MA INTERIOR DESIGN OF THE UNIVERSITY OF BRIGHTON IN THE UK
INTERIOR DESIGN PORTFOLIO THE UNIVERSITY OF BRIGHTON My education to date has equipped me with a wide range of skills. My junior college diploma equipped me with English skills and my studies in Sociology gave me an understanding of human communication and the needs of society. In many ways this mirrors the role of design to design projects which meet human needs and contribute to the improvement of the world around us. In fact I have always been conscious of the need to contribute to society in some way and at the same time have always been a very creative and artistic person who enjoys painting in my spare time. This inspired me to train to become an interior designer which finally gave focus to my interests and talents, and it also reflects into my dissertation design project in the University of Brighton MA Interior Design, which discussed the row house for extended family in Taiwan. Academically I have always been a high achiever always maintaining high grades. When I took my BA in Sociology at Tunghai University I completed the four year course in three years and during my first year at Tunghai took more credits than my peers in order to make up for missing the first year. My academic excellence was rewarded when I was made a teaching assistant during my third year and taught first year sociology courses. In the same manner, although I was not trained as an interior designer, I passed the exam of National Examination, Level B Technician for Interior Design of Building which is the only qualified license for the interior designers and the pass rate of the exam is only 5% in Taiwan when I was in the last half year in my undergraduate school.
HSIANG-I YEN COVER LETTER
Seeking Interior Design Assistant at... Completing my diploma in Interior design I realized that this field is increasingly becoming more professional and incorporating wider design elements. Interior designers need to work closely with architects, landscape designers and keep abreast of the latest technology in terms of materials and the environmental impact of design. The courses of MA Interior Design in the University of Brighton helped me to better understand how designers think, operate and work and allow me to balance the posibilities of design and practice. I focused my research on the role of caring people in interior design and how this can be meet the funcional needs. By studying with international students and working together on projects and groups I gained more experience of the design process and develop the practical skills I might need in my future career. After finishing my course I try to gain practical experience in the field of interior design. Before I came to UK to study, I did not have much knowledge and experience with interior design but only had a license. In the past 12 months, I learned how to use Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign, Lumion, 3DMax, AutoCAD and Sketchup to complete my school projects. I have developed to be flexible and responsible alongside with my creativity. I greatly enjoy new challenges, and I face them with a positive and open attitude. Although I did not have wealth of experience, I tried to do my best and pick up things quickly. In this sense, I will try my very best to devote myself to further work in the design fields.
May 1, 2014 elsie_0406@hotmail.com
01_Dessertation: Interconnected Living: A New Domestic Interior for
02_Main Design Project: The Learn
03_Design Projects: G.P. Refuge & Pavilion
04_Other Projects & Practives
HSIANG-I YEN TABLE OF CONTENTS
The Extended Family
ning Space of The Interior Design Studio of The University of Brighton
01
A New Domestic Interior for The Extended Family
三代 。
Interconnected Living: A New Domestic Interior for The Extended Family This masterwork investigates how to protect people’s privacy but at the same time create connections with other people in the domestic interior in order to enable harmonious living among the members of an extended family. For this purpose, the distance between public and private spaces needs to be rethought. A row house is a good housing option as it has the advantages of low prices and availability; yet, it needs a rethink in order to reflect the needs of the everyday life of an extended family. The site of the design project is a typical row house. Kaohsiung is the second capital city, is located in the southern part of Taiwan and is also my hometown. The row house forms a great proportion of total housing units (34.58%) and is the most used type of housing in the southern part of Taiwan. For these reasons, I use the typical row house as the site for my project with the intention of using my previous research on visual and spatial connection to design a new standardised row house plan. The footprint and the volume that the typical row house occupies will not be subject to change; in other words, I will keep the same length, width and height as the existing row house and only redesign its internal spatial arrangement. The site is in the centre of the Kaohsiung, which was the first developed area. Kaohsiung is divided into northern and southern areas through this district. The main train station is also located in the district. The living style of the district is living and commercial units combined together. Most of the houses in this district are less than six floors, which is the typical type of row house in Taiwan. Many people open a small shop on the ground floor of their house and live on the higher floors. There are a few business buildings that are higher than ten floors scattered around.
