WORK Alexander James Palmer
CONTACT: Alexander James Palmer 438 King Ave Columbus, OH 43201 419.889.8864 ajpalmer19@gmail.com The Ohio State University Knowlton School of Architecture 275 Woody Hayes Dr Columbus, OH 43210
ALEXANDER J. PALMER
438 King Ave / Columbus, OH 43201 / 419.889.8864 / ajpalmer19@gmail.com
EDUCATION 2012
The Ohio State University Columbus, OH Bachelor of Science in Architecture, Creative Writing Minor Cum Laude, Distinction and Honors in Architecture
2008
Arlington High School Arlington, OH Diploma, Honors
TRAVEL 2011
Eastern/Central Europe Intensive five week tour of architecture in Greece, Italy, Austria, the Czech Republic, Switzerland, France, and Germany
2010
Western Europe Intensive five week tour of architecture in Spain, Portugal, France, Belgium, Germany, and The Netherlands
WORK
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2011
FedEx Ground Columbus, OH Package Handler
2008
Anderson Construction Findlay, OH Intern, Operator
ACTIVITIES 2010-2012
ONE:TWELVE Knowlton School of Architecture Student Journal Writer and Copy Editor Writing Credits: Issue 001: “High Rise, High Skepticism” Issue 002: “Faces” “Know Your Order” Postcard
2011-2012
BikeOSU Safe Cycling advocacy group Treasurer
2001-2008
Boy Scouts of America Troop 318, Arlington Eagle Scout, Troop Instructor
SKILLS Software Rhinoceros 4, AutoCAD 2012, Illustrator CS5, Photoshop CS5, InDesign CS5, SketchUp 7, 3DS Max Rendering, V-Ray Rendering Fabrication Laser cutting, 3D printing, traditional shop fabrication methods, building architectural models Sketching Travel sketches, producing preliminary schemes/concepts, diagramming Writing Technical and creative writing
REFERENCES
Available on request
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ALEXANDER J. PALMER Columbus, OH: 08-12 Columbus, OH: 08-12
EDUCATION Current Residence The Ohio State University PROJECTS
Detroit, MI: SP12 St. Croix, US Virgin Islands: WI12 Caracas, Venezuela: SP10 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: AU12 Highland Heights, KY: SP11 Columbus, OH: AU10 Athens, OH: SP12 Grove City, OH: AU10 Nonfiction: 2012 No Location: 2012 Madria, Mexico (fictional): 2012 Nonfiction: 2011 Prague Porto, Aveiro Paris, Reims, Poissy, Ronchamp, Amiens Brussels, Brugges London Vienna, Bregenz Athens, Corinth, Delphi, Aegina Seville, Barcelona, Madrid, Zaragoza, Córdoba, Salamanca Vals, Zurich, Berne, Sumvitg, Basel Rome, Tivoli, Paestum, Florence, Bomarzo, Bagnaia, Montepulciano Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague, Groningen, Utrecht, Almere, Delft Stuttgart, Berlin, Munich, Cologne, Leipzig, Dresden, Frankfurt, Neviges
Next Detroit Hypo-Stylin’ Casa la Roca (Case Study) Rock’n Rio Safe Havens This Is A Market Lost In The Woods This Bitter Earth WRITING “A Crossroads At The End Of The Universe” “RUN” Short Story “The Dust Settles on Eternity” Story “FACES” One:Twelve Issue 002 TRAVEL The Czech Republic Portugal France Belgium Great Britain Austria Greece Spain Switzerland Italy The Netherlands Germany 7
NEXT DETROIT Alex Palmer Reese Greenlee
Joe Sizemore Josh Kuhr
CRITIC: Lisa Tilder Allison Drda Emma Silverblatt
HONORS STUDIO CRITIC: LISA TILDER SPRING 2012
In a group honors studio project tasked with defining nature, my group selected Detroit, Michigan for a speculative narrative project polemicizing a version of nature humanity could hold if we continue down our current path in regards to climate change, pollution, architecture, culture, and more. From Detroit’s current situation, its tumultuous history, and our speculative future, a rich and complex project for and of the city emerged. Combining all elements of our historical nature, the idea of Next Nature became the dominating political direction.
