J. Johnston Architectural Portfolio by J.Johnston

CONTENTS COMPUTING DRAWING

1 1-16

POINTS OF INFLECTION

2 17-27

BLOSSOM

3 ELECTROLAND

28-33 34-35

DIFFRACTING MEDIA

5 36-47

CANDE-LUM

6 48-49

SOLAR COMPUTATION

7 50-51

AIUCK

8 CONTENTS

52-57

The gamut of work contained in this portfolio is a culmination of unique projects produced during my time as an undergraduate architecture student at the Rhode Island school of design. It is meant to represent many of my interests which lie at the intersection of fine arts, sustainable architecture, digital media, and industrial design. I believe it illustrates my abilities and love for design, from the technical and digital, to the intuitive and analog, material and immaterial. It is my hope that these projects indicate the forces and developmental stages in my career that have been motivators in my goal towards becoming an exceptional architect and holistic transdisciplinary designer. I thank everyone who helped me achieve these endeavors along the way and anyone willing to absorb the material presented in this document. -J. Johnston

Computing Drawing Through the process of drawing, we come to understand the fundamental relationship between physical perception, analysis and tactile documentation. Drawing performs as an exchange of information and ideas, between the exteroceptive and the two-dimensional surface, but what of the ineffable? Still an extension of our selves and impressions, drawing in the computational realm can facilitate designers as a transformative medium for thinking and making. Computational means of representation can induce modalities of thought outside the mundane and purely aesthetic criticism, and can be conceived as suppositions to experiment with new ideas of geometry, space, tectonics and movement. The first phase of this project consists of drawings that are meant to test live-user input and symbiotic algorithms to explore traditional notions of drawing, texture and form. The second phase is an extension of the first as an exploration into the implications of building a 3-dimensional surface and its suggested interiority or â&#x20AC;&#x153;discreetâ&#x20AC;? internal spaces. The approach was to investigate notions of one-sidedness, flatness, constructing projections or scaffolding from a drawing or in similarity the collapsibility of a geometric figure to a plane. How do we perceive depth from a breadth of linear operations or edges of space making? Computing Drawing

Computing Drawing

Computation [i][k]

[i+1][k]

[i+2][k]

[i][k+1]

[i+1][k+1] [i+2][k+1]

[i][k+2]

[i+1][k+2] [i+2][k+2] curve1

Code diagram

jaylines

i = 0 j = 0 while i<len(jaylines)-1: k = 0 while k<len(points)-1: p1 = all_lines[i][k] p2 = all_lines[i+1][k] curve1 = rs.AddLine(p1, p2) k=k+1 i=i+1 Computing Drawing

al****Transference This continuation seeks to explore the computational verisimilitude across a series of drawings. The process is to utilize the initial series as a scaffold, enabling the others to be constructed via the code into an array of visually related geometries; both set of drawings mathematically derived from similar point fields but with excitingly distinct textural-linear qualities. The hope is that by experimenting with the transference of these qualities, novel conceptions of a tectonic type or visual aesthetic will be made apparent.

Computing Drawing

Racquetball Court Multi-purpose gym Entrance Lobby Administration office Bathroom Computing Drawing

Computing Drawing

This project began as an investigation into the scientific principles of passive solar design and building envelope technology with the intention of applying this knowledge to redesign the Nantucket Island School of Design and the Arts (NISDA). The process of design was based on suppositions concerning two primary intrinsic forces of nature, wind and light; the first, was a prompt to design planametrically based on prevailing summer and winter breezes which was primarily manifested through well-reasoned geometries of the building perimeters, landscaped elements and changes in topography. The second, to design sectionally based on the seasonal path of the sun to maximize necessary winter solar gains and minimize uncomfortable summer solar gains which was primarily achieved through the utilization of efficient building materials, roofing configurations as postulated by Ralph Knowles, and the appropriate window placements and sizes. By designing with these guidelines, an amassment of complex geometries become apparent, their own distinctive, multifaceted characters based on an intrinsic typological system extracted purely from program and microclimatic conditions. Truly, the forms were unequivocally realized through themselves, their context within the natural environment and their symbiotic relationship to one another. Inflection Points

