STATEMENT

Fang Shu is an architectural designer currently advancing his graduate studies as an M.Arch 2 student at the Southern California Institute of Architecture. Before joining SCI-Arc he was a consistent Dean’s List Class of 2019 student who received his Bachelor of Architecture Degree with honors from Syracuse University School of Architecture. During his time at Syracuse University, he received the Scholarship In Action Merit Award due to his academic merits and became a member of Phi Eta Sigma National Honor Society in 2015. His academic work has been exhibited during the 2016 NAAB Exhibition and his competition work, Studio Custom, has been published in Design Class in 2020.

Professionally, Fang practiced architecture in firms such as Amenta Emma Architects, Clive Lonstein, Studio Roberto Rubini, and CAUPD (China Academy of Urban Planning and Design). His professional design works range from architecture design proposals and interior designs to urban planning and art installations.

Continuing his design passion now at SCI-Arc, he hopes to focus his designs and research on blurring the line between reality and the metaphysical.

Toy Scale

Course Name: DS1200

Instructor: Rachael McCall

In Collaboration with: Joy Chen

Toy Scale is a project that focuses on creating immersive and interactive landscape by altering the user’s perception of scale using playful objects. By manipulating the scale of toys that children play with, the project transforms the entire school into a big playground, giving us the illusion that we are part of the canvas in this fantasy world of toys.

Our project started with the scaling and meshing of toys to form playful chair like figures for children to play with. For our classroom designs, we continued using this design strategy to form creative spaces using toys such as enlarging balloon whales to create reading domes and big mattress to manipulate how users perceive themselves within our toy scape classrooms.

Classroom Scale

Classroom Drapery

Diorama Scale

Classrooms Arranged

Outdoor Chairs

The outdoor area is divided into two different landscapes. The softer grass and small gardens act as resting places whereas the colorful precast terrazzo landscape act as playground for sporting activities. We also designed the wavelike shape of the grass landscape to compliment the drapery above. The drapery act as both shading and interactive structures, creating resting places and additional creative playgrounds for the students.

The intervention of our elementary school resides within the west portion of the Diamond Ranch High School. The white terrazzo landscape in the center of the elementary school connects the existing parking lot with the football stadium.

Masked

Course Name: VS4200

Instructor: William Virgil

In Collaboration with: Joy Chen

The mask hides the identity and liberates the persona. Within the wearer bears a yearning for inner expression in the purest and most flamboyant of forms. The young duke at day transforms himself into the Crimson Duchess of Flame at night. She enters occasional galas, and soirees with her identity concealed, enjoying music and dances while dressing in glamorous outfits that she has designed. Many have wondered who this mysterious fair lady was. However, in the hearts of the few who have witnessed her beauty, they will always remember her as the Crimson Duchess of Flame.

Insomnia

Course Name: VS4200

Instructor: Kumaran Parthiban

In Collaboration with: Joy Chen

Insomnia, the capital city of Harlan’s World, the kingdom of Lucis Harlan, is approximately eighty lightyears from Earth. The city was built upon crystal marrow mining which rapidly evolved its industry and technological power. On the surface of the city’s glamour, the disparity between the poor and the rich drastically increased. Insomnia and its hunger for growth has no regard for the weak. The outdated things are simply built on top of or discarded into the depth of the slums. A city filled with opportunities, built for the strong willed and the rich, is there really time to sleep?

Terraforming or terraformation is the hypothetical process of deliberately modifying the atmosphere, temperature, surface topography, or ecology of a planet, moon, or other body to be similar to the environment of Earth to make it habitable by Earth-like life.

This visual studies section will explore a small but essential part of world-building environment design and actively transgressing its principles to create fantastic immersive landscapes. Rather than creating a sense of grounded realism, we will work in the realm of nonlogic, with flexible rules and the unknown.