PORTFOLIO JAMES McDONNELL
1
CONTENTS
2
The New Charlesgate & Moxy Hotel: Esplanade - Emerald Necklace Connector
P4
Wentworth Exhibition Center: Education & Enterprise Meet Above The Turnpike
P10
Davis Square Market: An Exploration Into Suspended Construction Sites
P18
Theatrical Ambiguity: Abstract Shapes To Create Interaction In Public Space
P24
Parametric Storefront: Exploration Into Breaking The Traditional Row House Facade
P26
Gradient Light: Fabrication And Prototyping of Pendant Lighting
P28
Gnar: Seating Made From the Tides
P30
3
The Charlesgate is located at a crossroads. Centered at the collision of two unique block grids, it acts as a border between the Back Bay and Fenway neighborhoods and acts as a critical connection between the Charles River Esplanade and the Fens, linking the riverfront to the rest of Frederick Law Olmsted’s “Emerald Necklace.” In its current state, this connection is lost while experiencing the Charlesgate due to heavy infrastructure of the Bowker Overpass that dominates the site. The goal of this project is to redesign this portion of Boston Date: Spring 2016 in order to re-establish Olmsted’s intended relationship between the Location: Boston, MA Esplanade and the Emerald Necklace. Professor: Charles Cimino By emphasizing green space and utilizing the Muddy River, this design creates a welcoming river walk that allows for the user to experience the reunion of the Emerald Necklace with captivating views and open space. By using sharp corners and a linear outline, this modern Top Left: Focus on reconnecting proposal differentiates from the original winding traditional landscaping to create a 21st century connection featuring a land bridge, river walk, and Olmsted’s Emerald Necklace to the Charles River Esplanade and a submerged Storrow Drive to freeing the site of any majors barriers and allow for user circulation directly from the river to the Fens. the surrounding green space of This interplay between the new and old is continued in the design Commonwealth Avenue. Top Right: Highlighting the current of the Moxy Hotel developed for the site. This hotel features amenities such as a rooftop pool, 2-story restaurant with a rooftop bar, a gym, and path of the Muddy River to the lounge. This boutique hotel was designed with the millennial in mind Charles River. Below: Street -level perspective of and emphasizes the connection between the Charles River and the Fens the Moxy Hotel & the Charlesgate through views that can be enjoyed throughout the structure.
The New Charlesgate & Moxy Hotel
4
Right: Site plan of proposal to reconnecting the Charles River Esplanade and Emerald Necklace by using a contemporary plan of crossing pathways to allow for a sense of meandering through the landscape as Olmsted intended.
5
Top: Perspective of activity on the pier as users, such as sunbathers, fitness enthusiasts, and people watchers, enjoy the space and views the project offers. Bottom: Aerial rendering of the New Charlesgate, from the Cambridge side of the river.
6
At the northern most point of the site, a pier has been designed to thrust the landscape and activeness of the area into the Charles River. This “Gem� on the end of the Emerald Necklace offers a refuge of rest and relaxation for Bostonians and visitors from the bustling urban environment of the city. This area allows for the users to be surrounded by water, greenery, and open space while observing the skyline of Boston, the history of Cambridge across the River, and the uninterrupted view back to the rest of the Emerald Necklace.
Top left: Rendering of the hotel’s lounge area thats shares natural palette of materials to match that of Olmsted’s Emerald Necklace that is visible outside the space by using wood and stone as the primary finishes.
Left: The hotel’s rooftop pool area features an infinity pool that draws the users eyes to the view of the Boston’s Fenway neighborhood and historic Fenway Park.
Moxy is a chain of boutique hotel thats brand is focused on targeting young professionals visiting Boston. This particular hotel combines the aesthetic of the industrial history and the modern innovation that Boston has to offer. The design gives the user varied opportunities to observe city life, whether its from the Western rooms that have been rotated 45-degrees to give views up and down the Charlesgate or from the ground floor where glass walls allow for views of the Charlesgate river walk.
Below: Diagrams of how the form of the building allows for better views to the River and Fenway area from hotels rooms and pool area.
7
Rooms Circulation Lobby Lounge Fitness Center Restaurant Parking Storage/ Bathroom
8
Below: Programmatic sections of the Moxy hotel and surrounding context. The hotel’s large atrium allows for natural light to illuminate the buildings circulation corridors and pushes the guest rooms to the exterior to experience the site’s views.