SiteAnalysis Analysis Site Street Block of Kaohsiung City
Building under 10 Floors Building higher than 10 Floors
Site Analysis
Street View of The Kaohsiung City
Residential and commercial mixed space
Residential only
The streets in this district are quite narrow; that is, around six metres width or less. The houses facing these streets accommodate small businesses on their ground floors. In the narrower alleys, which are wide enough to allow only one car or scooter to pass through, the houses are mainly just for living. The row house taken from the research is for living only. In this type, the ground floor is designed for parking but not used as a shop front.
Main Road
The row houses built in the early 1980s are getting old and need to be rebuilt. So, parts of the row houses in the district are being redone. One problem that these new designs need to solve is the lack of sunlight in the interior. Because of the narrow alleys and the shared walls, the sunlight cannot get into the interior. It also results in the problem of high humidity, which makes people ill. This design project needs to consider how to design a house that not only fits the needs of residents but also provides good levels of sunlight and ventilation.
Residential only
New Row House Plan
Also, my proposal leaves some areas with undefined roles, which lets the family decide what their function is. The functions of these three spaces are adjustable according to the different stages of family life. For example, when children are young, the study room could also be their playroom. Parents can watch their children playing with toys while they are watching a movie. The flexible area can also be an open and ready space or one can put a piano there and make it onto a music practice room. This idea is adopted from Hertzberger’s “Diagoon House” – studied earlier in my masterwork. Hertzberger argues that a designer should leave some parts of the interior undefined to let the residents use their own imagination to decide how they use the space and what role it could play in the house.
① ② ③ ④ ⑤ ⑥ ⑦ ⑧ ⑨ ⑩
Grandparents’bedroom Living room Kitchen Dinning room Study room Parents’ bedroom Flexible area Children room Worship space Garden
The Open Areas
[View from the living room]
The social spaces of the house – living room, dining room and kitchen completely open and interconnected using the level’s height and view gap to define the space. More specifically, I relocated the kitchen onto the split-level between the floor of the living room and the dining room. Thus, it becomes the connection of these two sitting spaces.
[View from the kitchen]
The Space Connection
[View from the dinning room]
This interconnection of spaces does not let people feel too exposed under the gaze of others because of how the design manipulates what can be seen. I have designed this interconnection in such a way that through the opening people’s horizons can only stay at a certain high level, which is the space above the human head.
[View from the dinning room]
The Space Connection
Another space which also needs both connection and privacy is the study room.
The study room has an opening but is without a door panel to divide spaces distinctly. The walls of the study room are partially made out of glass to let the visuals penetrate. However, because the study room is separated form the staircase by only a pane of glass, the opening stops at a certain height so when people are on the staircase they can see who is sitting in front of the desk in the study room without knowing what they are reading. Moreover, the chair by the desk
is placed in a similar way as the sofa in the Moller house; the windows are behind the chair so people outside the study room find it difficult to see who is there immediately because of the backlight during the day; but the people who sit inside can easily see who is coming. This
spatial arrangement gives the people inside the study room a feeling of control and security.
[View from the study room]
Leave Some Spaces...
Besides the visual connection, the children’s room is divided by a flexible wall in the middle of the house, which lets the family
members adjust its degree of openness according to the needs of different periods. It can be entirely open as one room or completely closed, which can divide the space into two rooms.
[View from the children room]
Compared with the space arrangement of the existing row houses, I try to make sure every space has more connection by using the concept of transparency through openings and split-levels to break out from the enclosed wall concept.Some spaces are designed to be flexible and adaptable and let residents decide how to use them during different life stages. The
rearrangement of spaces is based on the interaction needs of different family life cycles of the extended family.
