Catherine M. Earley Virginia Tech College of Architecture
+ Urban Studies
THE MUSEUM OF WILDFIRE (collaborative) 1st place, Annual 3rd Year Competition South-West United States The proposal for the museum is an
intervention
in the dry and fragile prairies of the South-West. Instead of continuing to suppress the natural fire and
creating a
man-made disaster,
the building becomes the origin of the flame that cleanses the landscape. Once a year, people will gather to set fire to the prairie grass that has been sculpted into terraces for this ritual.
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Lookout Tower Exhibition Space Restrooms Library of Wildfire Courtyard Offices/Conference room Amphitheater
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As the revelers progress through the museum and up the tower, they will watch as the fire moves out further into the grasslands. The controlled lines eventually fade and the fire becomes wildfire, set free to naturally
consume as it ought.
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
URBAN PLANNING STUDIO: RECREATION CENTER & HOSTEL West Baltimore, MD Spring 2012 In order to revitalize the dilapidated neighborhood of West Baltimore, I worked with four other students, designing a
network of catalysts that would draw in tourists and residents from the surrounding successful districts. Each catalyst program was chosen to provide something for the community that was missing and whose addition to the community would make both visiting and residing in West Baltimore desirable. The Recreation Center and Hostel anchors the middle of the design scheme. The major purpose of this building is to create
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
a sense of movement that leads people along to the other catalysts, but also to make an event along the street, a space that people want to stay and enjoy. Passersby can get a sense of the activity within, and occupants can look out and see the bustle on the street. The main lobby staircase is the major route of circulation between the multiple floors and programs, concentrating the movement of the building to create a hive-like environment. An “alley” cuts through the site to a more private courtyard, and connects with an actual alley where visitors can allow themselves to be directed to the next catalyst.
PROGRAM basketball court
services
hostel
cafe
theater
offices & classrooms
dance studio
exercise equipment
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
URBAN LABORATORY & OBSERVATORY Cincinnati, OH Spring 2011 The ULO explores the context of the city through the act of constructing a building. An inhabitant or visitor can observe the city by participating in the building. The program is mixed use, including galleries, studios, a library, an archive, an auditorium, and housing for the researchers. In a city, where fields of facades and glass take on the reflections of their site, building exteriors are loaded with information about their surroundings. Their skins thicken until even transparent materials become opaque.
On the more public bottom floors, the ULO experiments with these characteristics of the city by combining thin, planar elements with glass and translucent polycarbonate, creating fields of structural screens. These screens vary in type for multiple uses and create a
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visually dense, inhabitable space.
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PROGRAM 4
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Gallery Space/Exhibit Hall Doors to Main Lobby Stairs to Auditorium Ticket Offices Film/Media Archive Offices Outdoor space Library Printing Lab Communal Kitchen Dorm-style living Family-style living Roof-top communal space
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
The top three floors are the more private residential floors. The rows of apartments are staggered to allow light to reach the rooms that are not along the perimeter of the building. The layering of the opaque walls creates a different kind of screen along the top exterior of the ULO.
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Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
THE WATER TEMPLE unknown river bank Fall 2011 The site is on the slope of a river bed. Throughout the year, the river
rises and
falls, sometimes covering part of the slope. Instead of situating the water temple on the plateau above the slope, the room is set within the incline, allowing the river to submerge it periodically. As the river changes, so does the room; a visitor coming several times a year can experience a different building each time. Because the water room is directly connected to the river, the visitor contemplates the river through the rushing torrent or a calm pool of water. building, whether the water is a
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
PAVILION FOR A NONEXISTENT COUNTRY unknown hillside Fall 2011 Composed of nearly sixty layers, the pavilion appears to be a solid extruded form. But the layers are
space,
separated by
so as the visitors draw closer, the form breaks down visually. Each layer is a different shape, and the visitors pass through the pavilion on a path defined by this irregularity. They encounter solid space in front of them, while at their sides the pavilion opens either to the outside or into the pavilion’s own inner volume. The fluctuating perception results in an
ambiguity between inside and outside.
As the visitor continues down the path, the perceived distance between the occupant and the outside changes as the path moves either closer or farther from the edge of the pavilion. Towards the end of the path, the layers are spaced further and further apart, diminishing the visual and physical barriers between the visitor and the environment.