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This combination map was the defining graphical analysis of the project. The individual architectural-nature parties chose a historical figure to base their explorations on. The Deep Ecologists are led by Rachel Carson. The Techno-Utopists are led by Buckminster Fuller, and the Neo-Luddites are led by
Ted Kaczynski. Within these parties and coding systems, each project was placed on a specific site in and around Detroit, most of which focused near the center of the city, and were plotted concurrently, regardless of position in time versus each other. Though the map doesn’t tell the full story in regards to
our created Detroit history, it works well as a palimpsest to recognize where each project has drawn or reacted to another, and in that way it can be carefully chronologized. The combination also defines for us the Next Nature position, led by Slavoj Žižek, which is the future the project predicted. 11
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Opposite: from foreground to background, Urban Farm (Deep Ecologist), Interchange Housing (Techno-Utopist), Packard Plant Inflatable Meetinghouse (Neo-Luddite), Downtown Detroit, with the Tesla Tower and Gateway in the background (Techno-Utopist) Top: Aerotropolis detail (Techno-Utopist) Left: Nuke Housing (Techno-Utopist) Right: Cow-Belle Isle (Deep Ecologist)
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TEACHING LABORATORY ST. CROIX US VIRGIN ISLES CRITIC: LISA TILDER GUI COMPETITION ENTRY WINTER 2012 Located on the Salt River Bay nature preserve on St. Croix, the laboratory program called for wet and dry laboratories, faculty and student housing, education wing, archive, and cafeteria. My project combined all of the programs into a single massive structure with discrete formal elements encompassing the programs. As science becomes a new religion with its various disciples and believers, it seemed fitting to house the scientific programs in forms reminiscent of religiosity. Though the public are not given access to the lab/cathedral of science, they are invited to learn the ways and “baptize� themselves in the knowledge of science through the community accessible education buildings which eventually process into the water. Separating each building is a spiral circulation unit, each representing a pilgrimmage point and a point of respite for those who tread there. At the end, the guests can take a short boat ride down to ascend the final circulation piece in the water, a coronation if you wish, and admire their new faith, Science.
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As the center needs to facilitate public and private programs, the division of these functions and their circulations was very important in the design. Public procession is designated in green and private in blue.
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ARCHITECTURAL GRAPHICS CRITIC: STEVEN TURK FABRICATION CASE STUDY SPRING 2010
The project was to recreate the model for the unbuilt 1995 Office dA project Casa la Roca using digital fabrication techniques and advanced 3D modeling. Using a mixture of digital and hand fabrication, my group created a model where structural members were modeled in basswood and all terra-cotta curtain wall elements, as well as the eponymous rock, were modeled with bristol board to clearly differentiate materials and their responsibilities to the project.
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ROCK’N RIO
OLYMPIC HANGOVER RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL CRITIC: BART OVERLY AUTUMN 2011 The City of Rio de Janeiro is hosting the Olympics in 2016 and has begun considering a post-Olympic masterplan to reuse the districts where the games are held. The program called for at least 2,000 units of housing, unspecified type, as well as commercial and retail to support the residents. Amenities like beaches and boat docks, as the site is on an inland lake in the city, were encouraged. Drawing from the natural setting of Rio, the project integrates the water, rock, and forest found all across the city into a planned district. The residents of the site live in the mat of rock buildings, cut through with swaths of road and courtyards giving access and light to all tenants. Prospective tenants have two flavors of living available to them, a more typical apartment block style room, and the invented type of Rock dwelling.
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The transition zone from forest to park.
Automobile circulation is restricted to the periphery of each building block with pedestrian and paths being the only means to traverse the site laterally once off the main coastal road.
Buildings exist on various scales to create different community sizes to meet specific peoples’ needs.
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DORMS AND “STUFF” HIGHLAND HEIGHTS, KENTUCKY CRITIC: ROB LIVESEY SPRING 2011 Northern Kentucky University needs dorms and amenities for 1500 students as well as mixed-use development. The project is sited on a hill just south of NKU’s main campus so it must also act as a gateway between the town and the university. My project took the tight site constraints and topography as a means to divide the program up into several smaller courtyard style buildings giving all residents semi-private outdoor space and public outdoor spaces as well. Two towers attached to the largest dorms draw you off the street, or up through the site, depending on your location of entry. Always visible, they create a unique visual experience in every space of the site in accordance with their relative location. The dorm buildings act to create a relatively normative experience of space punctuated by moments of intensity in the form of plazas and expansive views up and down the steep hillside.The mixed-use development at the top of the hill facing the street acts as a barrier to protect the living areas from the bustle of the town.