[View from the roof garden]
02
The Learning Space for The Interior Studio
互動 。
The Learning Space For The Interior Design Studio
Weaving Interactions “Central core as the MAID Studio� Due to the central stair case where the main arteries of GP potentially mediating the counterparts of private and public uses and other faculties. From the refuge and pavilion in G.P building, the degree of private to public is vertical. The refuge provides a personal space for students to take a rest in school, and the pavilion acts as a public sapce where people can walk more slowly and creates some corners for activities in the G.P garden. This gave me ideas for the character of the studio. The learning space will be located in the space between private and public sapce depending on the privacy degree of programes. It is like a transitional space for MAID students when they stay int he studio. In the studio they will have their own personal working space and also the exhibition
Break The Boundary
Physical Modle and Isometric drawing
Isometric
3F
2F
1F
From the refuge and pavilion in
The learning space will G.P building, the degree of private to public is vertical. The be located in the space refuge provides a personal space forestudents in t e a n d b t w e etontakepa rest r i va school, and the pavilion acts as a public sapce where people can public sapce depending walk more slowly and creates on the for privacy degree some corners activities in the G.P garden. This gave me ideas of programes. It is like for the character of the studio. learning space will be space located aThetransitional for in the space between private and MAID students public sapce depending on the when privacy degree of programes. It is they stay int he studio. like a transitional space for MAID students whenstudio they stay int they he In the will studio. In the studio they will have have own space personal their owntheir personal working and also the exhibition area where working space and also we can interact with students from other departments. the exhibition area where we c a n i n t e r a c t w i t h students from other departments.
GF
Bring The Sunlight In The previous G.P. Building has very narrow and dark corridor. Through the the glass window which is no only can let other people see the learning process in our studio from the corridor but also bring the sun light in to the interior space. The learning space becomes the light container in G.P. Building. I choice to make doulbe skins facade with glasses and wodden windows at an angle that can let more sun light into the interior. At the same time I also use the wodden pattern to shelter from the strong sun light in the main working area but won’t effect the sight view from the upper level in other building.
The Learning Space
Surrounding The Staircase Main stair is the important intersection point of walking path. However, it is cut by small places such as the restroom. Therefore this crucial corner is just a dark pass way distribution of the functions from public to private, in a vertical way sur rounding the stair. The assembly feeling of ground floor extends upwards. Through my design of pin up area to personal working space and refuge, this vertical distribution creates a space charge effect of screen in G.P. Garden. It's production and interflow of design with a transparent emergence.
The Chance of Communication
Depending on section plane in different levels. MAID studio has one kind of moderate isolation to the internal construction space, but view sight can still penerate this series of vertical spaces and to enjoy outdoors' green. Comes out to block sun's luck shoots and lets the gloomy corner have the ray to come in. This screen has its angle incline and suitable visor. Just like a light mesh.
The Chance of Communication
The sense of space of this light mesh extends and then has connection with G.P. Pavilion. These two different structures create a no boundary seamless trail connection. A transformation from liminal space to infinite
borizontal.
03
Design Projects: G.P. Refuge & Pavilion
停留 。
Refuge in London Business District
Nowadays, the north side of river Thames is a crucial business district in London. However, as a tourist who first comes to visit I felt unwelcome in this district where most people are in suits. Therefore, I started trying to find places where make me feel I belonged there. There are three places make me feel comfortable while I stayed there. First is in a small alley where is surrounding by the skyscrapers. Second place is in a church garden where there is a semi-open place. The last one is by the riverside. I chose the alley be my site of refuge in the London project. I try to design a refuge which can let tourist escape from feeling unwelcome in the business district. It is a space that belongs to the outsiders who are just passing visitors in the district. The concept of the shape of the refuge comes from the eyesight of three different places which make me feel easy there. The refuge frames the beautiful view and cuts off the urban negative while people stay inside. The refuge not only brings warmth to the outsiders, but also rises up the brightness in the alley by transforming sunlight through windows in daytime. Besides, it also can be a beacon at night when business people all finish work and the district becomes dark and still.
Sheltering above In the river side, this shelter provides a secured feeling in a publicity space for all. The semi-opened window in south limited people’s sight, which concentrate more on the view of the river with the downward window. A shelter which is located in a church garden. As a semi-public space, it allows people to escape from the busy business d istrict. The north inclined window dis- connects the sight of crowded traffic underside and focus more on the historical sightseeing spot — The monument The streetlight at night and the container that can transfer sun light at midday in this restricted public space. Let people stop walking and see the sky through the different way W
N
E
S
Siting Process
?
