Kevin carpenter p o r t f o l i o
o f
p r o f e s s i o n a l
a n d
a c a d e m i c
a r c h i t e c t u r e ,
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Kevin Carpenter CarpenterKS@gmail.com 908 391 6927
education. University of Cincinnati, DAAP, School of Architecture and Interior Design Bachelor of Science in Architecture, 2009
Universita degli Studi di Sassari, Facolta di Architettua di Alghero International studio workshop on issues of sprawl Summer 2008
Marmara Ăœniversitesi, Istanbul Turkey Studio workshop of urban design Summer 2008
professional. Kohn Pedersen Fox, London, England January 2008 - July 2008 Intern Architect As part of a five person design team, I worked on a headquarter office tower in a major expansion of Canary Wharf, London’s financial district. I built detail models, kept the project documentation in order, created and corrected construction documents, and produced the materials for meetings with clients, developers, city planners, and master planners.
Hillsborough High School, Hillsborough, New Jersey Honors Scholar June 2005
skills. HACBM Architects Engineers Planners, Lawrenceville, NJ June 2007 - September 2007 Intern Architect The majority of my efforts were in research, design, visualization, and presentations for a large private education project. I also worked on detail design and construction documents for a small cafe, a second story balcony addition, and a residential complex.
AutoCAD Bentley Microstation Blender 3D Maxwell Render Sketchup Currently Learning Rhino Currently Learning 3DS Max Adobe Photoshop Adobe Illustrator Adobe Indesign Dreamweaver Microsoft Office Mac OSX Windows
Housing
...explores contemporary urban forms created through an investigation of contemporary urban lifestyles.
Monastery
...introduces new sustainable practices and design possibilities to a traditional spiritual space.
Library
...exhibits a public space which is produced and maintained by a desire to engage and interact.
Professional
...presents work done in the collaborative environments of KPF London, and HACBM Princeton.
Greenhills
...displays a series of design experiments meant to question ideas of mobility.
Furniture
...shows a piece that creates a reciprical relationship between the choice of use and the design.
Housing
Northside Residences
Winter 2007
South Elevation
North Elevation
East Elevation
Maximize Space
Extend Daylighting
Layer Views
Provide Access
Program Space
The studio was asked to design a residence for a diverse array of clients with different conceptions and definitions of “home.” These clients included a six member suburban family, a single mother and child, a young urban family, a divorcée, a young single woman, and a retired couple. The location for this project is Northside, a progressive Cincinnati neighborhood that has been under economic duress for decades. A recent revitalization of the area, led by strong community involvement, has paved the way for Northside to become a model for urban renewal in the future. Evidence of Northside’s renaissance includes the conversion of the American Can Factory to loft apartments with ground floor commercial and event space, advantageously located across the street from Northside Residences’ proposed site. Taking into account the progressive lifestyles of neighborhood residents, the current economic reality of the area, and clients’ needs, a cohousing model will be introduced. A single complex will have individual, row-house style entries along the southern street-front as well as along the rear cobblestone pedestrian alleyway, with parking provided on the eastern side of the building. Each client, as well as inhabitants of several other units, have individual residences; however, for maximum cost-efficiency, residences will share amenities such as laundry, entertainment media, and an expanded, communal kitchen.
Roof Space Allocation
Circulation Paths
The form is generated by a highly iterative approach of structuring and restructuring lines drawn from the surrounding community to shift the resulting spaces and voids into a form that creatively addressed issues of sun and shading, public and private spaces, street frontage, and accessibility. The process started with a block that maximized the interior space and was then carved out, layer by layer, by site lines. The lines came from aesthetic forces in the surrounding architecture, connectivity of the urban fabric, and a programmatic grid. Units vary in size and intended use for mixed incomes and a diversity of residents.
Monastery
samdrupling monastery
Fall 2007
The Gaden Samdrupling Monastery is a Tibetan Buddhist Monastery and Cultural Center of the Gelupa lineage lead by Ven. Kyabje Dagom Rinpoche. The majority of the time, Gaden Sampdrupling is populated by four to six resident Tibetan monks, and occasional traveling students, but regular services welcome Buddhists of all nationalities, and cultural events held throughout the year are open to the community and may draw hundreds of people. To accommodate this flux, the site is designed with varying sizes of multiuse spaces, indoor and outdoor, which work as gardens and reflection spaces for the monks when not in full use. With regard to Buddhist values, the design creates a minimum site disturbance and emphasizes a recreation of any affected animal habitat. Employing a number of passive strategies and utilizing mainly recycled materials makes this a positive impact project.
Residential Quarters - First Floor 1/8 “ = 1’ 1’
5’
10’
Solar Chimney 50’
Geothermal Heat
Natural Lighting
Thermal Mass
Habitat
Heater
Power
The wall is filled with construction waste from the partial demolition on the site and from surrounding projects to create a rocky growing medium for vines and animal nesting.
