BRE N NA THOMPSON
1
2
C ONTENTS
2017
01 + Three Studies 0 2 + S e e d s o f ata r g at i s 03 + Capsul[a] xis Mundi 0 4 + Ta b u l a R a s a
2018
05 + bird’s nest 0 6 + k i lt e r 0 7 + s ta l l e d ! 08 + processus
2019
0 9 + c h e at- c o d e 10 + indexes
2020
11 + Nudging Vernaculars 12 + product design 13 + reveil
3
2017
5
01+
0 1 + t h r e e S t u d i e s i n t h e at e r
Zain Abuseir, Fall 2016
“‘In-between space’ is a meeting-ground of potentiality and authenticity, located neither within the self nor in the world of political and economic affairs. In this space, one finds the most authentic and creative aspects of our personal and communal existence, including artistic, scientific, and religious expression.” -Donald Winnicott, on Imaginary Space
Prompted by a study of memory, as it pertains to both individual and collective identity, Three Studies investigates “theater” as a conduit of cultural memory. Interested in the shared psychological space of theatrical performance, the work channels Donald Winnicott’s definition of the “Imaginary Space” and speculates upon the architecturalization of collective imagination. Through a medium of architectural machines that personify and spatialize three devices of authorship, the project seeks to define an imaginary space that transcends physical, temporal, or perceptual boundaries, and poses the question: Can architecture operate within the space of individual and collective imagination?
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Remembrance, Atmospheric Render
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The Light Box, a Hybrid Surface for the Generation and Presentation of Drawing
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The Work Itself is Co-Authored by a Practice of Individual Study and Collective Reflection
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Collective Memory Puppet Box
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Sited in a series of investigative drawings, the work manifests as three devices of authorship, corresponding to Playwrights, Performer,
and
Audience,
respectively. The Device for Transcription:
a
Stenographic
Machine
the
Playwright,
for
generates written output from the imagination and vision of an individual.
Cross-referencing
both the individual’s personal memory and the context from which it was produced, the Device produces a script for the Imaginary Space, and output that is in turn fed to the next Device. The
Device
for
Translation:
a Directive Machine for the Performer,
prescribes
action
derived from the Device of the Playwright, and imbues it with an interpretive input from the performer. The Device for Translation speaks in stage props and cues, constructing a skeleton for the Imaginary Space out of visual and aural masks.
The
Performer,
in
turn, inherits these masks to enable shifts in identity and the embodiment of foreign memory. The Device holds the additional responsibility of mediating the output of the Playwright and the Input of the Audience, translating imagination
from
the
individual to the collective.
The Device for Translation
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The Device for Translation
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A Directive Machine for the Performer
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The Device for Synthesis
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An Eidetic Machine for Audience
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The Device for Synthesis: an Eidetic Machine for Audience, engages the Spectator as the final author of performance. Scanning the psychological space of the audience for eidetic connections with the combined outputs of the Playwright and the Performer, the Device enables the proliferation of the Imaginary Space as a response to the Audience’s individual and collective memory. The result is a shared psychological refuge between Audience, Performer, and Playwright, generated through the collaborative authorship and participation.
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A Device for Synthesis, Memory Reel
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02+
0 2 + S E E D S O F A TA R G A T I S
Dawn Gilpin, Spring 2017
As a critical reflection on the refugee camp, Seeds of Atargatis seeks to imagine alternative paradigms by which architecture might engage with the crisis of displacement. Considering the key factors of displacement: mobility, agility, and responsiveness, and its key implications: homelessness, poverty, and anonymity, the work explores how collective mobility may act as a device to enable the preservation and relocation of a displaced culture. As such, the work is interested in the improvisational nature of migrating and questions how the need for flexibility and alertness may be translated to a transformable dwelling. By considering shifts between impermanent/permanent, terrestrial/aquatic, and dwelling/monument, this intervention proposes new territory for architecture on the basis of nomadicism. Seeds of Atargatis develops an alternative concept that addresses controversial situations and social dynamics described throughout Syria. To promote the revitalization of a displaced culture, through the preservation of artifacts and ritual practices across physical distances and varying landscapes, the work explores the people and communities oppressed by displacement and its inherent lack of freedom.