Rooms Circulation Lobby Lounge Fitness Center Restaurant Parking Storage/ Bathroom
9 Rooms Circulation
This project is following large economic boom within the city of
The city has become expensive and land prices are skyrocketing. The Wentworth Boston. Unfortunately for developers, there is very little land left within the immediate city to build upon. This reopens a trend that had previously Exhibition started in Boston, but needed a stronger economy to continue. This trend is the development of Air Rights over the Massachusetts Turnpike. Center Construction of structures such as the Prudential Tower and mall have Date: Spring 2015 Location: Boston, MA Professor: Thomas Lesko
10
served as strong cases where this type of project has seen success for both the community and developers. This conceptual project was built with the intention of being a beacon of the technological advancement and development happening at Wentworth Institute of Technology (WIT). The client, WIT, wanted the site to become a place for the college to exhibit its student and graduate work, while also offering the school to continue its research and commitment to the advancement of technology.
Bottom Left: Rendering of the projects exterior public space. Top Right: View of the proposed exhibition center from its western side of the Masspike. Bottom Right: Rendering of the project from the top floor of the Prudential Tower.
11
Top: Site plan of the buildings position over the Massachusetts Turnpike. Bottom: Section of this air rights project’s relation to the infrastructure below and its internal program.
The building itself includes a large exhibition hall, a lecture hall, labs, a library, offices, cafĂŠ, and rentable space for startup companies to give students a chance to enter the competitive job market smoothly. This project has the potential to bond a strong relationship with the community and create connection between the institute and professional world in order to benefit the students. This project becomes a valuable resource for student education, technological advancement, professional development and will develop into a city landmark as the gateway into the city from the Masspike.
12
Top: Rendering of the building at night at it’s northern-most corner. Bottom: Rendering of the building from the corner of Boylston Street and Massachusetts Avenue.
13
Left: A rendered photo of a process model that was created based on the concept of wind cutting through the site. Right: This rendering shows how the early concepts found in the left image were maintained through the final product.
14
Using wind as the inspiration for the form and function of this project, the Wentworth Research & Exhibition Center’s shape is meant to replicate the erosion of stone when exposed to the elements. The project went through a rigorous design stage to best illustrate the force of nature and how this can be embraced to create practical spaces. A design was created that used organic forms that are related to those found in eroded canyon valleys and underground caverns where the space has been carved out by water and air.
Right: These two sketch models were early process showing how to express how the concept of wind moving through the site can create a built form. Bottom: These sketches are extensions of the studies found int the models displayed above.
15
Top Left: Photograph of a model of the projects atrium and perforated facade Top Right: Study model of the mechanics of the exterior facade. Left: Detail section diagram of how the buildings double facade operates.
16
Left: Diagram of the sites wind patterns and how the site analysis affected the development of the project Top Right: Rendering of the buildings atrium from the secondfloor mezzanine.
This development is a display of progressive learning and technological evolution through program and building design. A responsive facade was added on the Southeast and Northwest side of the building in order to capture the sites seasonal winds. This facade clads the eastern and western sides of the building, responding to the wind levels on the site and comfort level within the structure itself in order to preserve the users’ thermal comfort. When there is a breeze across the site and the air inside the building becomes stale, the facades portals open to allow for the building to be ventilated passively. This passive cooling and the use of responsive facades exemplifies the institutes devotion to using new technology to cut down on energy consumption and their carbon footprint.
17
The Davis Square Market Date: Fall 2016 (Graduate) Location: Somerville, MA Professor: Mark Pasnik
Right: The Filene’s Basement project in Boston, MA was the main precedent for this project’s scenario. This void remained empty in the center of one of Boston’s most popular commercial districts for more than 6 years due to financial struggles.
18
This project is focuses on a fictional scenario based on realworld occurrences in our urban environments. Today, our cities are seeing massive growth and demand for housing and commercial space. This has supercharged the interest of developers for room within the city and the cities’ surroundings sprawls, leading to a dramatic increase in the amount of building in these areas to meet the demand. However, this trend is highly economically driven, leaving these developments vulnerable if there was a large economic downswing or financial troubles within the development company itself. This proposed project is based on a scenario were the construction of an apartment complex in Somerville, MA has been suspended during the early stages of construction due to financial struggles. The buildings footprint foundation and main mechanical core has been constructed prior to this suspension, but most of everything else is left unfinished. Due to the lack of funding and economic stability, the project has been left in this state for several months and has become an eye sore for the locals and a safety hazard for the community as the site fences begin to become compromised due to weathering by the elements. Since the development and construction companies are enduring economic hardships, it is extremely hard for the city to get them to do anything about the issues with the site. This proposal is a concept solution to not only create a safe environment, but also improve the community by creating a lively local market. It will allow for local artisans to sell their goods in a space with very low charge to the makers themselves during a time where space will be few and far in between. This local market will be physically supported by the current construction’s infrastructure and scaffolding. The new construction will be low cost and space will be curated using mostly the elements that are already present on the site. This intervention has the potential to give a much-needed boost to the area with a little investment from the city, along with creating a useful space out of current void in the urban context. The hope is that this design thinking applied to many different sites during both economic crisis and prosperity. Scenarios of suspended construction and developments like this are not uncommon, but doing anything about the voids left have been rare. This project harps on the potential to temporarily better these spaces while a more permanent and stable project is being planned.
