounds


Natural Room

549

Charles Ribart argued that the development of the French order could be found growing at the bottom of his garden. Some young trees “placed in groups of threes, regularly enough, even though planted by chance,” were clustered in such a way as to form a kind of natural room, hexagonal and out of the ordinary. All that was needed was the intervention of the creative gardener; Ribart trimmed the tops of the trees to an equal height, superimposed lintels, and built a roof of beams over his outdoor room, thus “rediscovering the true Greek type, but in a new guise and with marked difference.”

Ribart de Chamoust, The Type of French Order, pl. II, published in L’Ordre Francois trouve dans la nature, 1783.


550

New Grounds


Natural Room

551

Natural Room Installations, Andrew Robertson



Green Waste, Andrew Robertson


554

Ingenious Anchors As foundations, it would be hard to design a more efficient solution, the root plate grows in direct response to stresses of its specific context.

New Grounds


Ingenious Anchors

555

Claus Mattheck, Design in Nature: Learning from Trees.


556

New Grounds

Typology of Tree Roots Not all species root the same way, meaning some are more suitable anchors than others.

AERIAL ROOTS

PLATE ROOT*

FIBOROUS ROOTS

Banyan

Alder Ash Beech Norway Spruce Poplar Sycamore Cedar

Palm

1m

2m

*Represents 83% of Trees


Typology of Tree Roots

557

HEART ROOT

AERATING ROOTS

TAP ROOT

Red Oak Douglas Fir Larch

Mangrove

Corsican Pine Oak

Typology of Tree Roots, Andrew Robertson


558

New Grounds

Self Weight of Average Tree Species in Hooke Park


Self Weight

559

Self Weight of Average Tree Species in Hooke Park, Andrew Robertson


560

New Grounds

Estimated Lifetime Load Carrying Capacity of a Sitka Spruce Root Plate


Root Plate

561

Estimated Load Carrying Capacity of an Average Sitka Spruce Root Plate, Andrew Robertson


562

New Grounds

Tree Self Weight kN

Growth

Harvest Age

Tree Species Predicted Lifetime Root Plate Loading Post-Felling Comparison

Decay

Use

Standard Domestic Foundation 50kN

Years

Tree Species Predicted Lifetime Root Plate Loading Post Felling Comparison,, Andrew Robertson.


Root Plate

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New Grounds

Eurocodes: Basis for Structural Design The design working life of a building, is the assumed period for which a structure is to be used for its intended purpose with anticipated maintenance but without major repair necessary. The Eurocodes define the working life of an ordinary building as 50 years. Contemporary practice however has moved beyond this benchmark, increasing the design life of buildings in order to make them more sustainable.


Eurocodes

The longer the lifespan of a building the smaller its carbon footprint, as the initial input of carbon is offset through a longer time period. Thus today buildings are increasingly being built to last a lot longer, with 80 years becoming the benchmark average. This makes it hard for new developments to reuse second generation material, as guaranteeing the desirable timespans is difficult.

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New Grounds

TALLEST VOLUNTARILY DEMOLISHED BUILDINGS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM

5 12

10

6

1

2

1 Southwark Towers, London 1976-2009 (33 years) 100 meters (43 floors) 2 20 Fenchurch Street, London 1968-2008 (40 years) 91 meters (25 floors) 3 Bluevale & Whitevale Towers, Glasgow 1968-2015 (47 years) 90 meters (30 floors)

5 Red Road Flats, Glasgow 1971-2012 (41 years) 89 meters (31 floors)

4 Limebank House, London 1969-1998 (29 years) 93 meters (26 floors)

6 Winchester House, London 1968-1997 (29 years) 80 meters (22 floors)

BUILT BUILTTO TOSTAY, STAY,GONE GONETOMORROW TOMORROW


Demolition

3 4

9

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8

11

7

10 Clyde Tower, Birmingham 1967-2006 (39 years) 59 meters (20 floors) 11 Stephenson Tower, Birmingham 1967-2011 (44 years) 63 meters (20 floors) 7 103 Colmore Row, Birmingham 1975-2015 (40 years) 80 meters (23 floors)

12 Lawrence Tower, Birmingham 1971-2011 (40 years) 59 meters (21 floors)

8 MathsTower, Manchester 1968-2004 (36 years) 75 meters (18 floors)

9 Birmingham Post & Mail 1964-2005 (41 years) 67 meters (24 floors)

“List Of Tallest Voluntarily Demolished Buildings”. 2020. En.Wikipedia.Org.


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New Grounds

The Legal Recognition of Light Dwellings Region of Wallonia Map

In Belgium, at least 15,000 people live in “Light Dwellings,” a term which covers both mobile homes (barges, caravans, tiny houses) and fixed constructions anchored to the ground (yurts, bubbles, chalets, huts, etc.) Interest in this type of housing has spread amongst a population anxious to change their way of life, to create their own housing without having to rely on the existing market. Ensuring mobility and returning to a habitat that is better integrated with nature. However without specific recognition, these alternative dwellings are forced to meet the standards of conventional buildings. Standards that are difficult to meet and not totally relevant in these alternative habitats. In September 2019 Belgium’s Walloon Region inserted the notion of “Light Dwelling” via decree into its Housing Code for Sustainable Homes, extending legislation to legally recognise Light Dwellings. To qualify as a Light Dwelling, structures must meet at least three of the following criteria: removable, movable, of reduced volume, of low weight, having a limited footprint, self-built, without floors, or without foundations.The new legislation provides relaxation of the universal housing sanitation standards, exempts structures from the obligation to have individual mailboxes, lockable rooms, doorbells, and allows individuals to obtain permits for certain buildings without the involvement of an architect.

Attention has now turned to providing this type of housing with an appropriate set of standards, in terms of health, safety, stability, waterproofing, ventilation, etc.

Light Dwellings must meet at least three of the following criteria: 1. Dismantlable 2. Movable 3. Reduced volume 4. Low weight 5. Limited footprint 6. Self-built 7. Without floors 8. Without foundations


Legal Recognition of Light Dwellings

Domes

Chalets / Huts

569

Yurts

Barges

Caravans

Tiny Houses

Examples of Light Dwellings Legally Recognised in Belgium

(“La Reconnaissance Juridique Des Habitations Légères, C’Est Fait ! | Willy Borsus - Vice-Président De La Wallonie, Ministre De L’économie, Du Commerce Extérieur, De La Recherche Et De L’innovation, Du Numérique, De L’agriculture, De L’aménagement Du Territoire, De L’ifapme Et Des Centres De Compétences” 2020)


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Bibliography

Chamoust, Ribart de. L’Ordre Francois trouvé Dans La Nature, présenté Au Roi Le 21 Septembre 1776. Farnborough: Gregg, 1967. “List of Tallest Voluntarily Demolished Buildings.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, June 2, 2020. https://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/List_of_tallest_voluntarily_demolished_buildings. Mattheck, Claus. Design in Der Natur: Der Baum Als Lehrmeister. Freiburg i. Br.: Rombach, 2006. Otto, Frei, Winfried Nerdinger, Irene Meissner, Rainer Barthel, and Christian Brensing. Frei Otto, Complete Works: Lightweight Construction, Natural Design. Basel: Birkhäuser, 2005.




