Design Compendium

DESIGN COMPENDIUM Conner Bryan

/ 2008 - 2013

CONTENTS

Conner Bryan is an architectural designer from Navarre, Florida.

Conner recently received his Master of Architecture degree at The University of Texas at Austin. While completing his studies, he served as a graduate teaching assistant for Environmental Controls as well as the Public Interest Design / Build program.

Conner also served as a graduate research associate at the UT Center for Sustainable Development. He has previously worked at the offices of Allied Works Architecture and HHMA. Conner views the act of design through the lens of exploration - an ontological investigation. He believes in thinking critically through the act of making. He also maintains a firm belief in design that provides smart and adaptive responses to human degradation on the environment.

Conner previously studied at The University of Florida where he received his Bachelor of Design in Architecture degree with highest honors, as well as a minor in Urban and Regional Planning. He is also a LEED Accredited Professional.

CARGO TERMINAL

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education / Pearl River Delta, China

OPEN HOUSE

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education / Austin, Texas

TIMBER IN THE CITY

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education / Red Hook, New York

PHOTOBIOREACTOR

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education / Dusseldorf, Germany

PANTHER HOLLOW

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education / Austin, Texas

KUNSTHALLE

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practice / Columbus, Ohio

DESIGN NEIGHBORHOOD

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practice / Denver, Colorado

STELLATUS

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education / Austin, Texas

BEACH DEBRIS

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education / Navarre Beach, Florida

STICKS & STONE practice / Venice, Italy

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CARGO TERMINAL education course location date

University of Texas at Austin Advanced Studio Pearl River Delta, China 2011

collaborator

Michael Beene

Emerging manufacturing-based megacities require a new airport typology: the first airport dedicated to non-human travel. The Pearl River Delta (PRD) Air Cargo Terminal, located in China’s busiest manufacturing city, allows for unparalleled efficiency in the transportation of cargo while removing industrial waste from the delta itself.

This rapid expansion of manufacturing facilities in the region has caused tremendous water pollution.

As a response to this issue, the PRD cargo terminal is positioned to facilitate the clean up of industrial wastewater through a natural phytoremediation process. Plants called hyperaccumulators have the ability to tolerate large quantities of heavy metals, carcinogens, and other toxins. By implementing a hydroponic treatment system with these plants on site, the river water can be treated without the use of carbon-intensive industrial equipment. Once the river water enters the site, it flows through a series of constructed wetlands, where the hyperaccumulators absorb the toxins through their root structures. Once the plants have become saturated with heavy metals, they can be collected and incinerated, whereby the heavy metals can be captured, recycled, and re-used, eliminating them from the regional ecosystems.

In this way, the PRD cargo terminal can serve as a model for the entire region, addressing the rising need of cargo transport for the manufacturing sector, while also alleviating the environmental issues facing China today.

The building itself consists of two main elements: a series of modular processing bays and an elevated network of administration bars. This loosely defined network provides space for both administrative uses and workers’ facilities. The confined nature of the bar-shaped rooms, paired with views of the horizon, creates a more personal experience to complement the working spaces below. The modular bays can be expanded when the airport reaches capacity, clipping onto the elevated taxiway structure above.

This project was awarded the 2011 Excellence in Design Award by the University of Texas School of Architecture.

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CARGO FACILITY

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OPEN HOUSE education course location date

University of Texas at Austin Advanced Studio Austin, Texas 2013

collaborator s

Garrett Martin Taylor McNally-Anderson Tyler Noblin

The University of Texas at Austin is developing a small house design for entry into the 2015 U.S. Solar Decathlon competition. The current concept has been driven by four different overarching ideas: urban development, design simplicity, space extension, and smart technology.

One of the main difficulties in developing an entry into the competition is prescribing a purpose to the design, something of greater weight than a twoweek technological demonstration. In addressing this need, the team is focusing on Austin’s urban development problem. Specifically, what can be done to house new arrivals to the city while simultaneously maintaining the people and character of the existing neighborhoods?

The University of Texas School of Architecture has proposed a solution previously – the Alley Flat, a small home that can be built at the rear of a homeowner’s property that could serve as an additional source of income that could allow families to remain in place.

The Solar Decathlon proposal serves as an extension of that program – an 840 ft2 design that can be placed in a substantial number of backyards in Austin. The key is the modularity of the design – two 420 ft2 volumes; one housing living, dining, and kitchen; the other housing two bedrooms and a bath. These volumes can be placed in a number of different configurations (parallel, perpendicular, in-line, etc.), reduced in scale (one bedroom), or sold individually depending on the site and the needs of the client.