Top: The market would be seen from Davis Square via the adjacent Davis Square Plaza and surrounding streets. The colored column wall offers a sense of curiosity from the outside and sense of enclosure from the interior of the marketplace. Center: The market draws attention from the near by Davis Square train station. Bottom: A view within the market.
19
Above: Site Plan.
20
The site was split in half in order to create an intimate marketplace that is bustling at all times of operation. The project was designed using the concept of the seen and unseen, displaying the sites past through a series of reveals through material and sectional qualities. The project consists of zones designated for play, eating, drinking, shopping, and observation. With a performance space and tower at the center of the project, the concept of seeing others and being seen is applicable to the users, the site, and its surrounding context.
Top: Look Out Tower by Nartarchitects and Scaffold Staircase by MVRDV served as precedents for the method of construction for the market. Center: Night Rendering in the space. Bottom: A Night rendering of the “clouded� tower from the performance Stage.
21
Top: Section A. Bottom: Section B.
22
Below: Series of diagrams identifying the seeing and unseeing present in this project.
23
Theatrical Ambiguity Date: Spring 2017 (Graduate) Location: N/A Professor: Antonio Furgiuele
24
This project focuses on the theatricality of human interaction in public space. It consists of an amplifier, proscenium, and platform that intensify specific elements of a formal theatre performance: sound, view, stage, and motion. With their familiar abstract forms and lack of physical recognition, placing these “black and red� objects into the public realm activates the process of curiosity, interpretation, and reaction through materiality and form. These ambiguous objects allow handling and understanding as whatever the user wishes. In addition, the flexibility of the connections made between the pieces allow for a seemingly endless number of combinations limited only by the imagination of the members of the public. The interactions created by this installation attract attention through a show that is created by the people playing and interpreting their own unique narrative. This show is not only entertaining, but also evokes more users to join the performance. The hope is that this concept of undetermined architecture can be applied to vast and unused plazas that are in most U.S. cities today in order to positively increase the amount of engagement in the public realm and create a sense of place within these larges open areas.
25
Parametric Storefront Date: Spring 2016 Location: N/A Professor: Austin Samson
Below: Storefront Elevation.
26
This project was an exploration into the possibilities of parametric modeling in architecture. Given a site of row houses in an urban setting, I was tasked with creating a storefront that would break from the normality of the typical city vernacular. The design for this storefront was based on creating an organic aesthetic that could be considered otherworldly in form, while still keeping it familiar in materiality. Using the programs Autodesk Maya and Rhinoceros 5, the facade of this small row house storefront was molded to achieve the desired aesthetic. With modern aluminum panel placed over rusted steel, the facade references the metal and decay of our cities while the gold lace is representative natural vines taking over as a sense of hope. The apertures of the facade are capped and accentuated by bubbled glass and metal outcroppings. These forms were derived from the craters left by asteroid collisions on planetary surfaces.
This Page: Renderings of the Facade
27
Gradient Light Date: Fall 2015 Location: N/A Professor: Jared Ramsdell
28
Explorations in fabrication and prototyping led to the creation of this lamp. Designed as a single component of a group high-ceiling pendant lights, these lights where designed to give light to a large auditorium or gallery. Each of these lights give interest to a large space by embracing light gradients through variations of lighting intensities protruding from the objects bottle neck and transitioning as the viewers eye moves away from the bulb. The lamp was designed to cast steady light downward on those enjoying the venue below. This is a prime example of prototyping and how as architects and designers, there always seems to be room for improvement no matter how “done� we think our projects will be. Despite multiple iterations and strenuous planning, this project still has room for improvement, but those improvements could only be identified through this projects last iteration. This, yet again, proves that repetition is key for success in design.
29
Gnar Date: Fall 2015 Location: N/A Professor: Jared Ramsdell
Tides are one of nature’s most beautiful and powerful creations. Embraced by some and feared by others, tides have the strength to generate power, destroy cities, and spread nutrients throughout the earth. Not only do they have the ability to push and pull matter around the world, but tides also possess the capability to create space in solid and fluid forms; carving out large pieces of earth and water to creating voids in great masses. This project pays tribute to the power of the earth’s tides. Inspired by the form of a crashing wave, “Gnar” is a bench focused on creating voids, gradual transitions, and structural weight transfers, much like our ecosystem. Unique in its shape, this bench can be rotated, changing and creating different sitting arrangements and varying levels of privacy. Special credit to design partner Matt Roy BSArch ‘16
Below: Photo within the Boston Society of Architects exhibition Space.
30
Right: Section rendering. Center: Section rendering. Bottom: Axon of benches construction.
31
32