Academic Portfolio (Masters of Architecture 15-17) by Laurence William Ashley

Academic Portfolio

Masters of Architecture (15-17)

Contents

Reflective Introduction Situating Myself in the Broader Landscape of Theory & Practice Stage 5 PLAN Rotterdam Iterations & Intensities - The Embodiment of MVRDV The Removal of Place from the Event of the Stag Stage 5 TOOLS FOR THINKING ‘Wish You Were Here’ How City Image is Constructed, Projected & Consumed

Stage 6 THESIS Capital Intoxication Intoxication, Intensities & Trust in Capital

Stage 5 RE-MATERIALZE Rotterdam Hybrid Objects Floating Art Depositories - Re-imagining the Consumption of Art

Stage 5 & 6 LINKED RESEARCH Live Build Project Testing Ground 2017

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Stage 6 ARCHITECTURE & CONSTRUCTION Process & Management Intu Centre, Newcastle - Dealing with the Existing

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ARB Criteria

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Reflective Introduction

Situating Myself in the Broader Landscape of Theory & Practice I headed into my placement year with an interest in spaces that were marginal and often unused. The idea of retrofitting appealed to me, I was interested in reimaging all aspects of an unused building from its architectural intervention to its building program, as well as how that linked to surrounding context. I worked in a relatively large commercial practice, in a team focused on retrofitting. However, the experience often ended with me calculating net to gross sums for client and developer, and applying gestural façade treatments, rather that embarking on a thorough study of the existing and through that study a deep rooted re-imagination of it. However, I still kept that interest, within this commercial environment, there was perhaps a missing layer of experimental and theoretical unpacking that might have been taken further in the projects I worked on. I looked forward to developing a more theoretical and critical approach through my Master of Architecture studies, both in regards to the type of project taken forward, and in the supplementary strands of research and discussions involved.

Devonport Military Wall ‘In-between Space’, Plymouth, 2012

Thematic Threads

Throughout the past two years, I have strived to engage in critical discussions based within a theoretical understanding regarding challenging contemporary conditions and contexts. This developing level of engagement throughout the course, added to my two years of practice experience which saw me obtain a good body of practical experience has allowed me to enjoy the critical roles and responsibilities of architects today in developing critical architectural responses to challenging project briefs.

Intensification, Acceleration & Densification Critical Contemporary Architecture

Commodification of Experience

Architectures Role in the Consumer Society

Working in Existing Contexts

Through a Close Study of Existing Tectonics

Material, Detail & Architectonics

The Embodiment of Wider Values & Meanings through Detail

Over the course of the Master’s degree, I have experienced new methodologies applied to the process of design that has changed my own approach to architectural discourse. Throughout this body of text, I will unpack the key thematic threads within my work processes, and the linkages between them within the entirety of the Masters course. Added to that, the value and benefit gained through the differing projects and the skills acquired. Embedded throughout all projects will be any key architects, thinkers or external references that have influenced my body of work.

BA & Placement - Admiration & Interest It first maybe helpful to briefly introduce my experience and interests developed from my BA course and then into my two years in practice, how this influenced my architectural approach coming into the masters course. The image above is of me sat in front of Davenport Military Wall, my final BA year project saw me look at this marginal space, and asked us to critically address its marginality. I was tasked to both reimagine the wall as well as a derelict & listed market hall adjacent to it. It is within this project that I developed an interest in the idea of in-betweeness, space that was often forgotten, despite having rich associations, history and meanings. The project looked to reimagine and innovate, through a close study of the existing.

Interest Developing into Criticality Having retrospectively compiled and analysed the entire bulk of my work produced over the course of my Masters of Architecture studies, I believe that it is possible to establish my own personal development of thought process and thematic threads based within theories, ideologies and styles explored. Key themes have emerged out of each project, and having gone through this retrospective process, these overarching themes do have overlaps and cross thread the entire body of work, and has allowed me to critically think about what kind of architect and thinker I am and wish to be. The first semester of stage 5 saw me unpack the practice and design processes of MVRDV as an architectural studio. This critical and thorough analysis turned an existing admiration for the office towards a critical appreciation. Here I developed a response to the nature of both the cultural and commercial implications of city image and city tourism to the reality found in contemporary cities. My response was developed from thorough research on a contemporary condition where the ‘event’ outweighs the reality. Using the programmatic spectacle of a stag-do event space, through the project, I attempted to show how as an event, becomes exploited into a consumable and clickable package, and how that then becomes detached away from place through the commodification of event. My design propositioned a response that sat deliberately within a form of in-between space, between a major Rotterdam tourist beacon, whilst at the same time emphasising itself as a totally detached object. In line with the theme of the project and analysis of the practice, as a group, we produced a dense and intensified masterplan response; firstly, it highlighted MVRDV as a practice that engages critically with contemporary city, as well as embodying Rotterdam’s image as an experimental city.

Introduction The second Semester of stage 5 allowed me to further develop relationships between ideas of marginal space, in-betweeness, commodification and consumption within the context of art galleries and consumption of art. I chose the ‘Hybrid Objects’ brief, its aim was to create an architectural response to the complex in-between space that exists between viewers and art objects. This involved a thorough and critical process of unpacking both the object, which was a painting titled ‘Garden of Earthly Delight’ from Hieronymus Bosch. As well as the wider connections, meanings, and associations between painting and context. In retrospect, it was at this point that I believe the critical reading developed from my first semester design project and tools essay was brought into a design project in a detailed way. This project gave me an opportunity to build upon my own long-standing interest with existing in-between space. How as architects we can reimagine through a close and critical study. Following a thought process of unpacking multiple scaled ideas and contexts through the painting that centred on water and the event of flooding. In response, my project attempted to develop a multi scaled critical architectural provocation out of those unpacked ideas and meanings.

The project allowed me to develop upon ideas of commodification and intensification of experience within a critical framework. In retrospect, I have wrestled with representation and graphical communication throughout the two years due to the intensified and accelerated nature of my projects. Throughout all my projects, I have tried out different modes of communication to do this, developing into my thesis primer exhibition that used digital media to form an intensity of experience. The project has also allowed me to apply critical unpacking methods, in this instance of material and tectonic production of meaning, to form a project that asks what material, space and experience may mean in an increasingly digital market domain. In summary, I feel this thesis project, has allowed a platform for me to combine all the thematic threads, allowing me time to explore them in a more sophisticated and totalizing way.

A Final Thought Finally, I believe the Masters course has afforded a positive and critical stage from which I can continue to develop my own individual architectural practice. The course has stimulated general architectural admirations into critical reflection and discussion, and has given me the confidence to carry on developing my own architectural interest post university.

Material, Detail & Architectonics

It was within this project where I started to develop a real interest in architectural detail, how a detail could embody wider ideas and themes. Epitomized in my ‘Tell the Tale Detail’, which was a re-imagination of a gym stepper within a new context of a suspended stair. The detail used simple principles of gravity and weight, as the visitor climbs the staircase to reach the depository, with each step water is pushed vertically through a visible guttering system. The detail tests our relationship with water by creating a paradox between playfulness with the event of flood whilst exposing its looming threat, and with that, the detail attempts to sum up my project. Despite the monotony of some of the details I worked on over my two years in practice, it certainly laid the logical foundations for me to build upon and pursue a tectonic innovative approach to detailed design.

Intensification & Densification

I chose the ‘Intoxicated Space’ project brief for my thesis project; again, I was interested in unpicking in-between and marginal behaviours and spaces. I was interested in developing an understanding of how architecture induces and prolongs marginal behaviours and interactions. My thesis project developed into a critique of the near future of increasingly liberalised market-trading conditions, in which I propose an intoxicating trading-pit-come-betting shop as part of a refurbishment of Eldon Gardens shopping mall in central Newcastle.