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The Investigative Model
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Transformational Dwelling
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Permanence is often a quality for which architecture strives to achieve — the perpetuation of a legacy, the persistent claims at relevancy, the signification of presence and residence. For any number of reasons, a static relationship to ground and site dominates the way architects imagine the construction of space. However, as prevailing crises in the world continue to displace, oust, and uproot cultures, it becomes important for those of us who think about space to consider an oppositional
condition:
the
State of Impermanence. The Syrian Refugee Crisis, now a nine year long consequence of the Syrian Civil War, is one such uprooting force. As a result, the Refugee Camp has become an all-too-common typology throughout the Middle East, and
extending
to
many
countries in Europe. Assuming food and shelter to be the most critical elements for regaining a sense of “normality” for the refugee, these Camps operate in a highly-controlled, spaceefficient manner to provide temporary
solace.
However,
the longevity of the conflict in Syria and the fluctuation in Refugee Policies around the
world
“temporary”
render solutions
these less
fleeting, becoming residences for refugees for as long as seven to seventeen years.
Means of Evacuation
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Nomadic Dwelling, 5 Phases
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The paradox then, the quasitemporar y/permanenceimpermanence of the camp should be the focus of emerging political and social questions that go beyond the immediate need for food, water, and shelter: questions of identity, residency, safety, and culture. The camp must be reconsidered through a lens of architectural impermanence; fleeting,
or
a
transient,
improvisational
architecture that could take on several identities: rootless, wandering,
and
nomadic
amongst environmental and geopolitical conditions. It must consider long term necessities as well: the revitalization of a displaced culture, through the preservation of artifacts and practices not only across physical
distances,
but
in
varying landscapes and states; and
the
establishment
of
lineage, from an old state of being to a new, through an embrace of cultural remnants, which may have the capacity to
endure,
imprint,
or
monumentalize.
Site Drawing, Palmyria
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Displacement and Ruins
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03+
03 + Capsul [a] xis Mundi
Joyce Hsiang, Fall 2017
Capsul(a)xis Mundi, programmed to be a Seed Vault, begins to explore preservation as a cultural practice — monument as a physical relic of memory and burial as a ritualistic means of preserving. A seed vault, programmatically sited in the future, is a resignation to some future unknown. As such, this work seeks to acknowledge change through the exploration of a seed vault in terms of geological time, rather than at the scale of a humans lifetime. The project manifests as a two-part exploration of the “Seed-Planter.� Existing as both an armature for seed storage and a device for planting, Capsula Mundi continues to replenish plant-life in relation to varying climatic conditions. Its planting movement creates nuanced striations and topography upon the surface of the earth, logging a trace and trajectory of its imprints, and contributions. Axis Mundi, sited on the edge of shifting tectonic plates, practices burial rituals as it travels along a gantry system. As time passes, the mechanism actively adapts to new contextual conditions through the planting of various seeds and specimens. The service tower, where the main vault exists, remains monumental and static in this emergent landscape, challenging the need to respect the past and present while confronting the certainty of an uncertain future.
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Seed Vault Site Model, Shifting Tectonic Plates
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Axis Mundi Section
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Seed Planting Mechanism
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Exploded Axonometric
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04+
0 4 + ta b u l a r a s a
Joyce Hsiang, Fall 2017
“When is a work of art finished? To what extent does an artist have latitude in making this decision? What impact has this long trajectory had on modern, contemporary art?” – Press Release, The MET
Positioned as a Yale University Archive, Tabula Rasa serves as a repository for incomplete works of art, hosting items from the Unfinished: Thoughts Left Visible collection featured at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC. The project seeks to set a stage for the interpretation of the Unfinished collection by translating ideas of incompleteness into an architectural language. By utilizing scaffolding and exposed rebar, mixed perceptions of the building’s status are fostered, which seek to introduce questions of process within the built environment. Delineating qualities found in the collection: construction lines, holes, notes and guides, while utilizing the impermanent nature of scaffolding, the work proposes an architecture reconfigurable to different modalities of production found within the collection - writing, sculpting, and painting.