The program calls for a connection between the public street and the university with housing and mixed use development
There are two utility right of ways on the site that must be avoided in masterplanning of the campus
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My scheme uses these right of ways to create public to private transition spaces in the plan. The private spaces were accomodated with enclosed student courtyards.
These became access points where the new dorms can connect to the city of Highland heights, nearby amenity, and the residential communities nearby
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The towers act as points of interest to lead pedestrians off the street and down into the site.
Shops and restaurants for student and public use line the front of the site facing the main street. The plaza is sunk down several feet to help mitigate noise from the 45 mph road adjacent and to give the shoppers some privacy.
The sidwalk continues the existing edge of the site direclty adjacent to the street. The shops can be accessed via several stairs and ramps.
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The students live in two person dorms with private baths and have access to double height study spaces for every 16 rooms. Additionally, there is a large common area in the lobby for students to use to study and socialize.
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WHOLE FOODS STORE COLUMBUS, OH CRITIC: MICHAEL BAUMBERGER AUTUMN 2010
A Whole Foods store intends to build next to the existing North Market boutique and specialty food store in Downtown Columbus. My scheme chose to leave the existing North Market, which is housed in an old textiles plant, untouched. My design deals with the tension of two typologies, that of the market and that of the store. My explorations specifically focused on how the sign came to signify the market, completely separating the form and function of the building, much like the existing North Market. How a store is perceived is based mostly on our perception which is informed by the signage, following the theories of Venturi and others. With the sign taking the responsibility of identification, the store had the freedom to become any form it wishes. My project explored the formal games and narrative rhythms that can be created by repurposing a decontextualized typology, elevating the mundane act of grocery shopping to a spritiual experience.
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The form of the building intentionally resists site specificity as it is displaced from its roots in religiosity.
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S D O O W E LOST IN TH
HOSPITAL COURTYARD ATHENS, OH 24 HOUR DESIGN COMPETITION DESIGNED WITH JULIAN FUNK SPRING 2012 O’Bleness Memorial Hospital needs an area for respite from the stressful situations created with the field of healthcare. The site chosen is an existing area enclosed on three sides by the hospital building. The participants of the competition were told to interpret the word “respite” however they wished. In the design of Lost In The Woods we were seeking escape. In this pursuit, a fuzzy datum creates a new level on which an alternative inhabitation can be founded. At once a moment of rest and one of adventure, unraveled in a world separate from the plane of everyday life. The project gives respite from the stress of the hospital. It does this by giving you the sensation of walking into the woods, perhaps with a friend, and becoming totally, completely lost.
The wall was inspired by English walled gardens and the peace felt inside of them. The plant life softens the wall appearance making the occupant feel safe not trapped by their perceived solitude.
The hills inside the wall were inspired by English landscape gardens. Depending on where you stand in relation to the hills objects in the wall become available or obscured. The visitor also becomes a folly when atop the hills.
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H T R A E R E T THIS BIT
LANDFILL VISITOR CENTER GROVE CITY, OHIO CRITIC: MICHAEL BAUMBERGER AUTUMN 2011 The Solid Wasted Authority of Central Ohio (SWACO) needs a new Visitor Center for the landfill. The program is primarily educational: library, theater, classrooms, with community rooms, a cafe, and a reception area inserted. It was also important to give the visitors a chance to view the working landfill so an observation tower was included as well. The Tower that accompanies the Visitor Center serves as the conceptual point of how we treat the Earth; as a land over which we shall rise and proclaim our dominion. The visitor center’s idyllic space recapitulates the former condition of the world which is now only attainable through the built work. The rebuilt and remediated land surrounding the landfill represents our current state of our rebuilding of nature. The view afforded by the tower into the open end of the working landfill shows future that we hold.
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Visitors to the landfill park, get out of their vehicles, and take the long walk towards the concrete building ahead. From the outside it is a fortress, but once inside the walls the building becomes a sanctuary.
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Thank you for your consideration. 72