Commodification of Experience

Developing a Process of Critical Unpacking

Connecting the Threads

Working in Existing Contexts

Around the similar time, I also undertook my ‘Tools for Thinking’ essay where I traced the development of the image and our consumption of it within the contemporary metropolis. How the city then sales itself through the construction, projection and consumption of the image. Again, I attempted to unpack the meanings, associations and realities between the real city condition and the projected city image. In retrospect, I recognise that this essay firstly accelerated my critical thinking, directly feeding ideas of placelessness, consumption and commodification into my 5th year first semester project. It also brought out thematic interests that would later thread across my entire body of work.

Reflection

In retrospect, the project was also influenced by ideas of intensification developed within my first semester project, despite a differing context and brief, the project provided a critical response to the experience economy, in this case critical of our experience of art and how we consume it. On reflection, I was happy with the project, it gave me a platform to develop critical unpacking processes that were tested throughout the project brief and this was only a good thing as I pushed on towards my thesis project.

Berlin Study Trip, ‘Intoxicated Space’, 2017

Abstract

External Perspective Group Intervention

‘Part of the city but not of the city’ A dubious reading of what a global city wants, termed the ‘Stag-do City’, the buildings connection to Rotterdam is reduced down to a financial beneficially, a detached all-consuming tourist attraction, which sits in the paradox between a tourist beacon and an isolated object. The build up to this response has seen a re-imagination our own preconceptions of master-planning and its processes, these processes have been challenged through the gaming platform, Minecraft, which has allowed us to contest and grab urban space, causing discussions and in MVRDV fashion and exaggerated, exciting and hyper dense output.

Stage 5 PLAN Rotterdam, Iterations & Intensities - The Embodiment of MVRDV The Removal of Place from the Event of the Stag Brief “We were asked to emulate and embody the processes, and the techniques and methods employed by the practice we chose, with the aim of understanding their design processes and the similarities and differences to design processes we are otherwise familiar with. Through a critical reading of our chosen office and their associated research, which have gained prominence and influence as an identifiably ‘Dutch’ mode of architectural practice, we hoped to gain an understanding of Rotterdam and their approach to site, examining their techniques as a means of working and producing architecture. Fundamental to both practices is a belief in architecture as instrumental to the city: as agents with the capacity to change how we live through its clever (re) interpretation and positioning”

Developing Thematic Through a close study on MRDV, I started to develop upon ideas of densification, intensification and acceleration, and how these ideas can be applied to form a critical and provocative architectural response. Importantly this project formed the beginning of a two-year development in regards exploring different graphical representation modes, to reflect and represent these ideas of intensities within architectural discourse. Within this project, I also started to read form ideas of the event, placelessness, product and commodification of experience, and its attraction within a neoliberal capitalist consumer society. I also started to tie in research from my ‘Tools for Thinking’ essay that focused on city image and its consumption within the contemporary global condition.

Group Research Output Prominent MVRDV Research Strands

MVRDV Critical Embodiment The studio critically examined the design processes associated with MVRDV and their research output â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;The Why Factoryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;. As a group of five, the intention was to emulate and embody the techniques and processes of MVRDV, within a master planning framework. The image on the left reflects the extents of our critical examination of MVRDV as a practice, this was done before we started the design process, emulating and embodying there processes as a practice. The body of research undertaken allowed us to form a critical engagement with the design process. Through a critical reading of our chosen office we hoped to gain an understanding of Rotterdam and their approach to site, examining their techniques as a means of working and producing architecture.

Thematic Intensification & Densification A key strand of research that interested me was how as a practice they engage with contemporary contexts and issues through ideas of intensification, densification and acceleration. More cities are expanding and aspiring to expand vertically, many are advocating densification/intensification, MVRDV has developed a densification strategy that is taken across many of their projects, something I take forward through this project and across the two years. 6

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1250 - Island Established

1630 - Reduction of Island

1850 - Island Developed

1940 - Removal of Island

photo

Site research + Site strategy diagrams, Rotterdam, Delfshaven

2009 - Island Densification

2015 - Re-establish Island - Design Response

Photo taken from Euromast Tower, Delfshaven, Rotterdam

Site - Delfshaven, Rotterdam

Re-establishing a New Island through Hyper-Intensification Following our extensive research we were tasked with creating a masterplan based in southeast Delfshaven, the historic industrial heart of Rotterdam in desperate need for gentrification. As the site diagrams reflects through the restablishment of an island, we took inspiration from the Netherlandic tradition of land reclamation, but also the densification strategies of MVRDV. In search of a way to abstract our approach to site decided to propose the insertion of a new island into the site. Pragmatically this would allow for more waterfront, engaging with the water and interaction with the surrounding buildings and land. A common theme we noted in MVRDV was the abstraction of the surroundings, a â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;whitening outâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; (in representational approach). We thought that this island would allow us to respond to the surroundings and yet to an extent ignore the existing. It would allow us to build on our ideas and create a hyper dense masterplan intervention.

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“THE WEEKEND CITY”

Theoretical underpinning for programmatic idea, ‘The Weekend City’

Development of the ‘Weekend City’

‘What the City Wants’ - A Dubious Reading into the Global City Interrogation of ideas around densification, acceleration and intensification within contemporary city contexts from MVRDV are embodied within my project program titled the ‘Weekend City’. My initial reading of Rotterdam, depicts a city with a lack of people on the ground, in typical exaggerative but critical MVRDV fashion, I started to think how a program could get people into the city, developing into the idea of a ‘Weekend City’ a densified and exaggerated response to the rise of weekend tourism. The above image illustrate the projects theoretical underpinnings as well as my interest in ideas around placelessness, non-place and genericness, all influencing my programmatic response to the brief. The montages on the left reflect our process of characterizing each group members program, my program through the film character ‘Alan’ from the Hangover Films. The idea to personify our ideas as a means to rapidly produce guidelines from which to base our masterplan game movements on, this I talk about later. In addition, it is a critique on the oversimplification of the practice of MVRDV to design for a persona, a stereotype in order to diagrammatically solve large-scale problems through architectural intervention.

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Personification

Reduction

Failure

Realities

Propaganda

Package

Takeover

Epidemic

Commodification - Experience through Pleasure Package

Intensification -Realities, Issues & Problems

Extract from ‘Tools for Thinking’ Essay, City Image & Commodification

Commodification of Experience

The Event of Stag (Package, Click & Consume) The images to the left portray a commodified and intensified scenario. I designed a website for the Iterations & Intensities project reflecting my research and critical stance on the stag culture. Through commodification and packaging, ‘stag-do’ companies appear to reduce place for the event of a stag, down to a mere stereotype and rated system. This allows the website to contain neat click-able & consumable packages, creating an experiential product for the consumer society. My research is critical of the diminishing role of place for the event of stag.

Intensification of Experience

The Event of Stag (Exposing the Realities) The larger selected images portray the commodification but also the realities of intensification of the stag experience. The latter presents a troubling reality, within each screenshot the website depicts violence and ant-social behaviour in the place of the originally packaged up stag experiences.

Developing Thematic Above is an extract from my Tools essay, at this point I started to research around ideas of consumption, commodity and image within ideas of neoliberalism post-modernity and the consumer society. This threaded into my research for this project, and informed my eventual output.

“Too scattered and under connected”

“Not enough happening near me!”

“Fields running through studios reduce happiness”

Screenshots of Minecraft gaming process, speech bubbles reflect group’s conversations

“First half struggled with game mechanics”

“Slight disconnection with residential”

Ego City, The why Factory

Ego City, The Why Factory “Ego City is a multi-player gaming platform for participatory design, where multiple individual players can each confront and negotiate one another’s spatial desires. Based on the hypothesis of increasing density = increasing desires, the game explores the potentials of negotiation and density for both residents and design.”

Minecraft

Re-imaging Master planning - Space Grab & Game Play We elected to gamify the master planning process, using Minecraft. Ideas of gamification, contested space, and the way that created unique relationships, problems, & solutions intrigued us. Electing Minecraft as a platform for research we felt embodied the outputs and innovation from MVRDV. We thought that we could make use of its malleability, mod-ability, and the simple block based premise as a means to contest space ourselves. Initially we abstracted the new island into the Minecraft using a 1 meter square to 1 Minecraft block. We proposed 200 blocks placed per turn and allowed for solid blocks to claim solid space and transparent blocks to claim empty space. Later into subsequent rounds, we changed the rules, reducing the size of the site drastically. This created more of a contest as our ‘buildings’ were forced to layer and interact.

