PLASTIC FANTASTIC/ AFD10 http://cita.karch.dk
Plastic as soft membrane for pneumatics (Grimshaw’s Eden Project )
PLASTIC FANTASTIC: INVENTED INTERIORS FOR A SOFT SPACE WORKSHOP WITH METTE RAMSGARD THOMSEN CITA
Super strength (Fibre reinforced plastic)
How can be design materials to make use of its natural flex
This workshop explores the potentials of designing for and with plast based materials. Plastic is increasingly becoming part of our builidng culture. From the soft skins of the Eden Project or the WaterCube in Beijing, plastic is finding new applications across architecture and the built environment. An interesting point about plastics or polymer based products is that they are engineered materials. As such they are specifically constructed for their performance whether this is strength, flexibility, transparency or lightness. These materials therefore suggest the development of new design practices in which the architect and design is part of the material design. In this workshop we will explore plast materials in a speculative manner. Working with the given material of mylar we ask you how you can design with the particular material performance of flex, structure or transparency that this material enables. How can you cut, fold, laminate, crease, slice, sew, glue, melt mylar to give you particular performances? What kind of new spatialities and transitions do these materials enable? Can the flex, structure or transparency change across space? Across time? You are asked to consider a space of intimacy. If architecture is the creation of boundaries between private and public, intimate and shared what are the conditions that make a space intimate? How is scale and the relationship to the body devised? What role can pattern, ornament and detail play? Considering your proposition as a part design* you are asked to focus on the transitional elements and the way in which your material design and manipulation can facilitate this. The studio will merge digital and physical tools to explore the design of your proposal. Teaching Rhino and laser cutting we will engage a new set of drawing and making tools that operate outside the orthogonal logics of the section and the plan. The workshop therefore shifts between skill learning and proposal development. The workshop is short and you are expected to work intensely within the design period.
Can layering create structure?
* Part design would mean that you are not expected to solve a full architecture proposal. A project could be the garden wall against which seek the last warmth before the winter, the brise solei against which the space of the city is filtered into an office or the thinking of a particular room in which the programme of occupation necessitates nearness.
PLASTIC FANTASTIC/ AFD10 http://cita.karch.dk
Cutting and slicing
PLASTIC FANTASTIC: INVENTED INTERIORS FOR A SOFT SPACE Schedule
Perspex skins
Creasing
The project is group based. We ask you to work in groups of 2. The project will run from Monday the 30th of November to the 16th of December. The project will be run as a collaboration between your tutors and Mette. Monday 30 Nov :
14.00
Introduction by Mette
Tuesday 1 Dec
9:00 -
Rhino intro Concept development
Wednesday 2 Dec
9:00 -
Rhino intro Concept development
Thursday 3 Dec
13:00
First pin up of concept group discussions with Mette / Development of first models
Friday 4 Dec
13:00
Tutorials with Mette and tutors Show and tell of first models
Monday 8 Dec
Tutorials with Mette and tutors Develop design proposal
Tuesday 9 Dec
Tutorials with tutors Develop design proposal
Monday 14 Dec
Tutorials with tutors Develop final model
Wednesday 16 Dec
Layering
:15-12:00
Final review: process models, drawing and final models
PLASTIC FANTASTIC/ AFD10 http://cita.karch.dk
Shifts in light and transparency
PLASTIC FANTASTIC: INVENTED INTERIORS FOR A SOFT SPACE
A lined space: concept development In the first two days you are asked to develop your first design intention. Working in groups of two you are asked to develop the programme of your inquiry.
Watercube Beijing
The project suggests a space of intimacy. As a part programme you should find a condition for an intimate space. What is a place of intimacy and how does it differentiate it self from an outside? What makes the space intimate? Is it a place for rest? Or for contemplation? For private conversations? A bathroom, a bedroom, a changing room? You are asked to draw a drawing creating your first intentions for this space. In this drawing you are asked to consider a state shift - to imagine the transitory conditions from outside to inside, from public to private, from shared to intimate. What are the boundaries between these spaces? How can you imagine these shifts? As a transitory drawing it should notate the changing conditions whether over space or over time. Imagine the performance of your proposal, how does it exist in time and space, how do you occupy it with your body?. Is it for one or two or many? Does it change with time, unfurl or fold? Does it live different lives between night and day?
A new window?
The drawing should be understood as a performance – where you, like Meijin Yoon, imagine the changing condition of your proposal. You are asked to develop the drawing on a A1 sheet using the right media which could be: photo, collage, drawing, slicing, rubbing, cutting, model, gluing … all means are necessary!