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Sectional Scaffolding Model
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Site Photography Joiner
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THE MEMORY METAPHOR
The idea of archives as collective memory is sometimes employed as a metaphor for discussing the social and cultural roles of arhives. Archives, along with other communicational resources such as oral and ritual tradition, help to transfer information and thereby sustain memory - from generation to generation. If archives can play a part in extending the range of communication, thy can just as readily be implicated in any attempt to thwart communication by diminishing its temporal and spatial range. Archives are subject to the same social pressures that shape the collective memory of other institutions.
EFFACED MEMORY
Site + Plan Composite Drawing
35
Archives
help
information a
collective
to
transfer
and
sustain
memory
from
generation to generation. If archives play a part in extending the range of communication, they can just as readily be implicated in any attempt to thwart history by diminishing its temporal and spatial range. The project seeks to employ an architecture in tandem with the Unfinished
collection
as
a
metaphor for the potential incompleteness or intentional redaction of private archives. Utilizing nature
the of
impermanent
scaffolding,
this
gallery is able to reconfigure
Written
to the needs of the public but also
for
an
ever-changing,
amending, and growing archive collection. The displays within the archive are designed to present the work in the mode in which the piece was produced - sculptures presented
in
the
round,
paintings angled back on an easel, and books lied open on the table. Reiterating the sense of “inprogress” or “incompleteness” of the exhibit, the precision and customizability of the display determines the configuration of the scaffolding, and as more pieces are added to
Painted Modalities of Production
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the collection, the building becomes more and more dense.
Reconfigurable Gallery Rendering
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2018
39
05+
05 + Bird’s NEST
Peter de Bretteville, Spring 2018
Bird’s Nest provides dwelling for two low-income clients, an individual and small family of three. Situated in a 12-foot wide alleyway, the house is sandwiched between two existing structures while maintaining foot access to the alleyway below. The project seeks to use suspension to serve the small scale and thin nature of the site, as a means to mediate inevitable density with the program of two dwelling units. With a necessity for light for dwelling program and a dimly lit site, suspension is utilized to peel the floors away from the exterior wrapper and light is able to filter through to the lower levels. Formally inspired by hanging structures found in nature - such as bird nests, the design considers privacy and protection through a layering of wrappers. The inner structure, supporting the suspended floors, is lightweight steel construction. This structure is in-filled with glass to allow apertures to the exterior of which is carefully wrapped in a final concrete layer to provide privacy. The glass form is only revealed to the public in moments where the concrete peels away, emphasizing the nested quality of the dwelling.
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Suspension Model
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39’
30’
20’
10’
0’
1/2” = 1’-0”
Cross-Section
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1/2” = 1’-0”
Longitudinal Section, Suspended Stair
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Cross Section Model, Suspended Floors
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06+ 0 6 + K i lt e r
Peter de Bretteville Joeb Moore, Spring 2018
Team F: Deo Deiparine, Kay Yang, Megan Tan, Michael Gasper, Rosa Cogna
Kilter, Team F’s Proposal for Building Project 2018, hopes to create a sense of belonging to the New Haven neighborhood while fostering autonomy of its residents. Using a central axis as a spine through the middle of the site, the units maintain the housing grid and underlying rhythm of the street. Derived from the larger context of the New Haven railroad and river, the diagonal of the entry sequence became implemented as an internal organizational principle and underlying grid for the proposal. The diagonal manifests itself as both a room and a void to establish the units’ entryways, acting as defensible space from the street and between the two families who will share the dwelling. The diagonal entryway creates a chain-reaction and interior spaces are arranged in a play of puzzle pieces around its distinct disruption. The pieces afford light to enter in slippages and misalignments of space as the diagonal mediates the orthogonal nature of the site. Through the use of CLT, the diagonal becomes a structural and circulatory core, driving the entry void upward to create a light-well and beacon of home.
