Kathleen O’Connor koco1234@vt.edu
2 4
34
TABLE OF CONTENTS
20
WATERSHED OBSERVATORY
14
TRAIN STATION
28
MUSEUM OF WILDFIRE
FOLLY + CAPSULE
WATER TEMPLE
24
SCHOOL FOR THE HIGH WIRE
3
WATER PLAZA
4
WATER ROOM Studio Project, Fall 2010 Third Year
5
The Project: The Watershed Observatory accommodates at most 3 researchers at a time and includes public spaces, exhibition spaces, and rooms for the contemplation of water. 15,000 square feet.
6 SITE PLAN & ORDERING SYSTEM
ashioning the ground
The ground houses the river... Let go the desi Be human. Be The site floods with water twice a year, saturating the earth and challenging construction. Enjoy it. It is a membrane;
The upstream d a surface inviting water to pass through but prohibiting access to anything larger or more solid. still natural, it is
I stretched fabric over site models, examined the points of tension, and trained myself to see the earth as interventio a This woven facade to a private residence for water rather body, it will form than a solid mass of dirt. I approached the site the way I imagined the researchers would approach theirmake studies the land – looking aggressively for an entrance into the mysteries garment for the below grade.
Man’s impact h
The river on th time, the water is consistent in on the other ha opportunities. H since the dawn stone for conte
In this way, the 7
The nature of t
LIBRARY
5
N
10
25
50
WORKSPACE/ MAP ROOM
LOBBY
LIBRARY LOFT WORKSPACE
STORAGE ON GROUND FLOOR (ROOF ACCESS FROM LOFT)
Approach: Two buildings. Building 1: Visitor’s Center and Lab Huge concrete beams formally manifest the “threads” of the earth’s membrane. They give the “surface” concept a thickness and create spaces for the building to occupy. The roofs and walls weave into a concrete loom. Forms are triangular, flows; cyclical… a canvas for needlework.
8
9
WORKSPACE/ MAP ROOM
LOBBY
LIBRARY
LIBRARY LOFT
The ground is breached. 50
WORKSPACE
STORAGE ON GROUND FLOOR (ROOF ACCESS FROM LOFT)
The massive structural beams also serve as staircases and corridors within the building. The beam is an entrance to the building.
25
RESEARCH FACILITY
5 Visitor’s center site plan (above) and section (below). 5
N
10
WEST ELEVATION
10
N
25
Plaza plan (above), plaza model (below).
50
Plaza perspective (above) and water stained concrete. WATER PLAZA
0
N
Building 2: Plaza and Galleries The plaza sits below the visitor’s center in an area of the site that floods in the summer. For half the year, the rooms are pools; a space for recreation. The other half, they are galleries. The concrete walls retain the memory of every new flood.
11
WATER PLAZA
N
5
10
25
50
Building form from the form of inhabitants... Spaces informed by the scale of the body create a richer architecture because they acknowledge the purpose of a designed place. The plaza’s dimensions explore the scale of the human body, but add a twist: these dimensions are based on the body when submerged.
13
14
WATER TEMPLE Studio Project, Fall 2010 Third Year
15
The Project: The water temple is a room for the contemplation of water. Maximum of 20’ wide. Site situated on the edge of a river.
16
Painting: watercolor and salt.
Concept sketch and model render: the water “container.�
17
The underground room, constructed of perforated metal, makes water seeping through the ground and carving the dirt a part of the material palette. Over time, the earth and water squeezing through the grate will shape the room; dirt will soften the corners and eventually the ground will overtake the architecture all together. People move along ramps that are shallow enough to be steps, but their arrangement is an implied confinement. The edges of the ramps and platforms drop away into the pit below.
The architecture compares man to water; water goes rushing into every crevice of its container, man chooses how to inhabit. Contain – er suggestion At the end of the ramp is a 20’ x 20’ room. Once a year, when the water level of the river is at its peak, the river will spill over the wall and cling to its angle, cascading down through the grated floors, and into the pit below, being absorbed and returning to the earth.