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MT. LAKE ARTISTS’ RESIDENCES Mt. Lake Conservancy in Pembroke, VA Spring 2010 The prompt of this project was to design five artists’ residences in the Mt. Lake Conservancy, an area of protected woodland in Virginia. Each residence is divided into two functions - service (sleeping and eating) and study. The structure of each residence is comprised of continuous split main girders with floor beams spanning across. These components form a flexible grid system with the ability to add, subtract, or extend spaces; extensions of the girders beyond the habitable volumes form walkways and openings in the grid allow for windows and doors. The structural system provides a welcome constraint in the sloping landscape of the wild conservancy, but it also provides versatility. The form of each of the five residences can all be unique, yet still relate to one another through the module of the grid. The explorations of form, function, and grid were primarily through hand drawing. Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
THE WATERSHED OBSERVATory Tuckasegee River in Bryson City, NC Fall 2010 The Watershed Observatory is nestled into the river bank of the Tuckasegee River to take advantage of the rise and fall of the water. An existing ramp into the river and parking lot indicate that the local inhabitants use the site for recreational boating. A facility was proposed that would elevate the site to a cultural center that engendered the interaction between people and the river through scientific pursuit, artistic contemplation, and leisurely traditions.
One part of the program was a research building for scientists studying the watershed. Because the program meshes public space and private space, a challenge arose to accommodate the scientists need for a quiet space with restricted access while making sure they are not completely isolated from the local people who use the site for leisurely purposes. The science building, modeled here, is
1747’
“permeate”.
1707’
1687’
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comprised of interacting skins, with occupiable space in between. The scientists work in a private, weatherproof space, but use a public, outdoor stair (shown in the drawing) to traverse their tiered workspace. The rain screen surrounding the building protects the stair from the harsher elements. The public can still observe them through the glass/polycarbonate skin surrounding the interior volume as both use the public space that seeps from the terraces under the rain screen. The scientists and the public mingle with each other up and down these stairs – the two social spheres are allowed to
PRODUCT DESIGN: BENT PLYWOOD CHAIR Spring 2012 How does a seat meet the ground? The principle design idea behind this project was the joint between the two necessary components of any chair - the seat and the legs. This chair is an attempt to eradicate any secondary components. The bent
plywood seat locks into the notches of the CNC-routed legs, forming the moment connection that stabilizes the chair - no
glue is used, only the tension of the plywood seat held in place by the notches. The arms formed by the loop of the leg are slightly curved not just for aesthetic reasons but to allow the seat, when the three pieces are put together, to slide back into the top notch. As few veneers as possible were used to make the seat so there would be enough spring in the plywood to stretch back into the notch.
nested together to maximize the use of a single sheet of baltic birch plywood.
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
The construction of the chair also played a crucial role in the final design. Because cutting a continuous loop on the router would waste too much wood, the legs were designed in several smaller pieces that
Design decisions in profile:
Looking at possible angles of the seat component
Arms and legs form a single component
Slight curve given to leg and arm so the seat slides more smoothly into notches
Angle of seat adjusted to prevent cracking by accomodating the limits of bending plywood veneers
Bottom curve added to chair leg so that the chair meets the floor at points and removes any wobble
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
Each gridded square is two inches by two inches
PROCESS: THESIS Fall 2012 – Spring 2013 My thesis is the pursuit of transparency as a method of organization, pushing the definition of “transparency” beyond the visual. As transparency suggests the interaction/overlapping of two or more objects/spaces with one another, I have been thinking of transparency not as a way to “see through” a single object but as a way for multiple programs/volumes/planes to inhabit one visual space. As I develop a project, I rarely start with a complete vision of what I want to create. Instead, I envision moments within the building that I would like the occupants to experience. The full development of the building comes from my exploration of how these moments can be achieved architecturally, and I have found that my best method for exploration is modelmaking.
From the start of this thesis, I have been using modeling at all scales of the building. I first modeled an object that explained the experiential qualities of what I was pursuing. From there, I continued to use models to move from the theoretical and into the tectonic. Each iteration has helped me to focus my ideas and discover new ways to architecturally express the concept of transparency as organization.
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com
For me, a model is the most effective form of exploration because it brings my ideas out of my head and into the threedimensional world of structure and light and space. As I construct and tinker, the models become objects unto themselves, objects that I can react to and learn from as I iterate.
To see the complete thesis: http://issuu.com/cat.e/docs/book_1_issuucopy http://issuu.com/cat.e/docs/book_2_issuucopy
Catherine M. Earley • c.earley13@gmail.com