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Team Proposal for Building Project
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Section Perspective
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CLT Diagonal Core
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Side Elevation Models
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The central diagonal void becomes a beacon of arrival as it houses both entryways for the residents. The tower acts as a mid-point in the site and connects the front elevation of the house to the backyard through an elongated axis. The tower, clad in louvers which provide ambient lighting, serves to provide a sense of security and safety for the residents, as well as a warm welcome home. The discreet diagonal shift, offkilter by the dimension of one doorway, hides the entry’s from street-view, ultimately adding an extra layer of security. The CLT paneling manifests at the tower core, revealing itself outside while acting as a structural armature for vertical circulation on the interior, reminiscent of a vernacular hearth.
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First Floor Plan
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Second Floor Plan
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07+
0 7 + S TA L L E D !
Joel Sanders Architect Fall 2017 - 2018
Throughout the course of my time at Yale, I have had the opportunity to work with Professor Joel Sanders on Stalled!, which explores and proposes a new typology of restroom which is inclusive to all body types, genders, and identities. Surrounding current political disarray on trans-gender access to public restrooms, Stalled! looks to disrupt spatial constructs that have enforced gender binary situations in the public realm. Through the re-imagination of the public restroom, Stalled! acknowledges the need to create safe and inclusive spaces. For the project, I developed many of the plans, sections, vignettes, axonometrics, and 360 renders of which are featured on the project website: stalled.online. Please visit the website to view the 360 renderings as an immersive environment, as well as view the project video and description.
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Gallaudet Sports Non-Gendered Restroom Axonometric
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Gallaudet Sports Non-Gendered Restroom Schematic Drawing, Lower Level
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Using Gallaudet University as a case study for Stalled! design research, the work seeks to shift concerns from that of “gender” to “space.” Through iterating upon alternatives for the restroom typology, Stalled! has developed a set of guidelines that consider ALL people - from different ages, races, genders, religions, and abilities. The goal of the guidelines being to provide viable resources for retrofit and new construction projects to deploy inclusive spaces while making a larger commentary on the many controversies surrounding gendered restrooms.
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Stalled! Airport Proposal, Inclusive Restroom Washing Station
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Stalled! Airport Proposal, Inclusive Restroom Eliminating Station
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08+
08 + processus Annie Barrett, Fall 2018
“Not only do rituals create and reaffirm a sense of group membership, they are actually the source of morality and public order.� – Meredith Rossner, Just Emotions
Processus is interested in examining the role of the ritualistic in the spatial perception of an individual within the built environment and how ritual, repetitious in schedule, serves to place an individual within a social framework. The project develops upon typologies of ancient ritual and ceremonial spaces; the plinth, the oculus, and the incline, while considering the specific ritual elements of Restorative Justice; separate entrances, circle processes, and meditation rooms, in order to ensure reconciliation and the reintegration of the offender or victim into society. The proper emotional state one must be in to participate in Restorative Justice processes sets the stage for how the meeting will unfold. The project proposes a processional architecture to foster a sense of decompression or peripatetic thought as participants make their way down to the circle rooms. The integration of other public community program into the Restorative Justice spaces creates an anonymity of visitor, to put participants at ease of judgment or fear.
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Aerial Model
61
E JUSTICE
AUDITORIUM
ICE
AUDITO
Procession to Auditorium
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The interstitial space between the surface of the ground and the structure’s plinth offers a unique opportunity for quasiearthbound spaces. These spaces, linked to above through ocular apertures and axial ramping, exist as studies of subterranean retreat in an urban context, a means of inhabitation whose relationship to light, depth, materiality, and tactility begin to produce an atmosphere for reconciliation practices. These spaces, when occupied by those GALLERY dedicated to the processes of Restorative Justice and those in pursuit of refuge or retreat, become spaces for gathering, storytelling, and healing.
