YONGXIAO lIU PORTFOLIO
CONTENT
1
p.2
NO 1.
DETROIT MUSEUM HIGH + LOW
p.10
NO 2.
REVOLVING
p.14
NO 3.
BRIDGING THE GAP
p.20
NO 4.
TOWER OF THE CITY
p.28
NO 5.
SEE BEYOND
FOX
OLD FOX PARKING DECK
GIANTS
FILMORE
THE NEGELECTED
Site section and site plan
2
FORD FIELD COMERICA
NO 1.
DETROIT MUSEUM HIGH + LOW
Student Work: UG3, Fall, 2011 Instructor: Tony Patterson
NEOSTARS What is seen in Detroit is a broken balance of highs and lows. The concentrated and isolated housing, the high-rises of the central commercial districts and the popular recreational centres, are separated from each other, making the city fragmented. The site environment, on the contrary, is exceptionally rich in its contents of both old and new, density and scarcity, popular and the less attended. The design for a museum deals with different programs and issues such as education, digital media arts, live/work artists residences and general residence, all these different programs make the museum complicated, yet at the same time provide great opportunities. The organization of the museum follows the mixing idea by vertically alternating the highs and lows (in terms of popularity of each level), dark and bright, art and residence, etc. To maximize the experience of visitors as well as a response for the site. There are three special spaces inside the museum: the public graffiti exhibition entry level, the dark digital media art level and the open sculpture level up high.
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Organization of programs The organization of programs follows the principle of alternation and differentiation, while there is a general division between the residential and the arts exhibition area. Although a simple stacking project, the relationship between each floor is carefully calibrated to maximize the contrast and the experience.
Housing
Studio
Office/Administration Teens Gallery support
Galleries
Black-out
Retail/Restaruant
Entry
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Elevations HIGH + LOW DENSE + SCARCE NEW + OLD
West elevation 5
Features of different spaces
1
2
6
3
Housing
Special spaces:
Sculpture
Education
Art
Office
1. Space and architectural skin:
Restaurant
The skin penetrates into architecture creates a pattern of the exterior, at the same time forming space that people are be able to interact and even become rooms and partitions. 2. Ramps from above: The structure of the ramps from the upper level are exposed to the lower one of how it is meandering around the central circulation core.
Digital Media Art
3. Entry level Graffiti exhibition hall: As one of the special elements of the museum, the space embraces one of the characters of Detroit, allowing graffiti artists to create their work on the provided artboards in the museum during opening hours. The artboards are meant to be painted from the inside so it maintains the clarity of the fasade at the same time concealing the content of the artworks. Thus, more people are attracted to go into the museum and start an exploration. 7
Entry
Quality/Contrast The organization of space vertically aims at maximizing the difference between each floor. While in a conventional high-rise, different programs are isolated and functions horizontally, in this one it is more about the intrinsic vertical correlations of such difference between each program, while letting the visitors enjoy the purity of each floor. Also, “spice“ of unexpectedness is introduced as special spaces: a dark, enclosed space in the bright exhibition area and a work-in-progress housing space in the public. Such moments, however, drastically accentuates the quality of the space around.
Housing
1
East-west section Pencil on bristol 19” x 24” 8
Diagrams: 1. General Program logic 2 Open &Bright Spaces Enclosed & Dark Spaces
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2
1
3
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1. View from above: Space that penetrates multiple levels at the same time, giving a sense of verticality inside a horizontal project.
2. View into central circulation and terrace 3. View through stairs and ramps
NO 2.
REVOLVING
Student Work: UG1, Fall, 2011 Instructor: Sean Vance
Line drawing Axonometric: rotation revolution and density of space (38 *20 bristol) 10
The project is a study of generating winding space as it goes up. The revolving space is represented as both solid and void. Several spaces, extracted from the central space, become the connection between the solid and void. Since there is a geometrical similarity between the section of the void, rotation of the same object is used as the method to form the model.