Reflection On reflection, this process was useful, despite reservations from some group members. In its processes, it allowed us to explore a master planning framework through game play. It also created a certain intensity through competition, very fitting to my own development of ideas around intensity across the two years.

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Symposium presentation, All things digital - screens & projections

Photos of group process (building site model, undertaking research & developing ideas)

Symposium

Digitalisation, Projections & Intensification The symposium saw us present our group work as it manifested up to this point. Clarifying how we approached the master planning through our interpretation of MVRDV. We opted to present through digital media suing projections and screens to emphasize the digital game-play approach we took. We used the physical model as a way of representing our work within Minecraft in a more tangible and relatable way. It gave the digital experimentation a grounding, a sense of scale allowing the audience to engage and understand the intensification and densification for the intervention.

Characterization The other part of the project to this point was the simplification of people through characterization, all of our individual character and program ideas were illustrated on Ipad’s, allowing visitors to scroll through our individual ideas, my idea, ‘The Weekend City’ was personified by the character ‘Alan’ from ‘The Hangover’ Movie.

Reflection The symposium was set up that we were directly next to the other group within the brief who were analysing OMA as a practice and critically embodying them. They concentrated on the use of blue foam, and the physical, a real contrast to ours. It allowed us a critical understanding of how the two have embodied their two practices, not just their ideas, but their modes of representation and communication.

Creative Quarter

Weekend City

Water City

High Fashion Zone

Outdoor Play

Final Minecraft site intervention

Final sketchup site intervention

The Transition from Minecraft to Sketchup The images above reflect my final design for each of the two platforms we used. It is clearly visible that the Minecraft output had a direct influence on the site position, the rough form as well as the connections between the neighbouring components; it set up site constraints the tight nature of the gameplay meant my structure could only obtain minimal floor area, relying on a hanging structure.

Group Site Axonometric Hyper-Dense Intervention

The buildings generic swing like form could be from everywhere but at the same time from nowhere, the form has little contact between the building and ground of Rotterdam, only allowing for infrastructural flows of waste, goods & people. It is a showcase building, a destination, an ultimate city break experience. However, here lies a paradox, between being visible to the entire city, whilst being detached from the city â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;within the city but not of the cityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;. Its connection to the city reduced to a financial beneficially; this response embodies my developing ideas on placelessness, tourism and consumption. 18

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Step 2 (Outdated City Centre)

Step 1 (Chaos of Stag Culture)

Step 3 (Inefficiency Causes Antisocial)

Step 4 (Flip for Less Floor Area)

Step 5 (Isolate Activity from City)

Step 6 (Stretch to Create Efficiency)

Step 7 (Minecraft Site Constraints)

Step 8 (Hanging Response)

Group Site Plan

Hyper-Dense Intervention Final group plan illustrating our dense and intensify approach to the master-planning process, influenced from our readings into MVRDV. Because of the island nature of the site, it has meant increased interaction and conflict between all city components. Key to this, it has set up connections between each other, my own, looks to get rid of waste through the ‘Water City’ program.

Site Diagrams

Outdated City Centre & Problematic Stag Diagramming process looks to reflect upon the profession (MVRDV as an example) which attempts to solve large and accepted social and historical problems through architecture. With my process I reduced the model of a city centre as well as the stag culture into a typology, an outdated typology, of which I could re-imagine as MVRDV appears to do, thus ‘clean up the streets’ in the process. This step by step diagram process democratizes the architectural process, key to MVRDV representation and approach. 20

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Section through stag swing hangar space

Intensification & Densification

Ultimate Consumption & Inevitable Waste

Precedent -MVRDV & ADEPT, House of Culture & Movement

Reflecting upon MVRDVâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s House of Culture my section sums up the practices optimistic somewhat naive graphics, importantly though for a 2D drawing it has a lot of intensity and vibrancy through its playful portrayal of the activates that take place within it. I drew out an exaggerated playfulness in order to reflect the condensed, intensified themes in my design. Importantly however I was critical of MVRDVâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s optimistic attitude, and architectures claims to solve large-scale issues. The section portrays a hyper-real, compressed day & night, fun, clean up, waste, security experience. The hangar like space becomes a mere facilitator of the event, glorifying waste whilst forfeiting place. The drawing reflects the schemes approach to cleaning up the streets, by providing a dedicated space for the stag event, and with that solving a real problem in many media sources. 21

Section through ‘capital intoxication’ intervention - thesis project

Developing Thematic & Challenge The image on the right is from my 6th year thesis project, a project also based on intensities and acceleration within markets. The important link here is that both projects grapple with architectural representation of intensity. This becomes a constant challenge across all my projects due to the programmatic, critical provocations of the contemporary. My 6th year project section attempts through line work pick out movement and crowd intensities much like the section above from my 5th year first semester ‘Weekend City’ project. Both projects programmatically blur and condense multiple programs to form a critical response. 22

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Exploded Axonometric + Adrenaline Counter/Activity Coder + Time Graph

Waste Run

Infrastructure

Activities

Stag Swing Hangar

Intensification of Experience

Exploded Axonometric of Stag Event Space To the left is a exploded axonometric, describing all components and activities that form the totalizing stag-do experience. As well as a taxonomy of both day & night activities. My project uses the beats per minute (BPM) reading structure, to arrange all spaces into a colour-coded system of adrenal experience, creating a hierarchy of event for the stag visitors.

Mega-Structure

Stag-Do Component Diagrams Diagrams showing how I intended to compose the activities of the stag do within to the Stag-do hangar. Both the nightime and day time activities will be held in place by a mega-structure, creating a connection between night & day, condensing these into one space for a continuous 24-7 activity, a hyper-real condensed & intensified stag experience. The activities strategically sit upon the waste run which wraps around the outer edge of the box, allowing the 24-7 by-product of such consumption to be handled.

Hangar Space

Stage 5 PLAN Rotterdam Iterations & Intensities - The Embodiment of MVRDV The Removal of Place from the Event of the Stag

Critical Reflection I really enjoyed exploring how MVRDV practice as architects. Using this as a springboard, I pursued initial research strands about intensification and densification, how these concepts need not to be as we might think; in the case of MVRDV, they appear to challenge our general negative preconceptions of these themes. The strands that I initially identified, allowed me to start to think of the master-planning process in a new light, how to communicate these ideas differently. This was a real positive from the module, and to use the cliché, something that pushed me ‘out of the box’. Though importantly I was always critical of their approach, this includes the wider architectural field, personified by MVRDV, architecture’s optimism, almost arrogance to solve large issues through architectural diagramming. This critique shown throughout the process, through the characterization & simplification of building programs, the role of game playing & Minecraft in the development process and subsequent final drawings. In regards to the final drawings, I tried to be critical of this optimism; I exaggerated the visuals activities within each drawing, however importantly I also portrayed the realities that come with a ‘Stag-Do City’ response. On reflection I would have liked to push the themes of genericness and non-place further and explore a proposal that projects itself as part of the city but not of the city, something that airline or stag-do companies could almost buy into. This could be done through internal visuals, to get a real sense of the hyper-condensed night and day stag experience proposed. Over this period I have developed an interest in themes of place, nonplace, genericness, consumption, following the reading of key critical texts, it leads me to question whether our current culture which is fascinated by the event, and with this does this come at the expense of place?