RESTORATIVE JUSTICE
RESTORATIVE JUSTICE
AUDITORIUM
GALLERY
Gallery and Restorative Justice Spaces
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64
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Circle Process Room Exterior, Aperture
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Circle Process Room Interior, Ambient Lighting
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Ritualistic Oculus, for Circle Process
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Processional Ramp, to Plinth
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2019
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09+
0 9 + C H E A T- C O D E Anthony Acciavatti, Spring 2019 Collaborators: Limy Rocha, Rukshan Vathupola
In our urban intervention, Cheat-Code, loopholes discovered in the NYC building and zoning code which are typically abused by developers for monetary and revenue gain, facilitate the subversion of space to allow the flexibility of new communal ecosystems and distinct organic community spaces throughout the city. The pervasiveness of top-down planning is almost completely antithetical to the resolution of community problems at the human scale. To combat this, we have set up a system that facilitates a game of improvisation between the architect, developers, open space advocates, the department of education, the parks department, mayor, governor, and the individual communities. The game exists as a continuous cycle: 1. Isolate a need shared by the surrounding communities 2. Find a loophole 3. Establish a spatial connection between Steps 1 and 2 4. Use Step 3 to anticipate a socio-economic shift 5. Repeat Step 1
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Galfetti Interpretive Model
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FAR, Mapping, and Precedent Study Models
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C H E AT- C O D E s Section 7 Affordable Housing [AH] 701.1 Background As a result of the mezzanine loop-hole, a greater amount of rentable space can be added when building affordable housing units.
[AH] 701.2 Scope This additional space can then be transformed into an additional bedroom, or a communal public space according to the wants of the inhabitants.
[AH] 701.3 Intent These mezzanines can then be disassembled and converted into inhabitable space, as determined by owners.
C H E AT- C O D E s Section 6 Mezzanines [MZ] 601.1 Background Mezzanines are intermediate levels
or levels between
floors and ceiling of any story according to Section 505 of the International Building Code.
[MZ] 601.2 Scope They do not count for the buildable floor area as long as the clear height above and below is less than 7 feet and are less than 1/3 of the floor area of the space that they are located in.
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C H E AT- C O D E s Section 3 Chicken Coup [CC] 301.1 Definition In New York, no permit is needed to keep chickens nor to build a chicken coup, as long as they do not bother the community or act as a hindrance. [CC] 301.2 Scope Mechanical towers expend excess waster heat as a result of functioning 24/day. The mechanical spaces may provide heat energy to create stable, warm environments yearround. [CC] 301.3 Intent These chicken coups can provide a source of affordable and clean food for the Yorkville and Easy Harlem neighborhoods.
C H E AT- C O D E s Section 2 Mechanical Space [Ms] 201.1 Definition Mechanical spaces are those in which machine units that control the environmental, electrical, and plumbing systems of a building are kept. [MS] 201.2 Scope They do not count for the total buildable square footage, therefore an infinite amount of space may be defined as mechanical, under the defined 67% enclosure rule in Section 303.1 of the International Building Code. [MS] 201.3 Intent Mechanical spaces have therefore been used to boost the height and dimensions of a building beyond the limits for a neighborhood.
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Mid-Review Explorative Sections
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Transforming the Proposed Development via Loopholes
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With this cycle, we embrace New York City as an everchanging environment that informs the players, site, and repercussions of the JOP disenfranchisement. By expanding upon loopholes concerning mezzanine levels, mechanical spaces, and linkages, flexible models are deployed which adhere to issues of nonaffordable, affordable housing and rising market rates, charter school and COOP density, and a persistent food desert in the East Harlem neighborhood.
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Site Model, Mechanical Spaces in New York City
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ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT
“Because of the fact that architects [alongside developers] constitute a social body, that they are tied to institutions, their systems tend to close up , to impose itself, and to escape all criticism. This allows for the system to be formulated and set up as urbanism by extrapolation, without any procedure or precaution.� Lefebvre, pg. 431
2
HOUSING
AUDITORIUM 1
A
B
B
2ND AVE
BRIDGE
82
A
5
1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
Isolate a need/program shared by the communities of the Upper East Side and East Harlem Find a loophole Establish a spatial connection between Steps 1 and 2 Use Step 3 to anticipate a socio-economic shift Repeat Step 1
4 CAFETERIA
6
180 170
180 170 160 150 140 130
3
The best kept secret in planning has been uncovered, and we look forward to playing with it.