South facing wall near the residential quarters and kitchen support evacuated tube solar water heaters which will provide heating, cooling, and energy creation.
Solar panels take advantage of sunny areas along the wall to supplement the utility connection.
Guest Room
Guest Room
Open
Abbott’s Room
Reception / Dining
Kitchen
Outdoor Ceremonial Space
Residential 2
Small Meeting Room
Large Meeting Room Meditation Space Kitchenette Bedrooms
Mechanical Room
Living Room
Entry
Entry Gardens
Residential 1
Main Building
Runoff
To control runoff caused by the semi permeable parking surface, the wall surrounding the lot contains attenuation tanks and silt filters.
Buddhism is considered the middle path of eastern philosophy. It strives to find the balance between what can be perceived and what is the deeper essence. One of the most iconic beliefs is that of reincarnation. Buddhists believe that all sentient life is contained in a cycle of birth and rebirth. Every birth implies a death, and every death implies a new birth. Neither phenomenon is an affirmation of life, and neither is a negation. It is a cycle that defines life on earth while simultaneously erasing life’s conventional means of definition. Like the relationship between pool balls. One life does not turn into the next, just as one ball does not continue into the next ball. The resemblance, though, is obvious. Each life gives direction and momentum to the next. The cycle continues according to the rules of karma, swinging between greater and lesser states of life and being pulled and pushed by obstacles and challenges. Finally, when enough good karma has been built up, the momentum can catapult a being out of the cycle to the ultimate goal of the Buddhists study, Nirvana.
Bioswale Wastewater is filtered and deposited into the natural drainage corridor. A percentage feeds existing downhill vegetation while a portion is siphoned out, and moves through a series of filtration systems within the wall feeding directly back into the utilities of the residential quarters.
Façade The exterior wall transitions directly into a building facade to define an interior space and provide an insulating growing medium on the surface of the building.
The perpetual wandering of reincarnation is translated into form by a multidimensional wall. The wall moves over the contours of the site in a gravitational flow leaning with the slope and reacting to buildings and trees. This wandering line sets up boundaries, defines space and paths of movement, brings energy and passive strategies, and relates space to adjacent space. The majority of the wall is made up of a metal meshing supported by wooden members and contains recycled construction debris and materials. The vertical wooden members are spaced six inches from one another and create a procession of individual pieces which unite to form a whole. The support spaces for the meditation room as well as the residential quarters are all created under the aegis of the wall’s curves. The spaces are built into the curve, which supports the structure and provides energy, water, storage space, working space, and brings life to the space from other areas of the site. When this undulating energy source reaches the main Holy space, though, it simultaneously comes together and breaks. The three tall spires at the center of the site signify the Gompa, a space where one can meditate and break free from the earthly cycle. As they spiral upward, they define a roof garden which will be used for outdoor ceremonies.
‘Teaching Zen is like describing the moon by pointing at it in the night sky. One can look at the pointing finger, follow the line it creates, and see the far off object above them. If one misunderstands, though, he may look at the pointing finger, and take it for the moon. This would be a great mistake.’ -D. T. Suzuki
Library
Clifton Branch Library
Fall 2006
Existing
Proposed
This branch library plays off of the unique aspects of its site, in Clifton, about a mile north of the Universtiy of Cincinnati. Currently a parking lot, the location has the potential to become an anchoring point in the historic gaslight district of Cincinnati. The lot is currently being used as parking for the flagship location of Skyline Chili, a cultural institution in the city, and further down the street are sevral vintage and exotic shops, several Indian and Meditteranian groceries and spice shops, a bakery, wine store, coffee shops, and an independent movie theater. The Clifton branch library becomes a destination for window shoppers, neighborhood strolls, and community events, and a rediscovery of pleasure reading for graduate students and professors who populate the area. The library is a marketplace with a constant peer to peer exchange of media and information.
Third Floor
Second Floor
The form comes from creating programmatic blocks which house individual literary genres and arranging them in a serpentine pattern, interlocking with one another so the patron is constantly looking at the books along the walls. The serpentine pattern was coiled three dimensionally to fit within the site, to accommodate views and natural lighting, and to create an outdoor plaza which serves as an event space and invites deeper exploration into the literary labyrinth.
First Floor
The plaza serves as an outdoor browsing area for the casual passerby while just inside the door a rotating display shows a featured collection. To the left and right are adult and children’s literature, respectively, and ahead is a staircase which wraps around reception and places the patron deeper in the collection. The top floor houses a multipurpose room with an additional private access from the ground floor. The multipurpose room has second floor roof access to be used for additional event space.