Structure of the “well,” which sinks into the ground below the water room.
18
Interior view of the water room.
19
TRAIN STATION 3-Day AIA Competition, Spring 2011 Third Year
21
Section Looking East Summer Sun
Winter Sun
The sun enters through clerestory windows and skylights, illuminating a flat, white wall on the north side of the station. Ambient light bounces onto solid marble surfaces. In the winter, the sun passes through the train, creating a shadow on the wall. People in the lobby can watch the shadows of travelers coming and going on the train. ... generations pass, as they have passed, a troop of shadows moving with the sun...
25 22
50
North Elevation (entrance)
... be comforted; the world is very old, and generations pass, as they have passed, a troop of shadows moving with the sun; thousands of times has the old tale been told; the world belongs to those who come the last, they will find hope and strength as we have done. -Excerpt from Shadows by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
South Elevation
Perspective section looking into indoor (winter) platform and first floor lobby. 23
Life should be lived on the edge of life. You have to exercise rebellion: to refuse to tape yourself to rules, to refuse your own success, to refuse to repeat yourself, to see every day, every year, every idea as a true challenge - and then you are going to live your life on a tightrope. -Philippe Petit, Man On Wire
SCHOOL FOR THE HIGH WIRE Second Year Competition, Spring 2010 Honorable Mention Second Year
The Project: The school for high wire walking includes an underground library, changing rooms, bathrooms, and practice wires at varying heights.
The walker climbs the red, weathering steel tower. Up, up, over the spiny practice structures and the placid reflecting pool. Below, in the underground library, students of the wire study what the walker is about to undertake. Spectators from the nearby college campus wade through the long stalks of grass; this unkempt and wild place does not usually draw a crowd. Their legs are invisible in the earthy pool of green. The walker’s legs are a drum roll; rhythmically moving from rung to rung. One hand reaches the platform, then another. The walker climbs up and stands surrounded by the emptiness of the sky. The first step is to the platform’s edge. The next one is into the air. 26
27
THE FOLLY Studio Project, Fall 2009 Second Year
Fol•ly (n): Architecture without program. The folly is situated in a clearing with a spiralling platform on one side and a curved wall on the other. Sound projects upward from the platform, amplified by the structure, and reverberates through the clearing, using the wall and surrounding trees to contain the noise.
31
Blueprint for Folly Project
Folly Waste
Cuts Audio Time Capsule: Form from the waste of a past project containing a perspective of the present preserved for the future. 32
Reassembly
capsule
MUSEUM OF WILDFIRE Third Year Competition, Fall 2010 Project with Aubrey Lynch, Third Year
35
The Project: The Museum of Wildfire is located in the Western United States on a gentle slope that is the threshold between a forested mountain and developing suburb. The Museum serves as both the site of focused policy discussion and as a public space where exhibits and archived media explore the phenomena of wildland fire and the complexities of wildfire. The museum includes exhibition space(s), a lookout tower, a library, offices and meeting rooms. 3120 sq. ft. total
Sketch of the museum (left) and the architecture of a chimney (right). 36
37
inhabitable space uninhabitable space structure threshold lighting
38
During a fire, the architecture of the forest inverts. The creation of smoke is a transition of mass. Matter burns away into void and void becomes dense with darkness. The museum attempts the same inversion. Visitors inhabit the conventionally solid or structural parts of the building. The retaining wall is an entrance and slabs are hollowed into galleries. Spaces that would typically be occupied are dedicated instead to structural elements. Slumped glass and clear columns construct the void between floors.
39
The design uses the process of fire to question architectural components: How can a threshold be variable? How can emptiness be structure?
How can a solid be inhabited?
40
BR
BR
OFFICE
OFFICE LIBRARY / MEETING SPACE
ELEVATOR
Basement Plan
Top: Roof Plan Bottom: Gallery Floor Plan
N
41