n
B
HARLEM RIVER
fdr drive
1ST AVE
A Composite Drawing Showing Proposed Loophole Implementation
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Mechanical Loophole Working to Afford New Play Spaces
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Mechanical Loophole Servicing Institutional Spaces
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Proposed Intervention Perched on Site Model
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Mechanical also
space,
remains
which
autonomous
from FAR calculations, can be
outrageously
scaled
to
increase building height and shift
program
upward,
in
some cases reaching heights of 120’-0”. In hopes of defying local food scarcity, tapping into mechanical systems and areas
allows
a
harvest
of
excess generated heat for food production
through
green
houses and chicken coops. This,
in
return,
creates
a
framework for other programs, like housing units and play environments, to freely expand into. By multiplying the ground (or play) plane to multiple levels, public engagement and activity is facilitates on site with access to mechanical amenities (such as electricity, water, etc.) that may be “rentable” and create revenue for the JOP. Informed
by
an
archaic
definition
of
public
space,
the current system deprives individuals from an integrated community
within
the
city
that could provide schooling, sustenance, but
most
and
shelter,
importantly
the
flexibility among the three. Unsurprisingly,
the
sense
of community can be found through the improvisation of New York’s dwellers, which emerge through the subversion of existing formal structures and systems.
Above: NYC Subway System, Below: Central Park High-Rise Developments
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10 +
10 + indexes Mark Foster Gage Graham Harman, Fall 2019 Collaborators: Katie Lau
By conceptualizing freshwater as a hyper-object, a term coined by Timothy Morton as something “massively distributed in space and time relative to humans,� this project investigates the role that architecture plays in how thinkers engage with an entity that is beyond the scale of humans. Groundwater is pumped and distributed throughout the building in streams, pools, cisterns, hydraulic mechanisms, and thermal regulating systems, affecting the surrounding environments visually, auditorily, and atmospherically. The presence of water acts as an index of scale, conveying relationships between humans, Yamdrok Lake, and global freshwater supply. The unification of building, system, and resource push the experiential qualities of the building beyond visual perception and directly influence occupants by the climatic qualities of their contextual surroundings. The cisterns, which house meeting rooms, library facilities, and greenhouses, act as organizational nodes within the complex and serve to connect large stretches of outdoor circulation space conducive to peripatetic thinking. Occupiable spaces within the cisterns reconfigure throughout the day according to hydraulic mechanisms, mediating human relationships with valuable site resources through a range of spatial configurations. The architecture repositions the ways that visitors typically interact with water in a building, keeping water in the foreground of thought.
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The Greenhouse Cistern
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This design posits that although the architecture is clearly man-made, the building is not autonomous from its environment. Any building on this site will interact with the forces of water; but, our proposal emphasizes those interactions through aesthetics. By aestheticizing the interactions between building and site, while utilizing the building as an index of freshwater ebb and flows, we argue that the idea that this site would otherwise be pristine or static Nature is false. Human presence onsite doesn’t contaminate Nature, but it does shape new ecological interactions.
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Site Axonometric
91
Formal Cistern Iterations
92
Stepped Plan
93
The Entry Sequence
94
Main Water Collection Cistern
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Yamdrok Lake
96
The Reflection Pool
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11 +
11 + nudging vernaculars Stella Betts, Spring 2020
“‘Third place’, defined as a place between work and home that anchors community life and facilitates or fosters broader, more creative interaction.” -Ray Oldenburg
Tasked to create a new proposal for the Central Library location - with capacity to support the involved sorting and distributing operations of the network, Nudging Vernaculars looks to urban, vernacular forms of storage and to the existing library branches to evoke a sense of familiarity for the neighborhood of Jamaica. Water Towers, Fire Escape Stairs, Brick, Signage - many pieces comprise the context of our site. With an interest in the notion of public wayfinding, each of these pieces question how the site and program may be approached in a way that understands contextual vernaculars yet find ways to nudge them towards new potentials. Through its many layers, the building offers an experience of discovery. Through its formal ties to urban vernaculars, it expresses itself as a beacon to the public. It’s many layers of materials and transparency are welcoming yet protective of its neighborhood. The library seeks to be a space as comfortable and welcoming as home but with all the grandeur and amenities of a public space; a third place where you relax in public, where you encounter familiar faces, and make new acquaintances whether fictional or not.