Slowing Down Wood Cascading ‘Woodito’ to Reduce our Ecological Impact Buildings can become part of the climate solution. All around the world, there is a dynamic in favour of wood following climate-smart forestry plan of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement. Increased demand for timber as a building material could incentivize reforestation by re-covering parts of this planet with tree plantations. However, the unique benefits of wood can only have a positive impact on the environment if we make sure that forests are managed in a sustainable manner. In fact, reforestation with industrial tree plantations to match the timber demand is critical environmentally and has negative consequences on biodiversity on both the flora and fauna. Climate scientists are urging governments to reestablish natural forests and letting these grow much bigger and older as this is one of the best solutions to climate crisis. As architects, we shouldn’t increase further the demand for mass timber – a product based on small diameter plantation

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trees – but instead reduce logging pressures and support sustainable forests. When using wood, choose FSC-certified products - largediameter trees coming from sustainable forests - and salvaged wood, to extend the carbon benefit of using wood products. Millions of tons of salvaged wood per year is not being used due to its small size and odd shape. Optimizing the salvaged wood market can initiate a sustainable balance between wood demand and supply. My project offers an alternative to mass timber by using salvaged wood offcuts that are considered as waste. These wood offcuts will be turned into architectural products with different applications at different scales. These products will be integrated panels allowing both wood performances and cost efficiency of an industrial process. My ultimate goal is to have a positive impact on the environment by revaluing European timber considered as “waste” and contribute to the slowdown of wood cascading.

Clara Schwarz



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WOODITO Trouville Cafe Cafe - Normandie, France Product : Floor Tiles Colourway : Wood varies between pale yellows, brown, and reddish pink <-- Back to Projects


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WOODITO What is WOODITO? Sustainable Choices for Healthy Architecture About Woodito is a new material composed of timber and wood dust mixed with bioplastic components, the overall being tailored into customizable panels sizes and shapes. - 95% reused material, all sourced from within Britain - 88kg of CO2 stored in every panel (2x1m). - FSC Certified is in process, creation of panels to support sustainable wooden sources. Made locally in Britain and finished using a combination of state-of-the-art machinery and hand processes, it is a practical architectural panel material that requires no specialist equipments and extra materials to alter or install. We have put into place strict rules for our supply chain - all materials are sustainably source.

Contact us For samples and enquiries please email contact@woodito.net to arrange a meeting with your local representative.

Pre-consumed timber ‘defects’ from within Britain that would have been wasted, we will use them as raw materials


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British offcuts’waste’

Mixed wood waste from our local sawmill

WOODITO tile

Our Ethics & Materials For us sustainability is not just about recycling; it is also about longevity, quality of workmanship, and knowledge of your material’s provenance. We see waste as raw materials rather than something to be discarded, and we are deeply committed to reducing our ecological impact. This is not just through using recycled materials in our products, but also about designing for disassembly, designing our supply chain to reduce travel distances, and making thoughtful decisions in every aspect of our business. We only use pre-consumer timber waste from within Britain that would otherwise be unusable for joinery due to splits, knots, or odd sizing. We have built close relationships with our local sawmills to ensure that we can make the most of every tree felled, not only using everything that can’t become planks but all of the planing waste as well. Working towards our ethical goals, we have developed Woodito to be a durable material with traceable material origins, designed from the ground up to be practical and versatile in terms of architecture and design. In the past year we have more than doubled the amount of waste timber we use in each sheet and are now working towards our goal of a 100% recycled timber terrazzo by working closely with institutions and scientists to develop an architectural panel that have mechanical performances. We have also begun life cycle assessments of our supply chain to better inform our future choices. --> Read more about us, applications, and our ongoing development as well as our future goals --> See Projects


580

Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading


Building with wood

581

Timber’s resurgence

climate-smart forestry objectives

increasing carbon sequestration

reducing carbon emissions

increasing carbon storage

building highly energy efficient, with natural insulation

wood wooden products lock in carbon throughout their lifetimes, helping to combat climate change

‘neutral’ carbon cycle VS one-way carbon transfer

source: COP 21




584

Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading

Forest certifications The timber supply chain is indeed a complex and global network. Using wood for wood-based materials, it is crucial to understand how timber is harvested between trees that have grown in natural forest and those in plantations. The selection criteria are cost efficiency and reproducibility according to demand. Some environmentalists are aware of the gap between reality and practice as forests do NOT grow faster than the demand for wood. Since 1990, there has been an approximate 40% increase in the amount of forest plantations in the world, and this figure is expected to increase.


Forests, forestry and carbon

585

industrial plantation

sustainable plantation

monoculture plantation

diverse species plantation

short trees rotations

full tree cycle rotations

large scale clearcuts

small scale clearcuts sources: PEFC, 2014 and FSC, 2014


Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading


From offcuts to panels

587

Embracing inhomogeneity and uniqueness


WOODITO


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590

Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading

Wood pieces untouched with random length and nails

Compressed wood to the frame


From offcuts to panels

591

Step 1: sorting and cutting

Cleaning and cutting offcuts to specific sizes for specific products

Step 2: wood organisation

Structural panel


592

Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading

Ventilated panel


From offcuts to panels

593

Step 3: air gaps filler

Air tight panel


594

Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading


From offcuts to panels

595

Step 4: frame and connections


596


Products application

597

Solid wall

water runoff slope

X

1

External wall elevation view; X1=35cm


WOODITO Barbican Oakwood Tower

Residential units - London, England Product : External Wall Colourway : Wood vaies between a rich dark brown and a pale mid brown with a consistent grain that occasionally includes dark, almost black, lines and figuring Designer : PLP Architecture and Cambridge University <-- Back to Projects


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WOODITO The Mjøstårnet building Multi functional - Brumunddal, Norway Product : External Wall Colourway : Wood mixed of mid brown with light brown rays spreading across the grain Designer : Voll Arkitekter of Trondheim <-- Back to Projects


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602


Products application

603

Internal partition

X

2

Internal wall elevation view; X2=10.5cm


WOODITO Big Shed Workshop - Hooke Park, England Product : Internal Panel Colourway : Wood vary between a rich dark brown and a pale mid brown with a consistent grain that occasionally includes dark, almost black, lines and figuring Designer : Design & Make AA <-- Back to Projects


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606


Products application

607

Tile module

X

3

Flooring elevation view; X3=7cm


WOODITO Trocadero flat Residential - Paris, England Product : Floor Tiles Colourway : Wood vary between rich dark brown and a pale mid brown <-- Back to Projects


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WOODITO Cinema Sil Plaz Movie theater - Ilanz, Switzerland Product : Acoustic Tiles Colourway : Wood vary between pale orange-brown and a rich orange or dark brown with distinctive dark rings throughout Designer : De Giorgi Huonder Architects ETH <-- Back to Projects


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612

Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading

CARBON FOOTPRINT 80 70 60 50 40

70

30

60

50

20 10 0 -10 -20

20 0

-10

salvaged wood wood from industrial plantations

wood from sustainable plantations

concrete

brick

COST / M2 logging

transport

drying

assembly process

installation

250

200

150

100

50

0 wood offcuts products

Source: whole-building life-cycle assessment (WBLCA)

mass timber products

steel


Based on the carbon tax when using concrete, I am convinced that within the next few years, carbon tax will be included in the price of any wooden products based on small diameter plantations (i.e products that don’t have FSC certification).