In order to make this effort feasible and affordable, ease of construction became a point of emphasis.

Each volume will be pre-fabricated in a factory and transported to the site. Once the footings have been placed, the volumes will be hoisted into place and the

roof attached. This order of operations works equally well with both the competition and in practice, limiting the level of inconvenience for the both the team and the homeowner. Additional savings will come in the form of natural materials, ones that are locallysourced and low in embodied energy. This money will be reinvested back into the project’s architecture, particularly the craft, detail, and fenestration.

The deft handling of fenestration is a critical component of the primary architectural focus of the project, the relationship between interior and exterior living. The two volumes are separated by an unconditioned central space, one shaded with vegetation, serving as both entry and a seasonal extension of the living room. Two other outdoor spaces are present – a more private space adjacent to the main bedroom and a more public space just off the kitchen that supplements its program. These outdoor spaces are emblematic of the Austin experience, a sociable one that takes full advantage of temperate weather in the fall, winter, and spring.

The final concept, another trait commonly associated with the city and appropriate to the competition, is the use of smart use of technology. The proposed, locally developed systems would respond to user movement and contextual clues to project relevant information throughout the house. In such a scenario, cabinets in the kitchen could display their contents, weather data could be projected near the door, video could be displayed on the living room wall, etc. The system would adaptive, learning the traits of its users, primarily in how best to regulate the thermal metrics of the house. Despite its omnipresent nature, the system would be non-invasive, hidden in the background if the homeowner chose to untether from the outside world.

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SITE CONSTRAINTS

MASSING + ENVIRONMENTAL STRATEGIES

typical east austin lot size + envelope set backs

maximum build-out envelope

split volumes to increase air flow

solar decathlon envelope

shifted volumes to frame outdoor space + gardens

secondary apartment overlay service walls as buffer

tapered roof pitches secondary apartment maximum square footage

roof overhangs for shading

rainwater collection + storage

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TIMBER IN THE CITY education course location date

University of Texas at Austin Advanced Studio Red Hook, New York 2013

The competition prompt asked for a new mid-rise, mixed-use complex with affordable housing units, a job training/educational facility, a center for innovative manufacturing of wood technology, and a distribution center. The project site is in Red Hook, Brooklyn- a neighborhood in some flux, cut off from much of Brooklyn geographically, yet increasingly vibrant.

Aspiring to regenerate a dissipating urban manufacturing sector and address the housing needs of New York City, the project proposes a place for the creation of vocational opportunities embracing new wood technology.

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PHOTOBIOREACTOR education course location date

University of Texas at Austin Intelligent Building Skins Dusseldorf, Germany 2012

Hydrogen, manufactured locally using water, wind and sun, is a secure, inexhaustible, emission-free fuel for consumer electronics, heat and electricity production, the next generation of highway vehicles, and future building skins. Green algae produces hydrogen naturally by dividing water into hydrogen and oxygen. Comparing the CO2 – O2 ratio, the process is not only CO2 neutral but, in fact, it is a net negative CO2 relation. That means a surface applied with these microorganisms will produce hydrogen by dividing water and producing oxygen as a natural organism like trees. The only byproduct of this energy generation is water vapor, making this fuel source virtually perfect.

In this project, a photobioreactor cladding system was designed in a retrofit application, acting as a sun shading device reducing the overall heat gain of the building, while also producing fuel (hydrogen gas) in order to produce clean electricity and hot water for the building. An algae solution is pumped through the facade and to a separate central plant space where the hydrogen gas is removed and used for energy generation.

In this way, the project can be used as a model of future building energy generation systems. The system can be deployed on any existing or new buildings and responds to the growing need of distributed, sustainable energy solutions for our future cities.

Solar radiation is absorbed into photobioreactor cladding, growing algae colony, while also blocking direct solar gain from hitting the facades of the building H H

H

ALGAE H

Algae create hydrogen gas as a biproduct of photosynthesis. The hydrogen gas is removed in the central plant for the building. Hydrogen gas fuels a series of Molten Carbonate Fuel Cells,

Excess heat converts water to steam, while fuel cells power steam turbines, creating electricity for the building. Excess hot water is used in hydronic conditioning system and for hot water use in the building.

= This clean off-the-grid energy production system is a future alternative to carbon-intensive non-renewable central power plants.

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PANTHER HOLLOW education course location date

University of Texas at Austin Vertical Studio Austin, Texas 2010

This project serves as a place of escape and repose, hidden within the hollow. Dug into the hillside, the cantilevered structure acts as a marker in the landscape. The pool at the end allows for a moment of reflection for the passerby.