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South Facade
99
A
B
Elevated Ground Plan
100
A
B Cross Sections
101
Walkway, South Facade
102
On the main level visitors are left to use the space as they feel - a space of serendipity. Workstations, cafes, reception and help desks orbit the stacks while their silhouettes shape interior, void rooms for lounge spaces. From this floor, you can catch glimpses of those on a hunt for a book above or those awaiting their bus in the park area below. This plane provides access to the interior spaces of the stacks which house reading genres for adults, teens, and children. Acting as vertical circulation, the stacks are connected through a series of catwalks at varying levels. Deep inside the poche, shrouded by the books of the stacks, are intimate spaces of refuge, reading nooks, work and nap stations, and smallscale meeting rooms. From East to West, the stacks are shrouded in a metal mesh to provide sun protection for the books in addition to the sawtooth, channel glass facade. Wrapped in several layers, the rooms within the stacks are provided diffuse light from skylights above.
103
The “Third Place”
104
The Living Room
105
The Catwalk
106
Book Stack Section
107
108
109
2020
111
12 +
11 + PRODUCT Independent Work, Fall 2016- 2020
Product, is an ongoing exploration and fascination with the re-imagination of common, small-scale items. The series of explorations look at a range of considerations: materiality, proportion, scale, viability, and aesthetic. By working with objects scaled to the human-body, design-build becomes more tangible - as such, the process for each objects follows design, test, prototype, manufacture. Objects such as a pair of glasses, a hairpin, a lamp, a peppermill, a ring, and a tape dispenser have been reimagined in this investigation. Many of the items indulge in tools of architectural design to take on questions of affordability and customizability to develop a process that enables one to tailor the eyeglass, the ring, or the hairpin, to his or her individual taste and fit. The lamp, peppermill, and tape dispenser act as exercises in mediating functionality with design, each presented to a jury of product designers who vetted the designs for viability and appeal to potential users.
112
Customized Eyeglasses, Before Construction
113
The Eyeglasses
114
The Hairpin
115
The Desk Lamp
116
Transformation, Table-top to Hand-Held.
117
The Peppermill
118
The Tape Dispenser
119
13 + 12 + reVEIL
Curated Exhibit, Fall 2019
Collaborators: Michelle Badr, Alex Pineda, Limy Rocha
survival: (n.) the continuance of a custom, observance, etc. after the circumstances or conditions in which it originated or which gave significance to it have passed away.
In the current age of global mobility and immigration, there is a parallel desire to classify, sort, and identify difference. Resulting terms such as displaced, immigrant, refugee, asylee, alien, illegal, and marginalized connote an exclusionary societal view that systematically segregates, pushing these populations to the socioeconomic and spatial periphery. As prevailing methods in the U.S. continue to define, oust, and assimilate cultures at an accelerated rate and scale, it becomes increasingly important to consider the practices with which alterity survives. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, more than half of the service industry’s workforce is foreign-born. Under the veil of cook, cashier, sales rep, dishwasher, cleaning lady, delivery guy, janitor, valet [...], the service industry initiates them into its back-of-house, affording a distant view to the American Dream.
120
The Gallery Entry
121
reVEIL Panel Drawings
122
Compiling Personal Accounts, Scenarios, Rituals, and Objects
123
Once inside, a grey zone that is understood as a “private” realm— accessible only to those within— becomes the backdrop for survival; the retail store fitting room is subverted into a sanctuary for prayer and the restaurant is subverted into a temporary refuge. This unconsidered public subvert their surroundings with the need and desire to conduct daily rituals, creating an internal collective. We celebrate our collective identity and the act of sustaining it within a territory distant from our homeland.
reVEIL Scenarios
124
Compiling Personal Accounts, Scenarios, Rituals, and Objects
125
Installation
126
Floating Silk Drawings
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
The Scenarios Installed
135
Fitting Room Subverted into Space for Prayer
136
137
BT - FSG