University of Cincinnati
Marriot Hotel
Fries Bar and Cafe
My House
Hebrew Union College
Good Sameritan Hospital
Burnet Woods Fountain
Library Site
Ludlow Shoppng District
Skyline Chili
Unitarian Church
Professional
Kohn Pedersen Fox, london
I was part of a five person design team assigned to a high rise office project in London. The tower was part of a Woods Wharf development, an expansion of the Canary Wharf business district, and was planned by the Richard Rogers Partnership. The building was planned to be the first built in the new development which forced an emphasis on transportation and urban integration, setting the stage for further phases of construction. My responsibilities on the team varied between research, construction documentation, project organization, project visualization, detail design, and model building.
Professional
My first internship position was with HACBM outside Princeton, New Jersey. I worked on several projects but the majority of my efforts were focused on a LEED Gold school in Princeton for children with learning differences. The school focused on exceptionally bright children who have dyslexia or attention issues. The school takes a multi sensory approach to teaching and wanted an architecture that reflected it’s philosophy. The school’s proposal included botanical garden spaces attached to each room, outdoor classrooms, a parental education center, and unique scattered multi sensory spaces throughout the entire site. I worked with the design architect to research these learning differences, their teaching methods and design opportunities these differences create. I also participated in design problem solving, presentations, and regular meetings with the school’s director.
hacbm, princeton
Greenhills
Spring 2007
Mobile Housing
Spring 2008
Greehhills was one of the pioneers of suburban development. Founded in the early 1930’s, it was a product of the New Deal, a community built a safe distance outside of the decaying urban center which provided affordable, country style housing for middle class families who had fallen on hard times during the depression. A modernist community center and a belt of parkland around the town painted a picture of a small village, but regular bus routes along a newly expanded commuter highway brought workers to their jobs in the city. Greenhills was meant to be a safe place for families to get back on their feet through hard work an new technologies. For the last decade, this historic neighborhood, which is now well within the city of Cincinnati’s urban area, has been in economic decline and disrepair. The high tech vehicle based shopping center is now a typical strip mall; small, sixty year old houses are falling apart; the commuter bus is now overshadowed by freeway bypasses and high traffic. The town is in obvious need of direction, but the communities Historic Preservation Society and the Development Council have been in a heated deadlock over a way forward.
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We were invited to explore the town, its history, and it’s significance today, and to bring ideas to be displayed at a gallery exhibition in the center of town.
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Slot City
The Mobile Housing project is a visualization of a more transferable architecture. It takes a grasssroots approach to societal mobility, by creating a home that is as versatile as the current economic climate demands. It works on a 3D grid system which supports personalized homes that can be inserted into the voids. The inhabitants are able to move with their homes and businesses. Additionally, the structure is offset to allow daylight to reach lower levels and indefinitely repeatable to create a three dimensional urban landscape which has the capacity to increase density an shape itself around existing urban fabric.
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The Pneumatic Pnomadic Home
Step 1: All Packed Away
Step 2: Blow Up Baloon A second iteration of the project took a different approach. By creating a home that is as lightweight and compact as possible, the project becomes much more maneuverable. The structure is centered around the first level ceiling and second level floor. From this central rigid frame made of a lightweight steel alloy, structural walls fold up in the front and back, and a staircase drops from the side. The front wall swings up into the second story and contains bedroom cabinetry on one side and a fold-down bed on the other, while the back wall swings down and functions as the main wet wall with kitchen appliances on ones side and bathroom fixtures on the other. Encompassing the whole structure and defining the space is a large double layer of inflated plastic canvas. It is inflated with a pressurized hydrogen mix that keeps the canvas taught and supports most of its own weight while also creating a highly insulative layer. An automated collapse and set up means that the house can be taken down and packed up to a size and weight that can be transported by average vehicular means.
Step 3: Unfold The Walls
Step 4: Lock Into Place
Step 5: Enjoy Your Stay
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The Toy House The final iteration of the project, not only is the Toy House protected with a collapsible pneumatic shell, but the expandable structure and modular attachment means that it can fit into much tighter spaces and be transported to more delicate locations. This provides an opportunity to bring the transferable residences into new urban environments which are currently under used or inaccessible by a mobile population.
Furniture
Monastery Chair
Fall 2007
The Monastery Chair is made of a welded steel mesh framework with a white, nylon dipped finish which appropriately stains and weathers but does not deteriorate. The interior of the mesh forms a cage in which flora can be planted or allowed to grow naturally. The form is derived from a study of position and posture, and allows for maximum seating choices in a single simple form.
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As regular users come back to the bench and sit in their preferred position, the plant life reacts, being snuffed out under the repeated pressure and growing around the user. Over months and years the bench begins to show layers of growth that reflect the history of usage. Each generation of usage will leave a mark that becomes ephemeral on the green surface but leaves a lasting effect on the structural evolution of the piece.
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