PORTFOLIO: ETULAN A JOSEPH 2025_Metropolis 100

WORK SAMPLE

Etulan A. Joseph

University of Southern California Metropolis 100

This portfolio* work is a part of the overall developing portfolio/ book “Narratives, Fragments and Figments of the Imagination” - collection of academic work spanning across themes such as geometry and computation, assemblages and 3D collages, drawing and representation theory, landscapes, facades, publications and media, as well as architectural history. This project, like the others in the forthcoming book, is an exploration of mixing typologies, theories and technicalities through the critical identification and use of coactive relationships that generate contemporary spatial paradigms, experimental iterations of pre-existing models or critiques of such. It embraces architecture in its complexity, its social nature and its possibities, however that may be expressed.

TYPOLOGY: CULTURAL

INSTRUCTOR(S): SOOMEEN HAHM

NATURE OF WORK: COLLABORATIVE WITH BRYAN LEE

MISSION R.E.H.M

LOCATION: LOS ANGELES, CA, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

YEAR OF WORK: 2024

Mission R.E.H.M. — a 300,000 sq ft wildlife sanctuary and hotel, where humans and advanced technology collaborate to seamlessly integrate urban living with ecological stewardship, using robotics to improve the environment, society, and economy through regenerative sustainability. Through its programming, there is work to combat biodiversity loss and provide education on our ecosystems and its importance, creating a dynamic, sustainable, and entertainment-rich environment that blends built spaces with the natural world. This project aims to educate visitors about the importance of natural habitats, biodiversity, and conservation and seeks to inspire positive action for the planet. Through hotel profits, events and renting the film studios, Mission R.E.H.M can reinvest back into wildlife as well as sustainable climate initiatives — regenerating damaged landscapes. It is a celebration of plants, animals and the natural world, and reconnecting people with them. This sanctuary becomes both a source of economic revitalization for downtown Los Angeles and the rest of the city, but it serves as a global symbol of ecological preservation, education, and innovation.

TYPOLOGY: OFFICE

INSTRUCTOR(S): GESA BUTTNER DIAS/ ALVIN HUANG/ OLIVIER TOURAINE

NATURE OF WORK: INDIVIDUAL

NATURE OF WORK: INDIVIDUAL NATURE OF WORK: INDIVIDUAL

NATURE OF WORK: INDIVIDUAL NATURE OF WORK: INDIVIDUAL NATURE OF WORK: INDIVIDUAL NATURE OF WORK: INDIVIDUAL

100 ORD STREET

LOCATION: LOS ANGELES, CA, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

YEAR OF WORK: 2023

100 Ord Street explores the idea of the tall office structure when using almost a collage of structural elements and materials - timber, concrete and steel; where timber is the main structural make-up of the building, more than 75%. An assemblage of sorts, the main goal of the building is to promote continuous circulation - from the street to the ground, throughout the building, onwards to the top. This continuous gradient allows the user to not only occupy circulation but experience the multitude of programs within the building. The office building becomes a vertical public promenade, allowing for visitors to be free to explore this instituion that is privately owned. Furthermore, the facade experiments with this double skin that is dramatic in its design, which plays with the formal design of the programming and structure of the building as it breaks the pragmatic requirements that is a typical of an office building. Due to sun studies done during site analaysis, the broken facade occupies the west and south sides to couter the massive heat gains that occur on the site. The open panels and operable windows also allow for cross ventilation and a more sustainable approach, making use of the breezes that move through the site.

As one moves through the building, there is an experience of continuous circulation and occupation. Even though the building itself is an institution, democratizing it by allowing users to go where they please, sit where they please, work, meet, greet at almost any point in the building allows for a sense of community and ownership of this built space. Essentially the office typology takes on a communal language, not only for the individuals that work there but for the community in which the building sits - Chinatown. This continuous gradient of experiences allows the user to not only occupy circulation but experience the multitude of programs within the building while at the same time creating their own programming via how they occupy these continuous open circulatory spaces.

VIGNETTES - MOVING THROUGH THE BUILDING(THE MAIN ENTRY STAIRCASE)

VIGNETTES - MOVING THROUGH THE BUILDING(AUDITORIUM UPPER LEVEL)

VIGNETTES - MOVING THROUGH THE BUILDING(FACADE)

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