613


614

Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading

Who will help me?

How do I do it?

What do I need?

KEY SUPPLIERS

KEY ACTIVITIES

KEY RESOURCES

Hooke Park Wood Resellers Wood Industries Wood manufactruing plants

Artisanal product development in Hooke Park

Cradl c

Product testings in Hooke Park (thermal & sound)

Buildin c

Woodito industrial manufacturing plant Network of collect of offcuts to put in place

Buil certific therm

EPD c

BRE c

Industria What do I do?

KEY PARTNERS

VALUE PROPOSITION

Wood Products shop

CLT alternative

Architects

Granito aesthetic

Engineers

Thermal performances

Project manager

Acoustic performances

Property developer

Structural performances Cradle to Cradle materials

Network of products distribution to organize

What is the 5 years plan? BUSINESS TIMELINE

Step 1:

business vision & mission in Hooke Park

Step 2:

testing & fundings & industrial pricing & artisanal product launch in Hooke Park

Step 3:

project collaborations & certifications & marketing strategy

Step 4:

plant markets & network of suppliers and partners

Pric


Woodito’s development

615

Business model

le to Cradle certified

ng regulation certified

lding code cations: fire/ mal/structure

certification

certification

What are the offers?

Who are my targets?

USERS APPLICATION

AUDIENCE SEGMENTS

Sustainable forestry managements

Wall scale products Panel scale products

Wood Resellers

Tile scale products

Project manager Clients sensitive to the environment

Respond to different types of construction and performances

Cop 21 policy

al process How do I reach clients?

cing

MARKETING STRATEGY

Architectural influencers Public advertisements Social media Publication Project collaboration Hooke Park prototypes Partner prescribers

What will it cost? COST STRUCTURE

Funding for step 1:

business study

Funding for step 2:

artisanal development

Funding for step 3: marketing development Funding for step 4: industrial development


616

Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading

Year 1 offcuts just cut with finishes

Year 1 offcuts wear texture and a

Recycle i

Reuse offcuts for anothe Reuse frame for another panel

The re-connection of the architect to their supply chain Proposing a specific form of design practice, the project demonstrates that through proactively engaging in notions of constraint and contingency architecture can address urgent design, social and ecological questions on its own terms. A viable model that gives design culture agency in addressing critical global challenges, and one that raises fundamental questions as to the point in which ideas of material supply and architectural culture should meet.


10 r grainy a bit dirty

617

Filler + starch =Biomass

Woodito’s development

Year 25 offcuts wear grainy texture and offcuts rot

into particles to create the filler

er panel

Deconstruction et reemploi: comment faire circuler les elements de construction, ROTOR, 2018


WOODITO Woodito manufacturing plant Plant - Dorset, England Product : External Walls Colourway : Wood vary from pale yellows, brown, and reddish pink to rich dark brown and a pale mid brown Designer : Clara Schwarz <-- Back to Projects


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WOODITO Random combinations

Monochromatic combinations

mix of wood species sample

hard wood sample

mix of wood species sample

soft wood panel

mix of wood species sample


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Bichromatic combinations

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Specific effects

soft wood and hard wood sample

ventilation and lighting sample

hard wood and soft wood panel

burn effect panel

Subscribe Available in very limited stock, you can purchase offcuts and archive pieces that range from partial sheets to smaller a5 sizes. Sign up to receive updates on new items and get a 10% discount off your next order. For questions and enquiries to do with our offcuts please email shop@woodito.net






628

Slowing Down Wood’s Cascading


Manufacturing products

629

Ongoing & Future Supplies and distribution

Source: Forestry Commission 2018, gov.uk


630

Bibliography

Atlas of Vernacular Architecture of the World; Marcel Vellinga, Paul Oliver, Alexander Bridge, 2008. Cordwood Building: A Comprehensive Guide to the State of the Art; Rob Roy, 2 016. Déconstruction et réemploi: Wood; Michaël Ghyoot, Lionel Devlieger, Lionel Billiet, André Warnier, 2017. Design and Technology: Wood; R. Millett, E. W. Storey, 1975. Detail Practice: Insulating Materials: Principles, Materials and Applications (Detail Practice Series); Margit Pfundstein, 2008. Europe’s Changing Woods and Forests: From Wildwood to Managed Landscapes; Keith Kirby, Charles Watkins, 2015. Fast-Wood Forestry, Myths and Realities; Christian Cossalter, Charlie Pye-Smith, 2003. Formafantasma Cambio; Riccardo Badano, Rebecca Lewin, 2020. Insulation Handbook; Richard T. Bynum, 2000. Resource Salvation: The Architecture of Reuse; Mark Gorgolewski, 2017. Rethinking Wood; Markus Hudert, Sven Pfeiffer, 2019. Solid Wood: Case Studies in Mass Timber Architecture, Technology and Design; Joseph Mayo, 2015. Sustainable Timber Design: Construction for 21st Century Architecture; Michael Dickson, Dave Parker, 2014. The Hidden Life of Trees; Peter Wohlleben, 2018. The Management of Industrial Forest Plantations; Jose G. Borges, Marc E. McDill, 2014. The New Carbon Architecture: Building to Cool the Climate; Bruce King, 2017. The Re-Use Atlas: A Designer’s Guide Towards the Circular Economy; Duncan BakerBrown, 2017. Thermally Active Surfaces in Architecture; Kiel Moe, 2010. Timber: Its Mechanical Properties and Factors Affecting its Structural Use: Volume 8; Frederick D. Silvester, 2013. Timber Design (Architect’s Guidebooks to Structures); Jonathan S. Price, Paul W. McMullin, 2017. Timber Frame Construction (5th Edition); Robin Lancashire, Lewis Taylor, 2011. Trees; Bruce Albert, Stefano Mancuso, Francis Halle, 2019. Wood; William Hall, 2017. Wood Atlas; Gay Peter, Patrick Gay, 2001. Wood Urbanism: From the Molecular to the Territorial; Jane Hutton, Kiel Moe, Daniel Ibañez, 2018. Woodworking: The Complete Step-by-Step Manual; DK, 2020.




