CONNER THACKARA
PORTFOLIO
The following pages contain a selection of design work I have done both professionally and as a student. As a designer, I believe that the architecture I create should do more than just meet the programmatic needs of the project but can speak to the community and become an important part of the urban fabric. The design must engage both the intended users as well as its surroundings and context in order to succeed in becoming a lasting resource for everyone.
VENICE GUGGENHEIM ACADEMIC
PROFESSIONAL
01 02 03
BERGEN
PROFESSIONAL
VISUALS
PERSONAL
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TOWER PARKHURST PROFESSIONAL
PROFESSIONAL
REVIVING CANALETTO’S
01 2015
VENICE
Reviving Caneletto is a temporary art gallery for the Venice Biennale in tribute to the Italian painter Giovanni Antonio Canal, commonly called Canaletto. His work focused mainly on views of Venice at the end of the 17th century. The structure runs along the Viale Giardini Pubblici and aims to marry Canaletto’s passion for preserving Venice’s vistas with ecological efforts to preserve the waterfront. As seen in the section, this is done by creating a linear gallery that is raised up over new man-made ecological growth areas. Unlike the beauty and permanence of Canaletto’s work, this structure is designed to have the gallery enclosures removed after the 2 years leaving the structure and cable infrastructure. In likeness to Canaletto’s work, the layers of its assembly are designed to be understood and inhabited by those passing through it.
TYPICAL GALLERY MODULE SECTION
LOW TIDE UNCATAGORIZED DYNAMIC GROWTH
TIDAL POOLS
PRIMITIVE ECOLOGICAL GROWTH
DAILY TIDAL INTERACTION
DYNAMIC TIDAL SHIFT
DAILY TIDAL INTERACTION
HIGH TIDE
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VIEW FROM THE GIARDINI DELLA BIENNALE
SALT MARSH
COMPLEX ECOLOGICAL GROWTH
DAILY TIDAL INTERACTION
MUD FLAT
BASIC ECOLOGICAL GROWTH
DAILY TIDAL INTERACTION
INITIAL CONSTRUCTION
CANALETTO REMOVAL POST CANALETTO
UNCATAGORIZED DYNAMIC GROWTH
PROJECT BRANDING & WAYFINDING The project utilizes dramatic branding across the facade of each gallery that informs what years of Canaletto’s work is displayed inside. Each gallery’s size is dependant on how many works he created in that point of time; the facade’s branding tells a story of how active he was during the different stages in his life.
ECOLOGICAL & TIDAL INTERACTIONS As the tides move in and out of the site, the jetties will create different types of interaction with the daily changing of the water level.
PROCESSIONAL REDIRECTION & REFLECTION
POST EXHIBITION UTILIZATION
The sequence of galleries is periodically broken as the users are led back outside in order to redirect their attention to Canaletto’s muse, the Venetian waterways. The users are reconnected to the current state of the Venetian ecology in juxtaposition to the idyllic scenes of Canaletto’s art.
After the exhibition’s two year display period is over, all that will remain of the project will be the base mass timber structure and the cable infrastructure. The modules will become open vessels for communal activities such as performance spaces, open-air markets, or platforms for users to experience the newly forming ecological landscape below.
1. VERTICAL MASS TIMBER SUPPORTS 1
2. HORIZONTAL MASS TIMBER SUPPORTS 1
3. VERTICAL MASS TIMBER SUPPORTS 2
4. LATERAL TRUSS TIMBER SUPPORT
5. VERTICAL TRUSS CONNECTORS (FLITCH PLATES)
6. FLOOR SPAN SUPPORTS
7. CROSS LAMINATED TIMBER FLOOR
8. STRUCTURAL INSULATED PANELS
9. POLYCARBONATE ENCLOSURE & LIGHT DIFFUSION
SINGLE MODULE
DOUBLE MODULE
1-3 WORKS
4-8 WORKS
TRIPLE MODULE 9+ WORKS
MASS TIMBER SUPPORTS PHOTOVOLTAIC UNIT
CABLE INFRASTRUCTURE
CANVAS LIGHT DIFFUSERS
POLYCARBONATE APERTURE
SIPS
CROSS LAMINATED TIMBER (CLT) FLOOR
SIPS
TYPICAL GALLERY MODULE PLAN
INTERIOR CABLE INFRASTRUCTURE
ARTWORK SECURED TO CABLES
WOOD & STEEL FLITCH PLATES
MODULE THRESHOLD (ENCLOSURE)
CANVAS LIGHT DIFFUSERS
POLYCARBONATE APERTURE
THE HELSINKI
GUGGENHEIM
02 2014 CONCEPT DESIGN, DESIGN DEVELOPMENT, GRAPHICS & COMPETITION BOARD LAYOUTS
This project was an entry for the Helsinki Guggenheim Competition that celebrates both the museum’s collections inside and the unique landscape of Helsinki outside. The building is organized in concert with the grid of the city, celebrating its relationship to the Helsinki Cathedral and Senate Square. The linear box element that is the circulation spine serves as a moment between the city and the sea, allowing for a relationship with both, while at the same time focusing the occupant on the building’s interior. While the element is linear, the experience of it is anything but, with visitors entering at different levels and traveling up and down. As one travels through galleries, the restaurant, and the theater space, the visitor must regularly return to make a decision about where to go next. As a student , I worked with the principle architect to develop the design and concept as well as creating the drawings and visualizations.