Sun-light-“path”-through priciple
Panel Construction
Cross Section
Detail
09
G.P. Refuge
Sight Shot from the studio
Refuge at G.P. Building in Brighton A student who stays in the studio for many hours everyday, sometimes might want to havea place to leave and take a break but also want to see the situation in studio.
Refuge
ction-1
The refuge is located outside the studio in second floor. It is fixed in the wall by cable wires which connects with the wooden patterns of the refuge.
Pavilion at B.P. Garden in Brighton
The principle idea of the pavilion in G.P. Garden comes from the work of the 2009 Serpentine G a l l e r y Pa v i l i o n , w h i c h i s concerned more about ideal relationship between man and nature. In this pavilion, I try to make the boundary disappear and make it really fit with the natural view. While checking the photos I took in G.P. Garden, I found out that there is no more leaves on the trees and then realize that the winter is really coming. This make me notice that most of us usually ignore the nature is changing every minute. ThenI started to think back the view in the spring. Based on the principle of dematerial and less influencing to nature, the pavilion is designed with the shapes which fits in the garden view --- “ the leaves�. By using the steel ropes and glass to creat curved shapes which looks like withered leaves. The steel ropes are fixed in the G.P. Building.
Scenarious
Under the Pavilion
Pavilion is like a simplistic architecture. Dismantle the wall, and it becomes a simple cover. Unlike architeture usually emphasize itself in the pass, but hid in this case. W h e n t h e p av i l i o n r e f l e c t s surroundings and hides itself, the thin steel ropes let people nearly hard to notice.We are all cheated by the world we see when we are in the pavilion, and this is the most fascinating thing here. To diminish all the material needs, I will use a succession of curves and different height to create the most varied spatial impression. Respond to the garden as a public place where people can go inside in every way. Avoid building up a pyramid like prodigy, but a labyrinth scene. Cannot see through in a glance (although it is penetrant), but need to experience it.
04
Other Projects & Practives
合作 。
Instanbul Workshop With Universita di Ferrara, Politecnico di Milaono and Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University in Instanbul.
aduate Show
MAID Graduate Show
MAID Graduate Show Every pattern were bonded by pancil. However, compare with phycical model which wasmade by wood, B-board was softer and easy to change shape. Pancil made the connection hole become bigger then it keep falling. Besides,every patterns keeped jostling Phycical Model each other so the hole intalltion became deformed. Therefore, we cut other small pieces and used superglue to steady it. MAID Graduate Show
Cutting B-board We separated as two groups. One did the cutting and one did the combination, which raised the efficiency.
Cutting B-board Phycical Model
Lift Up
We separated as two groups. One did the cutting and one did the combination, which raised the efficiency.
Installtion Design
In the first instance just used rope to fixed, which is not that strong to support the weight Connect of B-baord with
the handrail Up of Lift mezzanine in G.P Building In the first instance just used rope to fixed, which is not that strong to support the weight of B-baord
Combination
Combination Every bonded pattern were bonded Every pattern were by pancil. However, compare by pancil. However, compare with phycical model which wasmade by wood, B-board with phycical model which was softer and easy to change wasmade by wood, shape.B-board Pancil made the connection hole become bigger was softer and easy to change then it keep falling. Besides, shape. Pancil made the connevery patterns keeped jostling each other so the hole intalltion ection hole become bigger became deformed. Therefore, then it keep falling. we cutBesides, other small pieces and used superglue to steady it. every patterns keeped jostling each other so the hole intalltion became deformed. Therefore, we cut other small pieces and used superglue to steady it.
Laser Cutting Use B-board to do the laser cutting and then build it.
Measurement Calculation Every pattern in specific measurements
MAID Graduate Show
Group Work
05
Drawing Practices
練習 。
Hand drawing practice Ground level: 15.65m*15.55m Scale: 1:50
elsie_0406@hotmail.com