Hooke Park SoundTrail Heard and (un)Seen Hooke Park is a woodland managed for timber production; Hooke Park is a campus for architectural education; Hooke Park is a playground for experimentations. But, Hooke Park is a 400-year-old ancient woodland; Hooke Park is also a habitat for wildlife. For years, the ecological roles of Hooke Park seem to be disconnected from the human, and the roles that are humanfocused have been explored much further than the ecological ones. Although this issue is noticed by the school, limited measures have been taken due to the lack of manpower. In this project, I propose a monthly pedagogical event, Hooke Park SoundTrail, to study and understand the woods by hearing rather than seeing. With invited professionals, local conservationists and volunteers, participants can collect acoustical information about the ecosystem while establishing their literacy of bird songs and other kinds of

natural sounds. The Pole Barn, the largest abandoned structure in the woods will be transformed into a classroom for listening to the recordings while shelters for staying overnight and listening to tawny owls will be proposed. These structures provide necessary facilities for the event and the designs will construct the required acoustic environments for different listening activities with bracken-based architectural components. From a broader perspective, many natural habitats in the UK are in a similar situation to Hooke Park. They have not been monitored, studied and conserved due to lack of facilities and human resources. Bracken, as a plant widely distributed across different habitats in the UK, provides a new alternative for building semitemporary structure in the rural areas. It could potentially help to facilitate the establishment of monitoring programmes like Hooke Park SoundTrail, to engage more public to engage, to study and to understand our nature.

Ke Yang



Hooke Park SoundTrail: A Journey towards Nature Full Video Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qjr0IT7tIho


The Mysterious Sound from Afar

The Shelter at Night


The Material Inventory and The Construction

I have never spent a night in the woods. When dark, I can’t see anything but I can still hear and sense the surroundings, the soundscape.


Map of the Sonic Environments


Hooke Park is a collection of natural soundscapes.

639

The richness of the woodland’s species, landscape and atmosphere have created a wide variety of natural soundscapes. The songs from the calling birds, the moans from the creaking trees, the sounds of the running streams and various kinds of natural sounds are working collectively to create a unique site-specific “Biophony”.

Recording 01

Recording 02

Recording 03

Recording 04

Recording 05

Recording 06

Recording 07

Recording 08

Recording 09

Recording 10

Field Recordings


anthropocentric

A Managed Woodland

A Campus for Architectural Education

A Playground for Experimentations

A Collection of Natural Soundscapes

ecocentric

A Habitat for Wildlife

An Ancient Woodland


Exploring the soundscapes can bridge the gap between the anthropocentric roles and ecocentric roles of Hooke Park.

641

Currently, the anthropocentric roles of Hooke Park have been intensively explored yet the ecocentric ones are under-valued. Since the acoustic information in a soundscape needs to be heard by humans, exploring the soundscapes can be the first step for us to engage with the woodland’s ecology and bridge the gap between human and nature.

Ecological Applications of Passive Acoustic Monitoring (Gibb et al. 2018)


Features of a Soundscape Soundmark - The Sound of Eurasian W Signals - The Sound of Birds Keynote - Forest White Noise

Eurasian Wren

Mistle Thrush Forest White Noise


Wren

Blue Tit



Summer has arrived, Loudly sing, cuckoo! The seed is growing And the meadow is blooming, And the wood is coming into leaf now, Sing, cuckoo!

645

Birdsong also has its cultural value which can be found among literature, methodology and music. The song, “Sumer is icumen in”, or known as “the Cuckoo Song”, is the oldest known musical round with English words. It survives in only a single manuscript probably made in Oxford during the 3rd quarter of the 13th century.

The Manuscript of “Sumer Is Icumen In” (British Library 2020)


“I heard a bird.” “What bird?“ “I don’t know.” On the one hand, extracting the information embedded in the can help us understanding therefore monitor the ecosystem. On the other hand, it can re-establish our literacy of natural sounds. Moving from rural to city, a modern man is losing the ability to describe and name the bird songs. Linguistic accuracy is not merely a matter of lexicography. Humans only perceive what we can name. In a man-dominated world, when the name of a thing dies, it is dismissed from society, and its very existence may be imperilled.


Tawny Owl Territorial Calls https://youtu.be/JHDkQwuvESI

Tawny Owl Flight Calls https://youtu.be/VEM-e7Ea0l8

Tawny Owl Alarm Calls https://youtu.be/SVEIzNVshHc

Tawny Owl Begging Calls https://youtu.be/_ogxiyWbqO4

Studies of Tawny Owl Calls


The Invitation


Hooke Park SoundTrail is a 24-hour ecoacoustics survey happens once a month at Hooke Park.

649

Developed from BioBlitz, which is “an intense period of biological surveying in an attempt to record all the living species within a designated area”, the event will study selected species for two years and mainly by hearing and collecting acoustical data. For the first cycle, the event will focus on the study of birds with a focus on tawny owls. A transect is planned for listening to birds based on their preference for habitats. Along the transect, some existing structures will be re-adapted to provide some indoor spaces and shelters for staying overnight will be built.

BioBlitz Event (Amateur Entomologists’ Society 2020)



Walk in the woods with a concentration on listening to the soundscapes as a measure to monitor the woodlands’ ecosystem while fostering the ability to understand nature.


A Clearcutting Site Heavily Covered by Weedy Species

Bracken


One of the aims is to monitor the regeneration of habitats at the clearcutting sites. After a clearcut, the original habitats for wildlife were damaged. However, the open canopy provides opportunities for invasive and weedy species to colonise the land and bracken is the most significant one. As can be seen, the ground is heavily covered by bracken which inhibits the growth of tree seedlings.


Cutting

Crushing

Livestock Treading

Cut twice each year: First, cut in about mid-June (mid-July if ground-nesting birds may be present) when the bracken is 50-75 cm high (this cut may have to be later in the uplands) and again six weeks later.

Less effective than cutting, but sometimes is suitable for difficult terrains which might damage the cutter blades. It is more effective to be carried out repeatedly on young brittle fronds that snap easily. Repeat the treatment for at least three years if doing twice per season, and for five years if only once a year. For sites where tractors or ATVs are inapplicable, consider using horsedrawn rollers or bracken-bruisers.

Attract livestock to the site by winter-feeding, so that bracken buds and developing fronds clos to the surface or rising just abov the surface can be destroyed by stock treading, which can also enhance the frost’s penetration t the rhizomes with the litter being disturbed and crushed. In spring when new fronds expand, remov the livestock to prevent bracken poisoning.


n se ve y

to g g, ve n

Different methods have been applied to manage bracken growth.

Ploughing and Cultivation

Hand-Pulling and Digging

In suitable areas, bracken cover can be significantly reduced by ploughing between late June and early August. Aim to invert deep furrows to expose the bracken rhizomes, leave them undisturbed over winter, and follow with a spring sowing. Deep tine cultivation in two directions has been used to control bracken without ploughing. However, this method should not be used on sites with valuable ground flora. It could also damage the intrinsic value of the cultivated soil, so it should not be used on undisturbed semi-natural and/or ancient soils.