Scanned in diagram within book - Situating ideas within wider context

TOOLS FOR THINKING ‘Wish You Were Here’ How City Image is Constructed, Projected & Consumed

Introduction “Within this essay, I look to explore the phenomenon of selling city image and the dominant role of city branding in current culture. How cities use imagery and media to firstly construct and then project the perceived external image of a place. Aided by a series of critical texts, I briefly trace the historical development that has led to the contemporary cultural context of city branding. To explore this dominant branding culture, I analysed how the two cities of Bristol and Rotterdam construct their own perceived city image. To obtain a rich and varied critical mass, I used a range of sources, from airline website pages to official local government policy documents. In my analysis, I focused particular attention on whether these documents in their portrayal of the cities, really understand its essence, considering whether they present a differing picture to the realities found in each city, or indeed closely relate to such realities.”

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Theoretical Underpinning for Essay Ideas

“Within contemporary culture it seems, everything is up for sale, everything has a value according to the price tag in which the market decides. Cities and architecture are caught up within the economic freedom ad culture of choice found in the global, causing a blue between architecture and marketplace.” Extract from main body of ‘Wish You Were Here’ Tools Essay

“Global cultural shifts have come to place a premium on consumer experience, celebrity, spectacle and ‘place’ has become increasingly commodified” Quote from Knox, P, L. & Pain, K. Globalization & Neoliberalism.

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Imagery of branding campaigns from both Bristol & Rotterdam

Conclusion “A brand comes some way to stereotype, relating to the striped down age of symbol and image but in its simplification misses out on what is happening on the ground. City image construct is ultimately shaped by local government stimulation but on the surface an increasing construction of image is done by Baudrillard’s postmodern consumers.” Extract from Conclusion Section of ‘Wish You Were Here’ Tools Essay

Critical Reflection On reflection, the compilation of this essay greatly influenced my development of thinking over the two years of the master’s course. Within the essay, I wrestled with ideas of placelessness, branding, image, consumption to name a view. These strands of thought I feel were grounded across all of my following design projects in some sense. This essay allowed me to be bring into my design a much higher level of wider criticality and aided later processes within the course.

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Abstract The project questions the experience of the addictive and intoxicating heightened state of adrenaline; a peak state of mind where you feel so immersed that you lose self-consciousness and a sense of context, a form of hyper focus. In addition, my research recognizes the peaks and troughs of adrenal intensity, the build-up towards a peak state and the subsequent stages of decline and release. To spatialize this reading into this heightened state, I undertook research into the production of adrenaline through the intoxicating activity of capitalism, (exchange, commodity and trading). The research I have undertaken has illustrated a growing detachment between people and market intensities. Despite an acceleration of intensities and further potential for adrenal intoxication due to de-materialization and digitalization, our comprehension and experience of capital has become increasingly abstracted.

Peak Adrenaline Perspective

This leads me to think critically and analyse how we actually experience this heightened state in the contemporary accelerated market condition, but also whether the acceleration of the adrenal intensities found in spaces and experiences of capital still form a long-standing relationship to ideas and layers of trust in capital as a system. It has lead me to propose a 21st century late stage-capitalist trading floor, and with that proposition, question its current relationship to us and how we might re-establish its intoxicating intensities into our experience of capital.

Stage 6 THESIS Capital Intoxication Intoxication, Intensities & Trust in Capital

Brief â&#x20AC;&#x153;This studio asks that you immerse yourself in a collection of texts, films and artworks relating to philosophical, spatial and political readings of intoxication, whilst exploring the spatial-experiential conditions of intoxication through installations at primer stage. You will then be asked to situate these readings and experiences within an urban condition, examining the cultural contexts within which intoxication is produced, culminating in immersive environments that are both intoxicating spaces and architectural proposals.â&#x20AC;?

Developing Thematic As explained within my reflective introduction, my thesis project gave me a platform to develop upon ideas of commodification, acceleration and intensification of experience. As well as providing another opportunity to explore how I might represent and communicate these intensities through architectural discourse. As well as this, it allowed me to develop upon my critical unpacking process, in which I started to explore within my 5th year projects, this time through unpacking the development of capital and markets. Again, the project situates itself within an existing context/building, offering me another interesting challenge.

Photo of the frenzied crowd - The force of capitalist desire

The Future of an Illusion, Sigmund Freud “It goes without saying that a civilization which leaves so large a number of its participants unsatisfied and drives them into revolt neither has nor deserves the prospect of a lasting existence.” “We may insist as often as we like that man’s intellect is powerless in comparison to his instinctual life, and we may be right in this. Nevertheless, there is something peculiar about this weakness. The voice of the instinct is a soft one, but it will not rest until it has gained a hearing. Finally, after a countless succession of rebuffs, it succeeds.”

Research Interest

Repression of the Individual The project started with a reading into Freudian theory, my interest is with his depiction of an underlying state of repression for man within civilisation. My interest with his theories in relation to the brief, looks at how human escapism, expression and detachment is so intoxicating when set against ideas of societal repression.

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Diagram - Situating the act of rioting within ideas of ‘Intoxication’ & Freudian Theory

DOS

DOC

Dev of Self

Ideal Self

Model Citizen

Dev of Citizen

Civilisation

The ID

Societal and Culturally accepted norms/ behaviours and symbols - civilisation renounces powerful individual pleasures in favour of a redistribution of equal and constant but less intensive pleasures. Denounces one large payment of pleasure for instalment packages creating cultural frustration and discontent with civilisation.

The repository of primitive urges - repressed thoughts & drives - seek immediate gratification rather than long term deferral and ungoverned by social and moral constructs - disregards everything except immediate desires. Seen as fantasy / Irrational thought bound by sexual & destructive desires which are inherently biological human components.

The Super-Ego

The Ego

Punishes through guilt and rewards through pride to assert itself over the sexual/aggressive impulsive ID and guide us towards behavioural/etiquettes deemed by civilisation as socially acceptable. Persuades the EGO to act upon moralistic goals rather than realistic ones. Developed through family relations within societal framework.

Holds the ID impulse in check and favours rational over emotional thought. Acts as a mediator for tensions that arise between the constraints of the real world and our primitive desires.

Situating Intoxication within Sigmund Freud Theory My reading into Freudian theory depicts an underlying state of repression for man. Within this reading, I constructed a diagram which situates the concept of intoxicated space. This intoxicated space and its marginal behaviours, I argue, sit crucially at the boundary between the moral pre-conscious of the Freudian Super-Ego and the instinctual & unconscious space of the Freudian ID. At this critical point human expression comes into contact with human repression, to form intoxicated behaviours of escapism and detachment, though the result is inherently a form of controlled intoxication, and only lies around the rigid socially accepted framework civilization has developed for itself.

This is illustrated by the conventions that play out within the typology of the nightclub. Where you lose yourself though the club doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t lose you, crucially society doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t lose you. It is at this point where I searched further for other intoxicated states, and here is where the act of the rioting punctures through the framework of my own diagram. I began to situate these events within my own reading of Freud, situated at the point where expression breaks the framework of societal norm and drags a person into the realm of the impulse, the space of the ID, the space we are supposed to repress.

‘The Swarm’, Lukas Felzman

Crowds and Power, Elias Canetti “For just as suddenly as it originates, the crowd disintegrates. In its spontaneous form is a sensitive thing. The openness, which enables it to grow, is, at the same time, its danger. A foreboding of threatening disintegration is always alive in the crowd. It seeks through rapid increase, to avoid this for as long as it can; it absorbs everyone, and, because it does, must ultimately fall to pieces. It seems as though movement of some of them transmits itself to the others, crowd expression, crowd power.”

Research Interest

Expression within the Intoxicated Crowd Following research into Freudian ideas of societal repression and the intoxication qualities of human escapism, expression and detachment, my research lead me to writings from Elias Canetti, who explores the power of crowd dynamics and crowd expression. Freudian ideas of human repression based within the expressive intoxicating quality of powerful crowds that Canetti illustrates led me to firstly situate intoxication within the events of the London Riots and then moving my research focus away onto spaces that encourage the adrenal intoxicated crowd ‘Adrenal Architectures’.