Inflection Points

3 2 1

1 3

Inflection Points

Artist Residence Assembly Space Entrance/Lounge Administration Gallery Classrooms Metal/Wood Shop Greenhouse

Inflection Points

Inflection InflectionPoints Points

213

Inflection Points

BLOSSOMBLOSSOM BLOSSOMBLOSSOM BLOSSOMBLOSSOM

This was a tremendous design-build project that incorporated the entire 2011 architecture design studio to engage in what is officially known as “Blossom” a community garden designed for the city of Pawtucket, RI. The 12-week studio course introduces students to the relationship between design concept and the tactility of actual construction methodologies. We began this project by breaking into factions, mine being the team that was to conceptualize the development of the garden beds and trellis system, components that would have to harmoniously integrate the decking, vertical structural supports, and create a place for storing gardening materials and seating for visitors. The garden beds went through multiple iterations and modifications to arrive at the correct dimensions and aesthetic of the architectural language, concerning “Blossom’s” construction in its entirety. Subsequently, we cultivated the trellis system which required that we adaptively reuse an existing parking structure as the foundation for the curvilinear forms that would act as the primary compressive members. We then had to devise a tensional system that would be built into the ends of the opposing garden beds to also withstand the weight of the melons and not slack from overuse or weather deterioration.

BLOSSOM

The Cyclone and Luminous Wall Electroland-Fabrication Internship

My responsibility as a fabrication intern required corresponding in a team with 3-6 other individuals working to construct a custom architectural installation for the Direct TV corporate building in Los Angeles, CA. This project was comprised of a two-part curvilinear wall made of a digitally fabricated aluminum egg-crate structure, covered with prefab aluminum sheets mounting a total of 47,000 LED lights, then covered with tempered Macrolon-plastic panels. The copious amount of LEDS acted as pixels for a larger projection screen that could display designed animations, videos and/or abstracted algorithms of color. Given that this involved a very tactile exposure to the project, it required that I have a familiarity with fabrication methodologies in metal, wood, and composite plastics accompanying basic construction/structural principles. The project involved understanding and working with multitudinous digitally fabricated parts as well as many on-site manually custom-made components.

ELECTROLAND

DIFFRACTING Sensing material. Sounding sense. Spatial sound, color, and light. T(w)o what has our experience of the phenome become in contemporary cities, when physical form dominates the attention of our architectural intellect? How do we define the resonance that perpetually encapsulates us? The breadth of our sensibilities experienced in a space occurs congruently with the energies of sound and light; these phenomenological mediums of design having intrinsic values in our impressions and memories. The ARTIFACT that has been resolved in this study is part of an ongoing thesis that seeks to express the simultaneity of these energies, with emphasis on how materiality and form can be reconciled to convey their converging effects.

SOUND-LIGHT

MEDI

IA SOUND-LIGHT

LED STRIPS

TRANSDUCERS

This inquiry has proceeded with the haptic as determined by the provisions of sound-light as metaphor and exploratory device. The ARTIFACTâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s minimal yet elegant form has been transformed by concaving its surfaces thereby giving it an analog relationship to its surroundings, reflecting all ambient sound-light to focal points normal to the would-be planes. Its digital relationship has been conceived using technical means such as programmed Light-emitting-diode strips and surface transducers, which utilize the properties of the material and form to project a new surrounding of ambient sound-light.

SOUND-LIGHT

231 south main street. Providence Rhode Island

PART 1

The site analysis and continuation of diffracting media attempts to calibrate the multivalent forces present on the site as generators of form and function, using Ecotect and Diva for Rhino. This investigation deals with the ineffable conditions of the site, allowing the users to experience subtle qualities such as vibration, sound, light, humidity, temperature, and movement within the urban interventions.

SOUND-LIGHT

if ( ev

SOUND-LIGHT

(force>=value){ vent } In attempting to extract radiation, lux, wind, and sound levels on the site as useful computational information, physical prototyping was integrated as a method to explore how this data can be expressed as tangible and dynamic sound-light events.