If mature bracken fronds and rhizomes need to be harvested and used for other purposes, bracken could be pulled out of the ground easily by hand without damaging the fronds and rhizomes, which can be cut into smaller segments and dug out. This method can be used from September to February. After February, the fronds might be too brittle to pull.

Bracken Management Methods Illustrated by the Author (Natural England 2008)



Harvest bracken as a measure to control the growth of bracken and explore its architectural potentials and aesthetic value.



Prototypes

The Leaves of Bracken

The Stipes of Bracken

The Rhizomes of Bracken


The Life of Bracken: From the ‘Pest’ to the Next


Full Book Available at: https://issuu.com/kyang931019/docs/the_life_of_bracken


The Proposal

Internal Sounds

The Spatial Requirements

Noise from Adjacent Spaces


The Pole Barn is the largest secondary structure in the woods but has been abandoned for years.

663

The Pole Barn, as the largest secondary structure in Hooke Park woodlands, used to be the storage of fell wood before they were delivered to the sawmill for processing. However, it has been abandoned for years. The main task is to create a walling system that is soundproof and waterproof to turn this semi-open space into a suitable space for working, taking classes and listening to the recordings.

The Pole Barn


Bracken Bundled Frame

Timber Frame

Fibre-reinforced Biocomposite Membrane

Leaf Infills

Woven Panel


Wall Partition Detail

This iteration uses timber plank as the main structure of the partition and bracken bundles as substructures to hold the panels. The wall partition includes three layers of materials that create a sandwiched insulation system. On the exterior, fibre-reinforced biocomposite membrane will act as a waterproof and soundproof layer and prevent all the winds and noises from breaking in, while its translucent property diffuses the direct sunlight. On the interior, bracken woven panels with different weave patterns are applied to reflect part of the internal sounds while some of the sound waves will penetrate the woven panel and be absorbed by the bracken leaf infills. Effective thermal insulation can also be achieved with this combination of materials.

665


Woven Wall Panel Detail I

Perspective Section of the Pole Barn Classroom

Woven Wall Panel Detail II


Pole Barn Refurbishment

667

Polycarbonate Sheet

Existing Structure

Absorbent Ceiling Panels Acoustic Wall Partitions

Roller Blind

Log Ends Floor

Exploded Axonometric of the Pole Barn Classroom


The Partition Details and Its Acoustic Performance



The 1:1 Mock-up Fabricated in Hooke Park



The Proposal

Wildlife Sounds and Forest Noise 20Hz to 20kHz

The Spatial Requirements

Owl’s Call

Wildlife Sounds and Forest Noise 20Hz to 20kHz


Shelters for Owl-Listening

673

The shelters are situated in a piece of broadleaved woodland with a diverse soundscape and a rich landscape. The structures collaborate with the local landscape, achieve the cohabitation of human and nature and ultimately integrate with the environment. Due to the complexity of the natural soundscape, birdlistening beginners could be overwhelmed. Therefore, filter and reduce the intensity of unwanted sounds will create a beginner-friendly acoustic environment to listen specifically to the calls of tawny owls.

The Site


Site Map


Sounds of the Woodlands, Sounds of the Birds.

675

The second site, the Shelter, is situated inside a beech woodland near the entrance next to the main road.

The Shelters Site 7:00AM Sounds Generated by Human Activity Human Movement Foot Stepping

Talking

Machinery

Car

Sounds Generated by Nature Animal Vocalisation

Environment

Bird Tree Singing Creaking

Wind Blowing

Aerial View


Eurasian Siskin 15 - 20dB 3000 - 6500Hz

Mistle Thrush 18 - 22dB 2200 - 4800Hz

Eurasian Jay 14 - 25dB 2600 - 6000Hz

Common Blackbird 15 - 30dB 2000 - 5000Hz

Tawny Owl 17 - 40dB 700 - 1200Hz

Great Tit 15 - 35dB 4000 - 6500Hz

Eurasian Blue Tit 15 - 25dB 4000 - 8000Hz

Eurasian Wren 18 - 28dB 3500 - 8500Hz

Carrion Crow 14 - 45dB 1500 - 2500Hz

White Noise 20 - 60dB 50 - 1000Hz

Tree Creaking 15 - 20dB 500 - 2000Hz

Footsteps 10 - 15dB 400 - 1500Hz

The Isolated Sounds


Reconstruct the Soundscape

677

The Reconstruction of the Soundscape

Due to the site’s location, car noises from the highway outside Hooke Park and from the main road, as well as sounds from hikers can sometimes be heard. However, the majority of the sounds are generated by birds, especially in the mornings, which makes it the best spot for experiencing the dawn chorus. Furthermore, as all the trees in this area are broad-leaved beech trees, which will shed leaves in winter, the forest background white noise will change in different seasons.


Helmholtz Resonator

Helmholtz Resonator

Frequency to the Radius of the Spherical Cavity

The Corresponding Acoustic Absorbers for Great Tit’s Call


Porous Absorber

679

lmin

Quater of a Wavelength Rule

Porous Absorber

Frequency to the Thickness of Material


The Corresponding Acoustic Absorbers for Different Birds’ Call


681


Helmholtz Resonator 01

Helmholtz Resonator 02

30mm

30mm

30mm 100mm

30mm 80mm

Carrion Crow

Blackbird Mistle Thrush

Radius - 50mm

Radius - 40mm


683

Helmholtz Resonator 03

Helmholtz Resonator 04

30mm

30mm

30mm 70mm

30mm 52mm

Jay Siskin

Wren, Blue Tit Great Tit

Radius - 35mm

Radius - 26mm


The Partition Details and Its Acoustic Performance

The Sound Brick


A “Sound Brick“ is made from bracken’s fibrereinforced starch-based biopolymer. After obtaining the dimensions of the four Helmholtz resonators, different methods have been tested to fabricate them. At first, to keep it lightweight, two biocomposite panels with 3D printed mould underneath were cast to create half of the required cavity on each panel. However, due to the geometry of the void, the panels cracked during the drying process. To solve the issue, a cubical sound brick was split and cast in two parts. In this attempt, the volume of the materials provides enough tolerance for it to dry and shrink without causing critical cracking issue. When constructing this sound filtering wall, the biocomposite sound bricks will be sandwiched in between two layers of woven mat. The sound bricks with smaller cavities will be placed at the bottom, whereas the ones with larger voids will be placed on high levels.

685


Perspective Section of the Shelter


The form of a shelter will be defined by the surrounding trees and ground flora.

687

A 1:20 sectional model of the shelter is made following the actual construction sequence. Firstly, the bundled columns are inserted deep into the ground with a stainless steel pipe. The steel pipe can help to avoid the structure to be decayed too soon by isolating it with the humidity at ground level. Then, the log ends floor, raised platform and the clay wall are built. After the columns are bent and anchored, the internal woven mat will be fixed to the columns, then the sound bricks will be placed. As the last step, the external woven mat with basket weave pattern will cover the structure as a waterproof layer.