GC2 - 2.1/2.2/2.3

Wrestle for Control

Re-appropriating the Street Rhythms

Momentum & Intensity

Crowd Formation

Searching for Adrenaline

LONDON RIOTS

Tottenham High Street - Adrenal Process Meets Spatial Environment Crowd Momentums & Intensities

London Riots

Intoxicated Crowd, Sam Jacob “In the riots, we saw people in a state of agitated excitement, an atmosphere not characterised by the anger that might be traditionally associated with past riots, but a kind of delirious happiness and expression, something verging on the carnivalesque, even.”

Reflection Following my study of the London riots, and process of mapping the adrenal intensities within the events. It was at this critical point where I moved my focus towards ‘Adrenal Architectures’, spaces which are designed for intoxicated crowds. This change of route meant that my project did not go down a path of intervening in riot ‘space’. My research eventually lead to spaces of capital and financial markets. This was a critical moment for the project, the move was taken following my reading into Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, and his idea of ‘Flow’, an intoxicating addictive heightened state in which Csikszentmihalyi situates the act of trading within. 42

Colosseum

Greek Amphitheatre

Cattle Market

Pamplona Bull Run

Auction Room

Trading Pit Floor

Casino Floor

Gaming Conference

Algorithmic Crowd

Genealogy of Adrenal Architectures & Crowds Intensities Over Time

All of these spaces have a relationship between control and action. Each architecture is both set up to orchestrate and control the crowdâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s momentum and intensity, at the level of the individual creating a form of hyper-focus formed from the adrenal process. Each space gives a platform for the production of the adrenal bodily process, a platform for expression, drives, urges, and a space where people go beyond what they originally expected to do. 43

Chicago Trading Crowd, Thomson Reuters

Chicago Open ‘Outcry’ Trading Pits Market Making Crowds

Following my research into multiple spatial environments that have the potential to deliberately influence the adrenal process, I focused my research towards the crowds within Chicago ‘Outcry’ Trading floor, where competitive market making crowds jostle for control. I was both fascinated with the relationships that play out between the spatial setting of the pit and the momentums, intensities, and constant surging and dissolving of the crowd, as well as the obvious bombardment of sound and visual stimulation for the trader bodily sensorium’s.

LONG TERM PLANNING

IMPULSE

MOTOR CORTEX

FRONTAL LOBES

PARIETAL LOBE

TEMPORAL LOBES

AMYGDALA

Blood Pressure Increase

Chemical Change in Brain

Heart Rate Increase

Logical Language Analytical Grammar Punctuation Sequential Detail Letters/ Numbers Decoding Short term (auditory) memory Thinks according to rules and patterns Fine motor Sense of time Planned Controls right side of body

Right

Left

Adrenal Release

The Science & Link to Freudian Impulse The production of adrenaline facilitates a heightened and intoxicating state. Following the release of the adrenal hormone from the glands into the blood stream, causing changes in your brain. The release shifts blood flow away from the frontal lobes (the governor of long term planning) to the motor cortex, forming impulsive decisions, and an all-consuming urge to do something at the critical moment between thoughts of panic, and action. To me this natural process reflects the ideas of the impulsive Freudian ID and its opposing Ego & Super Ego states. This heightened state dismisses societal repression for total expression and impulse.

Creative Pictures Intuitive Tonality Illustrations Simultaneous Big picture Symbols/ Spatial Encoding Long term (visual) memory Thinks outside of the square Gross motor No sense of time Spontaneous Controls left side of body

Pre Primer Experimentation - Recreating Adrenal Intensity

Selection of installation stills - Intensification of experience through repetition.

Primer

Recreating Intensity using Digital Up until this point, I had compiled mapping and scientific research, but as of yet I had not explored the feeling of the heightened state of adrenaline. The weeks leading up to my â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Primerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; event, saw me experimenting with repetition and rhythm using digital media, to attempt to create a feeling of intensity. The stills above show how a simple shape bounces across the screen, the image to the left, (test installation), shows how the shape bounced across all three screens. I edited the speed and intensity across a durational performance to synchronize with selected music, analysing how people react, what they focus on and whether people became consumed and immersed. Before the exhibition, I did not use site-specific objects, focusing on generic imagery and exploring simple ideas of repetition to create intensity.

Thematic Reflection In retrospect, it is obvious that the original premise of this project reflects my interest in intensity. Regarding this particular exploration, it reflects my added explorative interest in how I can recreate intensity using different modes of representation. Previously done through intensified line weighted sections. Within this project, due to the direction of the unit brief, meant I took the exploration further into an installation form.

Primer Exhibition - Recreating Adrenal Intensity

All Saints Church - Installation Breakdown - Journey, Lights & Objects

Selection of installation stills - Commodification & intensification of objects

Primer

Recreating Intensity using Digital Using digital media, I recreated the core experiential condition that someone may feel when adrenalized, creating an all-consuming immersive experience. To do this I created a digital over-stimulation of senses through the commodification of three room elements that were mapped onto three screens. Over the performance the elements gained momentum and intensity; moving, shifting and dancing between screens. 50

Between Volatility & Order

Hierarchical Design - Deal Efficiency

Frenzied Market Making Crowd

Aftermath - Visual Signs of an Event

Spatial Development of Markets

CATHEDRAL OF CAPITALISM Open ‘Outcry’ Trading Floor (Chicago Board of Trade) Spatial separation between product & trade + Relationship Between Body/Crowd & Place

Clock at Highest Point Market Signifier

Market Volatility organised within screen

Entrance Drop Down into Pit

Hierarchy Orchestrates the Deal

Pit Form Competitive Hierarchies within Pit

Raised Floor Ability for Pits to be Adapted

Axonometric - Hierarchical Space Breakdown 52

The drawing illustrates my research into the spatial formations found in the Chicago â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Open Outcryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Trading Pits. A form of trading which thrived on the tension between the chaos and volatility of capitalism and the order it requires, a space that fuelled divisions, hierarchies and a vehement defence of space.

Market Making Machines

Disconnection & Distance

Abstracted Traders

‘Anywhere’ Offices & Hidden Connections

Spatial Development of Markets

BEYOND HUMAN COMPREHENSION High Frequency Trading Rooms Body, Place and Crowd Disembodied from Market + Market Machinist Acceleration

Trading Desk Only Access to Market Barrier

Trading Offices Nondescript Hidden Market Connections

Connection Between Market & Market Analysts

Placelessness Disconnected Data Centre

Axonometric - Hierarchical Space Breakdown

The drawing illustrates my research into the current condition of High Frequency Trading. It represents the growing detachment between the information centre (space of trading servers and now the space of markets) and the trade rooms where traders are typically isolated from one another behind their screens, making the connection to the market for traders only through screens and hidden infrastructure.

Formation - Marketplace

Cathedral of Capitalism - Open Outcry Trading

Abstraction - Electronic Automated Trading

Diversification - Cattle Market

Floor to Pen - Hybrid Trading

Beyond Comprehension - High Frequency Trading

Development of Physical Space of Markets Accelerated & Abstracted Worlds

My research illustrates the development of the physical space of markets, from the original formation of the marketplace for the act of trade to the current accelerated algorithmic and mechanic worlds of High Frequency Trading. The development has seen clock time replaced by the continuous ticker displays. The markets have now become placeless, abstracted and separated away from market people and market crowds.

Chicago Board of Trade Building

View Down La Salle Street

Following the study of the development of the physical market space, I then began a detailed study into the specifics of the Chicago Outcry Trading Floor experience. Studying how the market traders there become the adrenalized market risk takers. I unpacked the ritual, experiential and spatial processes of the Chicago Trading experience that form a series of detachments towards the peak intensity of the trading floor. Analysing the importance of each process for the Chicago trader and how as a series of moments they induce the buildup of the bodily adrenal processes experienced by the traders.