Revolving Charchol of bristol 19” x 24” 11
+
=
Diagrams of the logic of generating the space: Revolving / rotation / twisting connectinoo of inside and outside
12
This model further explores the revolutionary form in a more explicitly architectural way. As part of the design, the site is specifically chosen to be at the side of a mountain. As a community center, the building was designed in a way to emerge from part of the mountain. The project allows architecture to become a threshold as people are climbing up the mountain, it is also concerned with virtual process of approaching the apex through a series of perambulation, and the stunning view from the top of the building is what is gained after the revolving path.
Section 1
Section 2
13
NO 3.
BRIDGING THE GAP
Student Work: UG2, Winter, 2011 Instructor: Caroline Constant
As a public library in Detroit, MI, this project aims at bridging the gap between the residential area to the east and the park to the west of Woodward Avenue, which should function as a recreational spot for the residential community. The library is envisioned less as a container for information and more as means to encourage the public to engage its social and cultural opportunities via its internal and external spatiality. Three primary volumes each have a distinct orientation and thrust, as if expressing the desire to embrace the world beyond. On the interior each volume contains discrete programmatic elements that are mediated via the spatial continuum and visibility across gaps between the levels. On the uppermost floor a more relaxing reading area allows views both within the building and outward to the park, echoing the internal arrangement of book stacks that extend outward from the rift that separates the trays of the three primary volumes.
14
8’ 0
15
32’ 16’
64’
Transportation and site map diagram: The site is sitting at the side of a very busy boulevard, with a dense residential area behind. The park right in the front is much less used because of this busy traffic that cuts in between, like a barrier. The library, as a result, should notify and make aware of this issue, bringing up people’s attention and ask for future change and revitalization.
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Entry Level 16 0
17
4’ 32’
Interlocking The library consists of three interlocking massings, all are set at a different level so that they provide visual and spatial connections that guide visitors from bottom to the top. The geometry of the void in the middle follows the geometry of the massing, creating a greater tension between the three volumes, at the same time providing enough space in between for a tripleheight central core.
Edge of floor slabs
View through the gap 18
16
4’
0
32’
The organization of the book stacks strengthens this relationship by radial alignment, pointing into the center, and pointing to the outside. The organization of the book stacks is acknowledge the center as well as bringing attention to the outside and letting people appreciate the great landscape of the public park.
16
19
0
4’ 32’
NO 4.
TOWER OF THE CITY
Student Work: UG1, Fall, 2011 Instructor: Sean Vance
As a museum displaying the history and culture of Ypsilanti, MI, and being located in the less populated district, the focus of the project is to establish the marker of the area, preserving and inheriting the history of Ypsilanti while letting people go up and appreciate the beauty of the entire region. The project focuses on the inter-relationship of different programs to each other; namely, the space of observation, the space of motion and the space of rest, and how these spaces collaborate and define the building and vice versa. As a result, the effort is to explore the very basic quality of spaces. A key concept for this project is the relationship between “travel“ and “rest“ The space of motion is entangled withthe space of observation, each of which provides the visitors a unique perspective to the landscape. The other side, the “rest“, is located at a rather solemn and retrospective double-height space that provides not only a physical space to rest, but also a space for meditation.
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21
Exterior rendering
Exterior rendering
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Depot station (historic) Frog Island Park
Vehicular traffic
Pedestrian traffic
train track (historic)
Site plan / circulation diagram
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The site is located within the historic district in the town next to a public park, and close to the farmer’s market providing rich cultural background that contributes to the building’s role as a museum of the history of Ypsilanti. Because of the infill condition of the site, the architecture finds a way to engage the neighboring building as well as the alleyway, creating a semi-exterior space that can either function as a passage or a shelter.
Entry and Public circualtion
Longitudinal section
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Cross section
Wall of Surveyor
Wall of city
Observation
Wall of Books
“Travel”
Rest “Meditation”
Travel / Meditation Exploring the history of a city is a travel of mind. Looking at the history of any place is a travel through time and so it is true for Ypsilanti. The travel is about moving and seeing. As circulation meanders up, there are moments of observation where the view of the town gives people a broader map of the city as a helpful hint to understand the history of the town. “Meditation“, in the higher, more divine space that gives you time to think about what you have seen and what you have felt, a stop at halfway of the journey.