1. The floor and the raised platform are built after erecting the bundled columns 2. After the columns are bent and anchored, the internal woven mat will be installed then sound bricks will be placed. 3. Woven panels will be installed.

1:20 Sectional Model




690

Bibliography

Amateur Entomologists’ Society. 2020. “Bioblitz”. Amentsoc. Org. https://www.amentsoc.org/insects/glossary/terms/bioblitz. British Library. 2020. The Manuscript Of “’Sumer Is Icumen In”. Image. Accessed May 28. https://www.bl.uk/britishlibrary/~/ media/bl/global/highlights/music/summer1%20is%20 icumen%20in%20harley%20ms%20978.jpg. Gibb, Rory, Ella Browning, Paul Glover‐Kapfer, and Kate E. Jones. 2018. “Emerging Opportunities And Challenges For Passive Acoustics In Ecological Assessment And Monitoring”. Methods In Ecology And Evolution 10 (2): 169-185. doi:10.1111/2041-210x.13101. Natural England. 2008. “Bracken Management And Control”. Natural England Technical Information Note TIN048. Schafer, Raymond Murray. 1994. Our Sonic Environment And The Soundscape. Rochester, Verm.: Destiny Books.



Inte

Exte


693

erior

erior

Index


Index bracken 633, 653, 654, 655, 657, 661, 665, 685

Symbols 2D 3D

bracken leaf 665

340 340, 685 C

A adaptations 147 affordable housing 113, 134, 139 agency 425, 450, 451, 535, 616 aggregates 165, 173, 188, 189, 190, 191, 248 all-in-one 177, 202 anchors 556

camp 521 camping 432, 509, 514, 515, 519 campfire 450, 509 capacity 177, 435, 437, 447 Caretaker’s House 389, 392 cast 165, 173, 186, 190, 197, 199, 233, 235, 253, 260, 263-264, 294, 685

angles 340, 349 anti-manifesto 426, 450, 452, 456, 457, 538 Architectural Assocation 51, 365, 374 AA 1, 3, 9, 86-87, 165, 304, 365, 367-368, 369, 371, 377, 394, 425-426, 428, 430, 431-434, 438, 441,

casting 165, 173, 205, 218-219, 223-225, 230-231 261, 265, 276 catalogue 260, 261, 262, 280, 313, 438 cement 128, 412, 413 channels 332

453, 466, 478, 491, 500-501, 519, 521, 529,

chapel 215, 233, 235, 237

544, 547, 604, 700

chimney 317

assembly 197, 520

classroom 460, 463, 504, 514, 633 clay 1 13, 121, 124, 143, 161, 291, 687 extraction of clay 143

B

claypit 143

barbed wires 86, 93 batches 109, 165, 169, 177, 199, 227, 301, 317, 322, 325, 327, 328, 344, 352 bathroom 157 bats 3, 361, 373, 377, 379, 381, 383, 384, 385, 387, 389, 391, 393, 395, 405, 409, 421, 422 Bat Conservation Trust 375 bat consultant 420 bat surveys 420 Bedford Estates 494 Bedford Square 494, 500, 505, 519 Bedford Square garden 500 Belgium 568, 569, Big Shed 351, 389, 390, 604 BioBlitz 649 biocomposite 665, 685 biodiversity 9, 101, 361-362, 373-374, 379, 385, 402-403, 405, 407, 409, 411, 413, 415, 417, 420-421, 573 indicators of biodiversity 361, 379

clearcutting 653 Clement, Gilles 51, 81, 94 cob 113, 123, 126, 127, 128, 136, 137, 140, 143, 145, 147, 155, 157 cobbauge 113, 121, 127-129, 132-134, 137, 140-141, 143, 145, 162

D dawn chorus 677 decay 473, 504, 505 decentralised 318 demolished 570 Design & Make 288, 305, 547, 604, 700 Diploma 18 1, 4, 313, 322, 375, 376, 387, 441-443, 700, 704 disassembled 311 dismountability 311 diversify 429 Dorset 90, 110, 113, 134, 339, 376, 422, 494, 500, 618

biodiversity net gain 402, 420 biopolymer 685

downcycling 311,325

Black Mountain College 465, 538

Dry stone walling society 109

Boyarsky, Alvin 433

dump 169, 181

drainage 123, 230, 231, 291


Index duty of care 493

hemp 113, 126, 127, 134, 143, 153, 161 hemp shiv 126, 127 hemp straw 126, 127

E

highway 51, 86, 205, 209, 213, 215, 238, 677

ecology 9, 51, 104, 105, 461, 311, 358, 376, 641, 690, education 426, 428, 432, 458, 459, 460, 461-491, 499,

holistic 458, 465 housing 113, 118, 134-135, 137, 139, 147, 149, 161, 568

633 architectural education 426, 428 educators 428, 497, 535

I

elasticity 441, 442, 443

identity 51

embodied energy 113, 121, 311

Illich, Ivan 499

environment 375, 403, 422, 675, 690 acoustic environment 673

immediacy 425, 443

Eurocodes 564 Europe 209, 432, 630, 705

incompatible 301, 330

Evans, Amy 91, 701

instructions 301, 330, 336, 344, 345, 349, 509, 520

imprint 97 insects 361, 371, 409, 461, 690 insulation 126, 134, 291, 581, 665

F

intellectualize 463

fabric 224-225, 227-229, 231, 235, 238 facility 294, 426, 438, 478, 500 farmer 181, 294, 325 fellowship 458, 521 fibres 113, 121, 126, 127

interface 301, 340, 344, 349, 352 interlock 272, 291, 330, 336-337, 352 Interlocking 202, 233, 272, 273, 301, 311, 315, 320 Intervention 35, 37, 39, 94, 420 island 1, 3, 51, 54-62, 64, 66, 68, 69, 70, 72, 76, 86, 88,

firing 311 flexibility 113, 159, 197, 330, 461

90, 94, 96, 100, 102, 108, 110, 111, 425, 426,

flying factory 113, 139

485, 487, 494, 499, 504-505, 508, 509, 513, 515,

448, 455, 457, 466-467, 470, 472-475, 478, 482,

food storage 241, 259 forest 51, 72, 369, 425, 506, 541, 584, 677 forest floor 72 formwork 128, 140,132,141, 165, 223, 225, 227, 230-233, 262-265, 268, 275