PART 2

SOUND-LIGHT

This continuation of “diffracting media” seeks to investigate the role of sound and light in the context of an urban space. The site for this installation is the south facing façade of the RISD architecture building and is intended to engage the public sphere by creating vertical clusters of interactive sound/light modules. The module being investigated utilizes the playful, vibrational qualities of tensegrity building technology while also providing a trellis scaffolding for the growth of vegetation.

SOUND-LIGHT

The floating compressive members of the modules have been milled to embed the LED strips and respond to external vibrations as well as the kinetic activity of students occurring within the architecture building. This novel wall system attempts to provide a visual expression and haptic interface between the pedestrians of providence and the “intangibles” existing within the creative environment of RISD.

Interactive Instruments:

PART 3

SOUND-LIGHT

This instrument was derived from the organic contour of a monocot leaf. Digital fabrication technologies and custom fabricated parts were utilized to create this form which uses a single line of light diffused through varying geometries and orientations of the acrylic material. This prototype would be dispersed through the site concurrently as a landscaping element and would indicate motion and Passive infrared presence in a space.

SOUND-LIGHT

This module was created with the idea that different degrees of force would occur on the site and could create very specific and momentary sound-light conditions from the person who activates it by their step. This panel was fabricated from acrylic and aluminum with an embedded FSR (Force Sensitive Resistor) and gives a highly exposed indirect-direct lighting effect close to the ground surface.

SOUND-LIGHT

CANDE-LUM

The intention of this project was to develop a luminaire concept that integrated the marriage of two distinct materials and to explore the idea and mechanics of user interactivity. The resulting concept was one that engaged contrasting geometries to experiment with the refracting qualities of light, and one that also utilized an easy two-piece assembly for kinetic operability, ultimately promoting dynamic lighting schemes and a playful usability. Precision machine tools such as metal lathes, bridgeport millers, and grinders were used in the iterative process.

CANDE-LUM

Angle Of Rotation = Brightness

CANDE-LUM

Solar Computation This project was a two person group assignment where the objective was to create and code with rhino-python scripting, an elliptical tower which supported vertical and/ or horizontal window shading devices that were a computational function of the direct solar radiation intensities of a specific place. In our case we chose Karachi, Pakistan and imported the EPW weather data from the department of energy website in list form to our code. With this datum we were able to write multiple algorithms that essentially translated the numerical values of the direct solar radiation(in BTU or British Thermal Units) into scaled vectors for multiple points on the surface of the tower (actual cardinal directions and intensities), and averaged the values with any given period of time within a year we specified. We experimented with different vertical components that run the entire height of the building and different lengths of the shading devices that would adequately block unwanted solar gains into this predominately glass edifice. The results, are nuanced proliferations or clusters of fins that fan out to occlude the solar rays, and also act as concealing surfaces for evening lights to indirectly diffuse from.

Solar Computation

A I uCK Archite c t ura l

I n s t al l at i o n

u si n g

Contou r s

a n d

K inet ics

This project was initiated with a curiosity in the kinetic metallic wall that divides the spaces between the architecture building’s gallery and its adjacent Lecture Hall. The wall’s simple rotational movement between its two locked states is the foundational parameter of the idea. Our goal was to use the accuracy and experimentation of the digital fabrication process to make a kinetic structure that utilizes the wall’s inherent movement to transform itself and its encapsulated discreet spaces. The first stage of development was the implementation of a joint mechanism that needed to accommodate for the wall’s dynamism. After several generations of this mechanism, it took on the ability to rotate, slide, lock and attach/detach at nodes desired and allowed for layers of members connected through it to move uniquely or in unison. These properties became instantiated in the form of AIuCK. The program of AIuCK, is a semi-closed off area for seating, and is mainly based on the need for resting points in the building and the desire to make the project interactive. The beauty of AIuCK, beyond the end result presented, is the numerous possibilities of what it can be. By simply changing the specificity of a single parameter, AIuCK can become something completely different, while still retaining its formal and performative qualities.

AIuCK