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Motion
Space of circulation and space of observation 26
Space of rest with terrace 27
NO 5.
SEE BEYOND
Student Work: UG4, Winter, 2012 Instructor: Ellie Abrons See Beyond is a children’s museum of digital media arts. The project seeks an architecture that we know by touch, rather than by sight. Using material changes that are hidden from view, low light levels, and light projection to dematerialize surfaces, it reinforces and makes aware the power of touch through an exploratory occupation of space. The project is organized on three levels, connected by a continuous staircase. The floor slabs are covered by a layer of white, elastic material that conceals the varied underlying structures and textures, giving way to the pressure of footsteps and the touch of the hand to reveal the materials beyond. The elastic material allows for the creation of a smooth space that eliminates the hard boundaries of edges and objects; thus producing ambiguity in size, scale, and direction. The minimizing of the surface and the maximizing of the underlying layers produces an unexpected space and calls attention to the ways that the quality of experience can be different from how a space appears. The material exploration of density, softness, hardness, decay, and smoothing studies the relationships between those materials and architectural elements such as stairs, openings, and pathways. In addition, the project questions how these various material qualities can be leveraged to alter the way people usually conceive of the architectural interior, and to explore a way of occupying architecture, space, and activities with renewed insight.
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Continuous interior rendings
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Material study models 1. Floor finish, beyond 2. Fiber strands 3. Polyester fill
Diagrams 4. Incontinuous surface, beyond 5. Soft and hard mateiral 6. Light and flexible surface
Key symbols Floor/ wall finish, beyond 1 Polyster fill Sand
Tactile experience 4
Projected sufrace
2
3
5
30 4
6
THIRD LEVEL
SECOND LEVEL
ENTRY LEVEL
31
0
10
20
30 ft
SPOTLIGHT/ PROJECTOR
Travel / Meditation Looking at the history of any place is a travel through time and so it is true for Ypsilanti. The travel is about moving and seeing. As circulation meanders up, there are moments of observation where the view of the town gives people a broader map of the city as a helpful hint to understand the history of the town. “Meditation“, in the higher, more divine space that gives you time to think about what you have seen and what you have felt, a stop at halfway of the journey.
SPANDEX CONE
PROJECTOR
CONNECTIONS FOR FIBER STRANDS
2 5
FIBER STRANDS
FINISH CONCRETE SLAB, BEYOND
Longitudinal Section
STRUCTURAL CONCRETE SLAB
CONCRETE SHELL
1
5’ - 4”
4
3
Cross Section
32
Detail Section 2
Each indivudual of the composite fiber is composed of a few single fiber strand, and by which way it allows the
form to shrink or spand. Also, it allows light to diffuse and Material section 5 a foggy, ambiguous penetrate through, creating atmousphere.
Each indivudual of the composite fiber is composed of a few single fiber strand, and by which way it allows the form to shrink or spand. Also, it allows light to diffuse and penetrate through, creating a foggy, ambiguous atmousphere.
FINISH CONCRETE SLAB, BEYOND CONCRETE SHELL OPENINGS FOR PROJECTION FIBER STRANDS
CONCRETE WALL
SAND
END CONNECTION
Detail Section 4 SPOTLIGHT/ PROJECTOR
SPANDEX CONE
LAYERS OF FIBER STRANDS
END CONNECTION
FIBER STRANDS 2’ - 6” 5 ‘ - 6”
CONCRETE WALL
1/2 “ CONCRETE FLOOR FINISH POLYESTER POLY FILL
THREADED ANCHOR INSERT CONCRETE SLAB
Detail Section 1 1/2 “
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1/8 “ 1/8 “
J - ANCHOR
YONGXIAO lIU PORTFOLIO