519, 520, 522-529, 531-532, 535 isomorphic 165, 197, 199 J

foundations 124, 544, 545, 554, 568 Forte, Neil 322, 701

Jo Ferguson 375, 701

fox 79

John James Roofing 308, 315, 320, 358

framework 113, 140, 494, 495

Juliet Haysom 103, 202, 700

fungus 75

Jurassic Reclamation 313, 315, 320- 323, 326, 329, 339, 358, 701

G galvanized 225, 227, 230 geometry 197, 685 ground conditions 101

K kiln 311 kitchen 155, 288, 464, 465 kitchen garden 288-289

H Hales, Stephen 369, 372, 373, 374, 375, 376, 701

L

handbook 520, 531, 533 Hanson 180-181, 183, 202, 241, 245, 249, 250-251, 274, 298, 701 headlap 333 health and safety 488, 528 Helmholtz Resonator 678, 682, 683

laboratory 301, 351, 352 labour 137, 147 landfills 311, 325 learning 93, 425, 426, 429, 460-465, 478, 499, 500, 504, 508, 514,


Index leftover 186, 248, 253, 268, 296

overlapping 328, 333

liability 453, 489, 491, 494, 495, 496, 497

Otto, Frei 546, 547, 570

institutional liability 453, 489, 491 lightweight 127, 165, 191, 197, 685 LILAC 139, 140, 162

P

loadbearing 113, 126, 128

Park House 544

local materials 118, 134

Parnham 544, 545

lorry 209, 218

Paths for All 109 pedagogy 9, 51, 93, 301, 352, 365, 425, 426, 428, 430-434, 478, 501, 505, 633

M

pedagogical project 426, 428, 430, 432, 434, 478,

machinery 140, 141, 145, 295, 578

501

maintenance 9, 113, 121, 161, 421, 564, 700

radical pedagogies 458, 460, 462, 464

mammals 361, 383

permission 399, 400, 446, 447, 453, 494, 529

Marley 314, 315, 330, 332, 334, 338

photogrammetry 340

mass 121, 147, 241, 253-255, 278,

pilgrimage 205, 208, 214, 216, 218, 220, 222, 226, 228

matchmaking 323, 330, 573 materials 113, 118, 128, 134, 137, 141, 145, 161-162,

230, 234, 313 plantation 64, 65, 106, 506, 573, 585, 613

205, 241, 254, 305, 311, 313, 347, 385,

plant yard 169, 181, 248, 260, 261, 262

397, 420, 463, 578, 579, 584, 614, 665,

platform 157, 218, 234, 301, 425, 520, 521, 529, 531,

685, 704, 705

533, 687

material flows 307

prison 488

material resellers 301, 307, 313

profile 341, 520

modern 1, 3, 205, 208, 214, 216, 218, 220, 222, 226,

prototype 113, 121, 127, 162

228, 230, 234, 315, 646 monuments 205, 209, 213, 215, 460 Moorcraft, Colin 432 moss 72, 73

Q quarry 102, 103, 109, 465

moths 373, 374 motorway 215, 217

R

multi-dimensional classroom 504 Mutual Home Ownership scheme 139

rammed earth 128, 131

mutuality 425

ready-mixed 251 reclaimer 248 reclamation yards 301, 313, 322, 339

N

recycling 173, 181, 188, 248, 579

National Planning Policy Framework 403 nature 51, 59, 63, 81, 91, 143, 361, 377, 432, 458, 460, 505, 549, 568, 633, 641, 651, 673, 705

Redland 314-315, 322-323, 330-332, 334, 336, 337, 338 Redland Delta 314, 322, 330-331 regeneration 653

O

removal 317

Occupier’s Liability Act 493, 494

replacement 317

offcuts 102, 103, 109, 110, 573, 579, 587, 591, 593, 595,

resellers 301, 307, 313, 340, 347

Repatching Day 161

614, 616, 617, 623

resource exchange 301

osteomorphic 197

responsibility 421, 462, 496, 497

outpost 513

reuse 183, 245, 301, 317, 565

overgrowth 93, 473

RIBA 420


Index ridge-way 98, 99

surplus 165, 205, 218, 241, 256, 264, 295, 337, 704

roof 123, 153, 273, 291, 301, 307, 311, 313, 316-320,

sustainable 420

324-325, 327-328, 333, 339-340, 345, 349, 351,

system 113, 126, 165, 169, 233, 272, 361, 432-435, 499, 663, 665, 704

353, 356, 358, 383, 384-385, 392, 393, 413, 541, 549 roofers 301, 340 roof tile 301, 311, 317, 319, 320, 322, 325, 356 roosts 361, 377, 380-381, 383-385, 389, 397, 400-401, 407, 411, 417, 420-421 roosting opportunities 401

T tadelakt 157 Taliesin School of Architecture 458, 459-463 Tawny Owl 647, 676

root cellar 293

temperature fluctuations 254

routes 205, 211, 397, 421, 443

testing 126-127, 165, 191, 197, 304, 345, 443, 614

ruin 51, 56, 60, 62, 64, 66, 68, 70, 72, 76, 86, 88, 90,

thatch 153

94, 96, 100, 102, 108, 473, 505

thermal 121, 126-128, 147, 254, 278, 291, 385, 614, 615, 665, 705 thermal mass 121, 147, 254, 278, 291

S

Third Estate 81, 110

safety 461, 488, 491, 528, 568

Third landscape 51, 91, 94, 95

salvage 51, 313, 319, 573

tile 291, 301, 311, 313, 314, 317, 319, 320, 322-323, 325, 327-328, 340-341, 344, 356

samples 315, 320, 321, 358, 578 sand 124, 173

tool 425, 499, 501

Scarlet elfcup 75

training 140

seed dispersers 379

travel 205, 432, 579

self build 137, 138, 139, 140, 155

tree 76, 361, 376, 382, 387, 453, 464, 493, 541, 547, 573, 579, 585, 653

assisted self build 140 self-governing 487

truck 143, 177, 181, 185, 187, 202, 210, 218, 223, 234, 241, 246, 260,

self-organise 521 sharing 147, 462, 519, 524

typology 147, 205, 278

Somerset 320, 321, 376

Tomlinson, Nick 375, 376, 387, 701

sound 169, 614, 665, 685, 687, 705 soundscape 637, 641, 673 sourcing 113, 161, 301, 317, 318, 323, 356, 578 Southwark Towers 566

U UK 113, 121, 126, 128, 138, 139, 162, 165, 173, 217,

staff-student ratio 447

249, 251, 256, 291, 298, 301, 311, 313, 339, 352,

staff supervision 447

353, 379, 385, 397, 405, 421-422, 432, 490, 494,

stamp 320

633 Building Regulations in the UK 128

standards 251, 347, 568 state of exception 502

University of Plymouth 113, 126, 162

stone 103, 109, 117, 278, 385

unmanaged 51, 69, 396, 425, 505, 704

storm Dennis 59

upside-down 233

straw bale 139

users 345, 494, 515

strength class 251, 265

utopia 209

structural 117, 121, 126, 127, 128, 136, 143, 251, 464, 541, 547

V

students 9, 305, 365, 367, 371, 390, 425, 428, 431-432, 438, 441, 443, 447, 450, 458, 460, 464-465, 501, 513, 521, 535, 538 stump 541

value 51, 87, 93, 161, 325, 463, 465, 501-502, 505, 547, 645-657 variations 320, 328