The Chicago Traders

(Photos from left to right) Jody Micheal “The Bustler” Peter “Zap” Chelemengos Marty Venit ‘“Danny” Alves

De-constructing the Bodily Adrenal Trading Experience Drawing Through Trader Experiences

The research into Chicago culminated in a set of montages that illustrated each key moment in the Chicago trading experience. As well as this, I produced a long linear sequenced drawing, which illustrates the totality of experiential, spatial and ritual detachment processes that the Chicago traders went through. The research drew out an understanding of the importance on spatial sequencing and orchestration for the Chicago trading environment, this in order to build adrenaline and anticipation within the market crowd, to increase volatility and in doing so capital.

Unfolded Axonometric of the Chicago Outcry Trading Experience + Montages of Key Trading Moments

Adrenal Build-Up “Becoming Intoxicated” H - (8:30AM) “Entering the Trading Pit”

Adrenal Peak “Peak State of Intoxication” I - (9:00AM) “The Pandemonium of the Trading Pit”

Adrenal Release “Decline of Intoxication” J - (6:00PM) “View over the City”

Adrenal Aftermath “Decline of Intoxication” K- (7:45PM) “Crash Back to Reality”

Research

Unpacking the Chicago Intensity My research into the heightened state of adrenal and the bodily process played out through the spaces of Chicago recognizes a build up to peak-heightened state. The spaces begin the trajectory of adrenal build up across time, clock time is always prominent in the build-up trader spaces. Following the build-up processes (experiential, ritual, and spatial), my research illustrates the peak-heightened state of traders in Chicago. The trading floor was a space for the crowd, the body, it was an attack on the senses, traders had to reach peak focus ‘Flow’ to better other traders in the chaos and frenzy of the pits. This was a competitive, adrenalized crowd, and an intoxicating environment. As well as this and key to the totality of adrenal experience in Chicago there are subsequent stages of decline and release of the peak state. Montage J illustrates two traders drinking following a frantic day in the pits. This was a regular form of release for trader and release formed a substantial part of the trading culture, a stopgap between trader and outside person. The final stage of my Chicago research illustrates the aftermath (K); the outside or home life of traders; the reality away from the adrenal processes found in the Chicago Trading experience. This other side to the trader experience is in stark contrast to the frenetic trader. This stage forms an equally important part of my research, as in its monotony it exaggerates the heightened state.

Growing Cultural Uncertainty

Growing Economic Uncertainty

“Hyper-normalisation”

“Wolf of Wall Street” & “The Big Short”

BBC documentary, Adam Curtis

Films directed by Martin Scorsese & Adam Mckay

“The future is always to some extent uncertain, but never more so than right now.....“Disruption is the new normal” ‘Hyper-normalisation’ tells the extraordinary story of how we got to this strange time of great uncertainty and confusion. Uncertainties and the unthinkable have become the norm, events like ‘Brexit’, the electoral success of Trumps ‘Make America Great Again’ campaign, the War in Syria, the endless migrant crisis, random bomb attacks I argue, are examples that reflect uncertainty, and it feels as though our uncertainty is rising exponentially. As well as market and capital acceleration, my research has unpacked the wider political and cultural uncertainty, and reflects a tipping point, a world of confusion and complication.

All of these environments are tied to the increasingly precarious economic system of Late Stage Capitalism and its cylindrical volatile boom and bust cycles. My research recognises the repetitive crises nature of capitalism. Within this post-global financial crisis condition has grown uncertainty and formed a difficult moment for trust, allied to an intensification and acceleration in all spaces of capital, which binds contemporary culture of the consumer society. This volatile and accelerated condition is best illustrated in the events of the Flash Crash of May 2010, in which $1 trillion was wiped off the value of markets in the space of 10 minutes. This is considered the most dramatic crash in stock market history and occurred within only 10 minutes. Welcome to the world of High frequency Trading.

Key readings & influences to help situate my thinking into wider context.

Unpacking the Wider Context - Accelerated Capital Accelerated Capital Intensities and Intoxication My research illustrates an accelerated market due to the mechanic world of algorithmic trading. The acceleration of intensities is not only in the trading environment, but also within the wider context of shopping, consumerism, and exchange, through the de-materialization and digitalization of money and culture.

Programmatic Idea Capital Intoxication

All my research has suggested both an acceleration and intensification of markets, from trading, to shopping to betting. I have traced an adrenal intoxicating quality through the development of spaces of capital (markets). The accelerated relationship between all the research falls under the umbrella of consumerism, commodity and exchange. My provocation then becomes â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Capital intoxicationâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; which will see me blur and collapse betting, trading and shopping into a totalizing experience, an experience that can be consumed, and importantly, be intoxicating. Blurring the experience of all spaces into one, a space where the betters, traders and the shoppers, can become intoxicated.

GC2 - 2.1/2.2/2.3

Intu Centre - A Total Environment, (Photos from left to right), New Grey’s Food Quarter, Eldon Gardens Cafe & Restaurant Space, Eldon Square St Andrew’s Way High End Development, Eldon Leisure - Sports Centre

Intu Centre, Newcastle, A space for Capital Intoxication Global into the Local - Testing Ground Model

My plan is to situate a trading and betting zone within a space of commodity exchange whilst situating the local into the global condition of contemporary market place (shopping malls). The plan is to blur shopping, betting, and trading under the umbrella of capital and the activity of capitalism, making each a consumable commodity in its own right. Trading and gambling becomes its own consumable thing, for all the public. The intention is to normalize this relationship into the global condition of the shopping environment. The question then becomes, ‘where do I situate the intervention?’ Following extensive research into the statistics and spaces of major inner city shopping centres around the country I chose Newcastle’s Intu Centre . It boasts the 9th biggest shopping centre in the UK, and has the 5th largest yearly footfall. Due to its centrality and inner city location it is primely placed next to all the connections in and out of the city, from city Metro links, major bus terminals and central train station. Newcastle is a regional capital, it has generic capacities and global properties, and it is a major city with the added bonus of not having many cities around it creating an obvious pull factor in the North East. Also, it doesn’t have any other other major ‘inner city shopping centre’ within 100 miles (closest being Leeds Victoria), so it retains a major shopping and commercial pull factor. Newcastle is also known for being a beta testing ground for new goods, equipment and consumables. The intent is to test this new trading zone model within Newcastle, Intu Centre, but then the model could be taken across the country, to other major inner city shopping centres.

GC7 - 7.2

Theoretical Underpinning - Srnicek, N. Inventing Future & Fisher, M. Capitalist Realism.

Platform Capitalism, Nick Srnicek “What unites Google and Facebook, Apple and Microsoft, Siemens and GE, Uber and Airbnb? Across a wide range of sectors, these firms are transforming themselves into platforms: businesses that provide the hardware and software foundation for others to operate on. This transformation signals a major shift in how capitalist firms operate and how they interact with the rest of the economy: the emergence of ‘platform capitalism.” This book critically examines these new business forms, tracing their genesis from the long downturn of the 1970s to the boom and bust of the 1990s and the aftershocks of the 2008 crisis. It shows how the fundamental foundations of the economy are rapidly being carved up among a small number of monopolistic platforms, and how the platform introduces new tendencies within capitalism that pose significant challenges to any vision of a post–capitalist future.”

Future Provocation - Northern Stock Exchange Increased Dissolved Powers & Deregulated Trading

The graphic on the left illustrates google (a global company) and its scattered peripheral offices across the globe. It reflects the reality that large global companies and social media platforms are firstly inherently global, but key to this argument is that they are distributed everywhere, to peripheral cities. Not only google, but market trading firms are also an example of this. They are situated globally and locally, and my provocation is that Newcastle could be one of the peripheral offices, where trading firms set up a smaller office.

GC7 - 7.2

Photo of main entrance of Intu Centre, Northumberland Street.

Totality

Zones

Existing Conditions - Intu Centre

Anchors

Circulation

Connections

Proposed Intervention - Reinstating Wing

Site - Newcastle Intu Centre

Zones, Anchors & Nodes

The Intu shopping company has a clear strategy on how they plan their commercial space, this is done through creating destinations, zones and anchors at strategic location points to create the totalizing smooth shopper experience.