This piece was exhibited in a show titled Land Lab at the University of Texas Coop Material Resource Center in the fall of 2010.

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KUNSTHALLE practice location date

Allied Works Architecture Columbus, Ohio 2012

Allied Works was invited by the City of Columbus to participate in a design competition for a new contemporary art museum. The project will be located on the Scioto Peninsula, a prominent 90-acre site immediately across from the downtown core.

The museum is intended to catalyze new economic activity and redevelopment of the peninsula and to provide new cultural offerings for residents and visitors.

Allied Works’ concept began with a new masterplan for the peninsula redevelopment, which capitalizes on key connections to the surrounding city and existing landscape, historic and cultural assets. Within this framework, the Kunsthalle and adjacent Artists’ Square define the heart of the new district as a shared space for public gathering, civic events and arts programming. The Kunsthalle provides a range of sites and spatial experiences for occupation and transformation by artists, performers and curators.

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DESIGN NEIGHBORHOOD practice location date

Allied Works Architecture Denver, Colorado 2012

This project deals with the rehab and reuse of the former Denver Post printing plant, converting it to a new neighborhood and center of design.

The site will include retail and restaurant space to create a multi-dimensional facility for design professionals. The addition of offices for architects and interior designers would allow a synthesis between professionals with overlapping services and customers.

The project’s second phase will add a residential component on 10 acres of the site. Between 250 and 500 units will go up in total.

The third phase will be a new, 90,000-square-foot building with flexible work areas, leased to tenants who would share common areas, office equipment and links to technology.

The Denver Regional Transportation District’s light rail line northward will also add a stop at 41st and Fox streets, just two blocks from the project.

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STELLATUS education course location date

University of Texas at Austin Prototype Austin, Texas 2012

collaborator

Jeff McCord

Stellatus Lighting System represents a unique step in lighting technology, bringing high-architecture to the discerning design consumer. Applicable at a variety of scales from task lighting, to paneled assemblies, to architectural aggregations, Stellatus is a simple, modular, and dynamic means of achieving dramatic and customizable lighting effects at minimal cost.

Available in a variety of materials and appropriate for interior and exterior applications, Stellatus can be adapted to the standard dropped ceiling grid, typical wall assemblies, or any build-out system.

This piece was exhibited in the West Austin Studio Tour at the University of Texas Coop Material Resource Center in the spring of 2012.

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BEACH DEBRIS education course location date

University of Florida Environmental Technology Navarre Beach, Florida 2008

This attempts to highlights the conflict between man and nature. The luminaire consists of found materials from Navarre Beach, Florida - my home and ground zero for Hurricane Ivan in 2004, the sixth most costly hurricane in U.S. history.

Ivan reached Category 5 strength and became the 10th most intense Atlantic hurricane ever recorded.

At its peak in the Gulf of Mexico, Ivan was the size of the state of Texas. It also spawned 119 tornadoes across the eastern United States. Traces still remain years after the storm.

Porous driftwood serves as the focal point of the piece; it is punctured and suspended within with a series of rusted roofing nails. The light is meant to illuminate the tension of this natural artifact captured within an industrial man-made material.

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STICKS & STONE practice exhibit location date

Allied Works Architecture Venice Architecture Biennale the Casa Scaffali at the Arsenale; Venice, Italy 2012

This piece was designed for the Venice Architecture Biennale 2012 – Common Ground – as part of the exhibit titled Wunderkammer.

exhibit description In keeping with the theme of shared or common ground, this installation explores the interwoven phenomena of inspiration, collection, and meaning in everyday objects. Architects and artists often draw inspiration from the most unlikely or mundane items.

These things often provide a clue as to how they think and what moves their work.

In recognition of this, thirty-five architects and artists from around the world were chosen by the curators (Tod Williams and Billie Tsien) and asked to select objects that have relevance either to themselves or to their work, and place them in a simple wooden box or “chest.” The chests originated in New York and were shipped to each respective recipient around the world, collecting this “information” before arriving in Venice.

The resulting collections of objects – chosen by practices and individuals from North America, South America, Europe, Australia and Asia – are disparate, unexpected, and evocative. In Venice, the chests and objects became a collection, a tapestry per se of the commonalities and differences that are shared by architects and artists.

piece description Allied Works’ home is in Oregon, the Pacific Northwest. It is a place formed by violent forces that have over time yielded a landscape of tremendous power, vitality and beauty. The raw materials that are abundant here – timber, stone, obsidian – are records of change. Like the landscapes they define, each material is a site, a locus of potential.

The inspiration for this project is rooted in the land, the innate qualities of material, and equally, in the possibilities of making, craft, memory and infinite space.

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