Index vernacular 1, 3, 113, 116-117, 122, 124, 126, 128, 132, 134, 138, 140, 142, 144, 146, 148, 150, 152, 154, 156, 158, 160, 630 voids 411, 415, 420, 421, 685 Vulpes vulpes 79 W warden 448 wash-out 188, 248 waste 51, 165, 169, 171, 177, 179, 181, 183, 186, 188, 199, 200, 201, 205, 241, 245, 247-249, 253, 256, 260, 262, 274, 541, 547, 573, 579, 704 wasteland 51, 505 waste management 165, 169, 253, 704 weather check lugs 337, 341 Westminster Lodge 369, 394, 439 wildlife engineering 67 window details 132 Wrens Nursery 91 woodland 9, 51, 67, 79, 88, 361, 365, 367, 368, 374-375, 387, 425, 435, 439, 466, 471, 494, 513, 528, 633, 639, 641, 673, 675 managed woodlands 387 unmanaged woodland 51, 425 Y yard 169, 181, 188, 217, 248, 260-262, 313, 319, 322, 324, 339



Acknowledgements Diploma 18 would like to extend our sincerest gratitude to the unit’s many collaborators, especially the maintenance and management team in Hooke Park. Behind every chapter is an understanding enriched by encounters with

Zachary Mollica . Hooke Park Christopher Sadd . Hooke Park Charlie Corrywright . Hooke Park Georgie Corrywright . Hooke Park Tia Corrywright . Hooke Park Edward Coe . Hooke Park Jean-Nicolas Dackiw . Hooke Park Erwin Kalocsai . Hooke Park Gill Coates . Hooke Park Sheralyn Stuckey . Hooke Park Amina Yusupova . Student, Design + Make Sam Little . AA Graduate 2019 Arvind Roy . AA Graduate 2019 Mark Morris . AA Head of Teaching Simon Withers . AA Studio Master Ed Bottoms . AA Head of Archives Elena Luciano Suastegui . AA Landscape Urbanism Javier Castanon . AA Technical Studies Miraj Ahmed . AA Unit Master Juliet Haysom . Artist & Designer Amica Dall . Assemble


Sebastien Marot . Writer Bim Burton . The Bartlett, UCL Jack Self . The Real Review Sophie Boone . Rotor Arne Vanden Capelle . Rotor Maria Speake . Retrouvius Adam Hills . Retrouvius Peter Jurschitzka . David Chipperfield Architects Johannes Feder . David Chipperfield Architects Irene Djao-Rakitine . Djao-Rakitine Landscape Architecture Anna Falgueres . Movie Director & Production Designer John Shank . Script Writer & Production Designer Nigel Fisher . Whytham Woods Conservator Elisa Dierickx . Flora & Fauna Philippe de Wouters . Royal Forestry Society, Belgium Amir Bouyahi . Royal Forestry Society, Belgium Jean Goovaerts . Royal Forestry Society, Belgium Nick Tomlinson . Naturalist, Bat Specialist Stephen Hales . Naturalist Jo Ferguson . Bat Conservation Trust Danielle Linton . Bat Researcher Neil Forte . Jurassic Reclamation Kate Edwards . Edwards and Eve Cob Building Hanadi Rammu . University College London Philip Powell . Museum of Natural History, Oxford Kristin Ross . The School of Architecture at Taliesin Jessica Martin . The School of Architecture at Taliesin Amy Evans . Wren’s Nursery Jason Watts . Hanson Concrete plant in Yeovil Christopher J Smith . Mixmate Concrete




704

Diploma 18 2019/20

Shidi Fu is a big fan of World of Warcraft. He currently has a L.36 Undead Mage and a L.30 Worgen Druid. He also loves landscape and planning and plans to do something along those lines in the future. Shreya Kochatta is interested in the revival of unmanaged and abandoned landscapes. She has a proclivity towards dark architecture and has also designed a house for a killer. Lydia Cho Ying Liu is interested in the material aspect of the building process as a means for collective action. She is also an avid collector of rocks and has a passion for geology. Sorana-Stefana Mazilu is interested in the concrete industry’s waste management system and its potential for creating new construction techniques using surplus materials. She is a diligent follower of The Great British Bake Off and is currently trying to master the Éclair. Ele Mun continues to explore his keen interest in narratives through the written word, filmmaking, as well as architecture. He is also a self-proclaimed hoarder of all things pleasant (most recently roof tiles). Joyce KaKei Ng is an architect with a particular interest in environmentally conscious work. She also hopes to design her own narrowboat in the near future and explore England’s canals. Nicole Ng would like to further her belief and interest in the role of design education for the practice of citizenship. She aspires to be an educator and to create an architectural education network in South East Asia where she is from. She is also a lover of coconut water (the one from Innocent) and the game Overcooked (the first one).


705

Alice Nobel is fascinated by the inherent qualities of different materials and aims to use each material for what it is good for. She started off the year becoming the unit expert on Hooke Park’s wood species, and later researched the thermal properties of concrete. Popcorn is what keeps her awake in the nights, she eats at least one bowl each night. Andrew Robertson is a designer drawn to complex problems that require elegant and unique solutions, embracing entropy in architecture and in life. Clara Schwarz wants to be a specialist in timber construction and forestry management. She also dreams of running her own designer bakery in Paris one day. Connie Lynn Tang is interested in the management of local resources and the relationship between humans and their immediate environment. She enjoys the little things in life such as the sound of birds chirping and the smell of cedar. Cheddar is her least favourite type of cheese. Ke Yang is both a lover of nature and a natural lover. He specialises in the intersection between material research, high-tech and low-tech fabrication techniques and design.

Lionel Devlieger spent a lot of time studying the material economy of the Italian Renaissance and the cultural representations that accompanied it, before deciding to turn his attention the same topic for the present age. Aude-Line Duliere enjoys engaging in architectural, research and pedagogical projects that calibrate implications such as the use of resources, labor practices, timeframes, users aspirations and cultural relationships. Maarten Gielen is a founding member of the collective Rotor where he c urrently works as designer, manager and researcher. He curated together with Lionel Devlieger the 2013 Oslo Architecture Triennale and was awarded the Rotterdam-Maaskant prize in 2015. James Westcott is an editor, most recently of Countryside (Taschen, 2020) and Elements of Architecture (Taschen, 2018), and the author of When Marina Abramovic Dies: A Biography (MIT Press, 2010). He is interested in ecology, climate, the neolithic, and domestication.




Shidi Fu Shreya Kochatta Lydia Cho Ying Liu Sorana-Stefana Mazilu Ele Mun Joyce Ka Kei Ng Nicole Ng Hui Min Alice Nobel Andrew Robertson Clara Schwarz Connie Lynn Tang Ke Yang

Aude-Line Duliere James Westcott Maarten Gielen Lionel Devlieger

2019/20


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