Site Strategy

Inhabit & Normalize within Failing Zone

GC4 - 4.2 GC5 - 5.3

I chose the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Inhabit & Normalizeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; site strategy that will look to plan out space within the modus operandi of a shopping centre company, in search of normalizing a trading and betting zone within the totality of the shopping experience. This intent will see me situate my proposal within a wing/zoning strategy. I will create a new atrium within existing Eldon Garden site to better link the existing multiple levels of that section of the shopping centre to ground floor level as well as my program. This will form a more fluid, interconnected wing that ties into the rest of the centres circulation strategy and visitor footfall patterns.

Pamphlet Design - Materializing a relationship between intensity & trust

Technical Declaration Architecture of Trust

The project has explored intensities within spaces of capital and how that can lead to a heightened state of adrenal intoxication. My project also recognises the accelerated and abstracted market condition; a condition that challenges the human relationship with the market, whether we trust as well as comprehend it. In response, the project challenges how we might experience these high frequency intensities of capital, its volatile, intoxicating peaks and troughs. This is done through realizing a relationship between the accelerated purely experiential intensities of capital, and an architectural materialization of that market. My interest in the Chicago Open Outcry trading environment recognise that High frequency trading is the current form of trading; however I am critical of this accelerated disconnection of market. The project provocates a 21st century trading floor, what it might look like, and how we might experience and trust it. This has led me to challenge the possibilities of shifting from the inadequate rhetorical aesthetic and programmatic response of openness and transparency typical of spaces of capital and finance to a new idea and architecture of trust, experience and immersion around its increasing volatile intensities. The project strategy looks to form critical relationships between intensity and trust, established in response to the culture and economy of uncertainty and acceleration.

Closed Design Solidity

A design that originally signified wealth, security, safety and virtue trust is placed within its impregnability to deposit. Imposing physical assets signalled that a bank was reliable and discreet, a bank that could be trusted, depositors knew their money was safe and borrowers knew money could be found. Its monumental gravity helped to underwrite the every credit it made available. 1694, Bank of England

Open Design Transparency

A design that represents hospitality, community, honesty and transparency. Trust is formed through its employees as a place to transact our financial affairs, bankers could be trusted to treat customers fairly, competently and benevolently, and provide a variety of personal services in addition to just taking out cash (investment advice) â&#x20AC;&#x201C; personal assets not physical assets. Glass communicates an image of speed, the sheer amount of it communicates capital acceleration. 1953 Manufacturers Hanover Trust Office

Retail Design Adaptation

A design of banks and spaces of capital that is increasingly associating meaning to the high street, adopting familiar languages from retail architecture. One example of this point is the reality that advertising and posters often paper over the windows of banks, offering the latest financial â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;productsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;,

Solidity, Transparency & Retail Adaptation Development of Trust in Capital

Contemporary Capital

Material Inventory

I undertook research into spaces of contemporary capital (shops), photographing and recording the materials used within these spaces, paying particular focus on their junctions and connections. The Materials used in these spaces all have a seamless quality to them, they are smooth, glitzy, shiny and are finished with bevelled edges. The material qualities are found both within the contemporary high street bank interior, as well as all high street phone shops. What is interesting here is the interiors of these spaces are mimicking the technological products in which they sale or use. This is shown in the larger photo below, the shop display stand has the same visual material qualities as the phone and this reality appears to be a common trait across all these spaces. The material displays in these instances are referring to the accelerated and seamless machine world of contemporary capital. Due to the fact that these materials are used throughout all these spaces of capital, there is a definite argument to suggest that a contemporary capital material inventory exists and with that a trusted and accepted association to contemporary capital.

Deutsche Bรถrse Trading Room, Frankfurt

Flagship 02 Store, London

Barclays Bank, London

The Seamlessness of Contemporary Capital The three photos the left, reflect the common seamless material quality found across spaces of capital, from a trading floor to a phone shop to a high street bank. These spaces all hold material commonalities. What is interesting here is my research has unpacked the accelerated and seamless world of markets, within these spaces of exchange trade and capital, the material quality references this seamlessness. The seamless reality based within the development of capital and the development of our association with trust is where my interest lies. How in these spaces, through material specification and material meaning they materialize a form of contemporary consumer faith and trust.

Crystal Houses, MVRDV

Immersion & Inversion

Altered Shift in Materials

A New Form of Trust in Capital

Crystal Houses, MVRDV

This project has an obvious reference to transparency reflecting the overwhelming desire of global brands and capital for that material reference to transparency. However, I am interested in what is illustrated at the gradient junction between glass and terracotta brick. This example reflects a material inversion, the strategy I am exploring through design to form new relationships to contemporary capital.

My research has led me to explore the development of trust in capital from solidity, to transparency and now towards retail architectural adaptation. The research has also illustrated the accelerated and materially seamless world of contemporary capital. However, I am critical of our relationship to contemporary capital and markets, a disconnection has developed between market and people.

The precedent plays on trusted and material expectations and explores the moment where the two materials bleed into each other, the stitching of new material applications and associations within existing to form a hybrid relationship.

I am interested in forming new relationships and human comprehension to the accelerated and digitalized market place through a design and material strategy. Firstly, my design looks to immerse people within the market, to create experiences with the intoxicating intensities and realities of the global marketplace. One aspect of experience towards the market is trust, how in the context of capital materials have associated cultural values and meanings attached to them. My project looks to invert those associations and expectations of materials and their contemporary application within spaces of capital. To invert those relationships between what we expect materials to do, to counter the seamless myth of contemporary capital.

GC8 - 8.1

GA2 - 3

Capital Intoxication Design

Entrance ‘A Back of House’ Inversion My design incorporates a formal processional entrance based on my research into Chicago and how it impacts traders psyche. This main axial circulation route punctures through a crowd of market servers, causing people get a sense of a compression of data. This cabled entrance is a programmatic inversion, having flipped the ‘back of house’ (data centre & servers) to become the front of house, exposing the realities of high frequency trading, market machine reality. This is also a flip on the red carpet glitzy feel of contemporary capital; with this we have red escalators and guild plated slip resistant edge treatment, a play between the monotony of slip resistant and escalator floor finish and high end material expectations. The perspective also reflects the cross section of ‘intoxicated people’ that would use this totalizing space of capital intoxication. As the trader arrives early for a day of trading, others are leaving, a little worse for wear after a night out and a ‘flutter’.

Axonometric

Processional Space & Compression of Data

2 3 1

Entrance Moments

Material Inversion - The Detail

Glass - Solidity & Mass

Marble - Veneer & Rail System

1 - Glass Brick & Transparent high strength adhesive 2- Aluminium Server Racking Framework

1 - Existing Concrete column & Beam Structure 2 - New 250mm Concrete floor slab system 3- Carrara marble tile Veneer 4 - Internal Cladding rail system & framework

The application of glass is often if not always used within the contemporary shopping environment as a slender pane that mediates the shopper and the products behind. In this case the shopper sees the servers over products, the glass acting as a mediator for the experience between the flashing market making server machines and the public. Key here to this detail moment is the use of glass bricks over a glass pane. Its mass gives the illusion on structural integrity, added by it sitting on the structural line, underneath the existing concrete structural system. It gives a visual appearance of mass and solidity, loading, and compression. Re-establishing the traditional shopping facade, instead of the planal contemporary shop facade, familiar window details but using glass instead of ornate metalwork or woodwork.

The centrally positioned servers are sat on top of a raised marble plinth, within an encasement of glass. Attaching and symbolizing a higher power, reflecting where power actually lies in contemporary capital. The servers are positioned deliberately and abruptly against the main axial escalator route, forcing people to experience and comprehend where there intoxication comes from. However, this material treatment is just a cladding and rail system. Marble tiles are hung from a metal framework giving the illusion of contemporary glitz and glamour and associated beliefs in solidity, but the reality is different; seamlessness is just a veneer.