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GALLERIES
SOCIAL
RESTAURANT CAFE LOBBY
COMMUNAL
THEATERS SPECIAL PROJECTS EVENT PROGRAM SPACE
FUNCTIONAL
CIRCULATION OFFICES TECHNICAL SPACES
LONGITUDINAL SECTION
LEVEL 2 PLAN
PLAZA BRIDGE LOBBY CIRCULATION GALLERY RESTAURANT CAFE BOOKSTORE SPECIAL PROJECTS THEATRE CLASSROOM ADMIN OFFICES COLLECTION STORAGE MAINTENANCE LOADING
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THE UNBUILT SERIES I created The Unbuilt Series as an exploration of the intersection of architectural design, visualization and graphic identity. The images in the series consist of photorealistic renderings of significant designers’ unbuilt architectural designs. My process was to find an unbuilt project and recreate it in a 3D environment based of off drawings or sketches from the original designer. This process of interpreting the original drawings and filling in information gaps about materials and construction, required that I studied more than just the given building. I researched the designer’s entire body of work and design philosophies to ensure that the image would be as accurate as possible to the original design intent.
VISUALS
03 ARCH 2018 PROFESSIONAL FREELANCE RENDERING & DESIGN SERVICES
In 2018, I began doing freelance architectural visualization with a peer and friend under the name deVoxel. This created an opportunity for me to create a new graphic identity and branding package which has always been a passion of mine that I love to bring into my design work. I created architectural visualizations working closely with the client and architect to create an identity for their projects. I strived to explore new areas of rendering such as fluid simulations and the visualization of historical unbuilt architectural projects based on famous architects’ original drawings.
BERGEN
04 1041 2015 DESIGN DEVELOPEMENT, DRAFTING, CONSTRUCTION ADMIN
1041 & 1057 Bergen Street are a pair of residential buildings in the South Ward of Newark. Despite Newark’s boom in development over the last 15 years, not much of it has reached the South Ward where it is desperately needed. 1041 & 1057 Bergen were designed to fill the need for both affordable housing and new community amenities. The design utilizes modular brick and EIFS panels that shift from floor to floor to create a cost effective interior layout while still creating a bold and dynamic exterior. The design process involved several hands-on meetings with local residents, leaders and community groups in order to establish what the community needed from the projects. 1041 & 1057 Bergen St have since become a nexus of redevelopment and community activity.
SOUTH WARD DEVELOPMENT
While development in Newark has exploded over the last decade, the South Ward still only accounts for 2% of active and future development projects in the city.
serve as a catalyst catalystfor forchange change “serve ” of the South Ward’s Bergen Street commercial corridor...
- Newark Community Economic Development Corporation
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FUTURE LAND DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS - NEWARK MASTER PLAN
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...A transformative project that will
1057 BERGEN ST 4 Stories 10 Residential Units Community Space
1041 BERGEN ST 5 Stories 32 Residential Units Retail Storefront
BERGEN ST. ELEVATION
LEHIGH AVE. ELEVATION
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2. EXTRUDING VOLUME
3. RAISING VOLUME
4. MAXIMIZING VOLUME
5. EXPANDING VOLUME
6. PRESERVING ADJACENT BUILDINGS
7. INTRODUCING PUBLIC PLAZA
8. VOLUME CORE
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AMMENITY SPACES
SUSPENDED STATES
TOWER
05 2014 CONCEPT DESIGN, DESIGN DEVELOPMENT, VISUALIZATIONS
The Suspended States Tower is designed so that it is adaptable, repeatable and locatable wherever there is available vacant land for the ground floor structure. It can rise out of a compact site and float above existing buildings and parks. The flexibility of this strategy reflects the need for a huge growth in the housing market in NYC for smaller residential units for single tenants. The 40 story building has been developed as an inverted pendulum structure. The central core acts as a rigid spine with an exoskeleton steel hat truss on the top. High strength braided steel cables are suspended from edges of the hat truss continuously down and are anchored to the foundation along the perimeter of the building, which serve as the connection system for the living units and program modules. By unifying the module types and repeating them throughout different unit types we can economize the construction of the modules. This system gives the freedom to have a plan that is adaptable and flexible, but at the same time gives rigid ground rules for that flexibility.
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18TH AVE
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URBAN REDEVELOPMENT
MASS TIMBER STRUCTURE
The proposed building was the catalyst for the city to redevelop the zoning and master plan for the surrounding area to encourage more sustainable and successful development.
88 Parkhurst will be the first mass timber building in New Jersey. The design utilizes a glulam structural system with cross laminated timber (CLT) floors and walls. This required an intensive study of the proposed future changes to the building code regarding mass timber construction.
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ADAPTIVE REUSE & REHAB The project will be an adaptive reuse of an existing 19th century factory building that will be rehabbed and incorporated into a larger building mass. The interior of the existing building will be converted into residential units.
PARKHURST
88 06 2017 CONCEPT DESIGN, DESIGN DEVELOPEMENT, URBAN REDEVELOPEMENT STUDY
MAIN ENTRY
88 Parkhurst is a new 7 story, 58 unit residential building in Newark. The project is an adaptive reuse of an existing abandoned warehouse that was originally built in 1865. The project will rehab the existing structure as well as add 4 more stories of residential units on top of the building. The new expansion of the design carries the original building’s architectural grid and rhythm through the facade in a way that brings a more contemporary factory aesthetic. The building will be the first mass timber building in New Jersey, utilizing glulam structural members as well as CLT floors and walls. The project was also the catalyst for the creation of a new zoning redevelopment plan by the city of Newark. We worked directly with the city and planners to develope a new urban master plan for the surrounding community that would promote smarter, more sustainable developments and design.
VIEW FROM ADJACENT CORNER
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FLOOR 3 PLAN