GC1 - 1.2/1.2 GC8 - 8.2/8.3

GA2 - 3

Capital Intoxication Design

Peak Adrenaline ‘Compression & Over-stimulation’ My design recognises the realities of high frequency trading and its machinist world, and understands that the Chicago Trade model is becoming increasingly outdated. The intoxicated environment associated with the Chicago Trading model, and its moving and dissolving crowd intensities is where the projects interest has been focused on. My response is design a space where shopping, trading and betting markets are blurred, a space of ‘capital intoxication’. This will allow a cross section of people to use the space, from a trader to a group of people before a night out, allowing the possibilities of an intoxicated crowd once more. The pit is spread over two floors and the screens are set around a central screen, which captures an internalised focus. The design understands research ideas of compression and the importance of an internalised focus.

Axonometric

Trade, Bet & Shop Pit - The Adrenal Peak 83

Peak Moments

Material Inversion - The Detail

Services - The Connected Office

The Pit Floor Glitz

1 - Cable Junction 2- Cabling for central pit screen on suspended system

1 - Raised Circular Design Rubber Flooring System, Brass Finish 2 - Raised Access Flooring System 3- Lightweight Steel Structure

Within contemporary spaces of capital (shops and high-street banks), the material pallet used in all of these spaces portrays an appearance seamlessness and smoothness, reflecting the technology in which each space either uses or sales. Contemporary trading offices appear sterile environments in comparison to Chicago as there connections to the market are hidden within the floor and ceiling voids. Through material application inversion, my project looks to dispel the myth of seamlessness and transparency. Firstly exposing the services within key areas of the building, and also thickening up the cabled reality of capital and its machines. To do this I exaggerate where connections bend and junctions need to be formed, to reflect the reverse of this apparent seamless condition and its reflect its stitched reality and with that bring it into comprehension through a play on materials and their accepted and trusted associations.

Following my research into Chicago and the importance of the pit to the frenetic and intoxicating environment, I wanted re-established a pit architecture as the key space of my design. With the material specification of the pit floor, I created a play on slip resistant flooring, which you would get in most commercial spaces, and the glitzy aesthetic of spaces of capital by using Raised Circular Design Rubber Flooring tiles, brass finish. Both as a practical function work but also its finish creates a visual focus towards the pit floor, one of the key aspects to the space, along with the services and the screens, forming a connected and pitted environment.

GC1 - 1.2/1.2

GC8 - 8.2/8.3

GA2 - 3

Capital Intoxication Design Release of Adrenaline â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Excess & Fragilityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; My research recognises the importance of a release to the heightened state of adrenaline. A common form of release found within trading is drinking, so in response my design incorporates at its highest level a high class and indulgent champagne bar. It is positioned at the end of the journey through the building and is deliberately situated at the end to reflect the desire for capital and excess. Both time and market comprehension have been recurring themes throughout the project studies, my design looks to re-establish these. Positioned at the centre of the space is a fountain clock, this dramatic statement looks to re-project time and market capital back into the city, due to its position at the top of the building and scale, it allows the city to have a glimpse of this delights of this excessive space. Due to its position and scale, this aspect of the design intends to engage at a wider city level, adding a macro layer to market experience. Throughout all of the spaces of the building, each space has been designed to unfold onto the next, this is done through an emphasis on creating dynamic sightlines and connections, and this careful and choreographed sequencing of space reflects my research on Chicago. The buildings unfolding design which allows people to see on to the next stage of capital experience, reflects the belief system in capital and how it encourages and structures that belief. The bar area, has been deliberately set inside, forcing the back of house bar area to the edge of the space, this design decision reflects my belief that its more important to be seen within these places, and the radial nature of the space is an obvious help to that, forcing people to view each other.

Axonometric

Champagne Bar - The Adrenal Release 87

1 2

Release Moments

Materializing a Belief System through a Floor

The Dominance of a Radial Grid

Fragility of Capital

1 - Primary Steel Structure 2- Glass Dome & Solar Shading Strategy

1 - Poured Terrazzo Floor Finish 2 - Slip Resistant Floor Panels (Back of House Bar) 3- Lightweight Steel Frame (Secondary Structure)

My structural and material design strategy for my intervention within the existing looks to insert a lightweight steel structure, and use cladding and rail systems to hang material veneers and panels. This gridded panellized approach is epitomised within this space of release. The structure and material panels are set on a radial axis, from the centre point. This grid is set out across multiple component systems, flooring, balustrading, and bar counter surfacing. It also sets up a bar furniture layout, each stool post sells past the floor finish (between each floor panel) to connect down to the structure below, this detail moment gives a clue to the fragility of the space, the fragility of capital.

This detail moment, illustrates the radial totality of the floor build up across the space, the raised floor finish sits upon a lightweight radial steel structure, allowing for a service zone. At this spatial point, I wanted to materialize the fragility of the belief system in capital, so I have played on flooring finishes and their associations, the terrazzo floor is designed to be engineered to its thinness point across its longest span, to be visually delicate, to feel almost too thin, on the cusp of collapse. This feeling is illustrated best at the floor edge detail between floor and fountain, where a person has a view down into the darkness of the pit.

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Renders of OMA’s Berlin’s KaDeWe store (Kaufhaus des Westens)

Printed model of dynamic circulation design

Capital Intoxication - Design Section through Scheme

The section shows the entirety of my circulation strategy, from a person entering through the processional space of servers and mechanic markets, through to the dynamic atrium, into the pit and from there the dome above. The drawing tries to communicate an intensity of movement encouraged by the design, particularly through the atrium space, with its dynamic and twisting floor plate and escalators. The design has taken references from OMA’s KaDeWe scheme, with each rising floor level, my designs floor plate and circulation shifts around the octagonal form of the pit above, each floor level shift is sequenced to maximise views and circulation intensities, The section also shows the shopper route into the atrium, this space takes ques from the duty-free shop format, a space without walls only products and advertisement, which compresses and dictates the circulation patterns of visitors, a space of acceleration and overstimulation. 90

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Entrance - Funnel, Compression & Precession

Capital Intoxication - Design

Buildup Atrium - Dynamism & Destabilisation

Pit - Compression & Over-stimulation

OMA’s Unfolded Plan, Dutch Embassy, 2003

Unfolded Plan

Due to the nature of the research undertaken on the Chicago trading experience, I recognized both a sequential build up towards peak state as well as subsequent stages of decline and release of the adrenal heightened state. The research culminated in an unfolded axonometric drawing (far right) that attempted to communicate the sequenced nature of the Chicago trading experience across its multiple levels. I drew out the trading experience from trader’s memoirs, drawing out their unfolding and sequenced build up experiences, resulting in an elongated and sequenced drawing. The drawing was influenced by OMA’s unfolded circulation plan for the Dutch Embassy. This mode of communicating circulation and movement strategies across one single drawing I felt was effective and reflected my own research around the sequencing experience. I looked to bring this mode of plan into my own design (above), the drawing allowed me to communicate a multiple levelled scheme within one unfolded drawing. Emphasising both the unfolding nature of the design, and my research into the importance of circulation between the key spaces in building up intensity.

Release Champagne Bar - Fragility & Excess

Aftermath Exit Strategy - Precession & Desire

Unfolded Axonometric - Chicago Trade Experience

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Capital Intoxication - Design Site Axonometric

I produced the site Axonometric to afford people a total understanding of how I intervened within the existing Eldon Gardens structure. The rendered part being my design and the line drawing showing the existing context and building outlines.

Reflection The design journey was very much an internalised process; the form of my design generated through section and internal experience. With a focus on ideas of compression, precession and sightlines to generate an internal intoxicating set of experiences within this space of capital. Despite the important fact that this drawing was one of a few that showed the scheme within its context, showing its relationship to the city. It was at too large of a scale on the final wall presentation, drawing discussion towards it, when in frank terms the exterior for this project did not matter as much as the internal experiences generated. Its external expression is universal thus allowing it the ability to be applied to other shopping centres globally. In retrospect by reducing the presence of the drawing on the wall, it would have allowed me to get across a focus and discussion around my tectonic and material approach

Thematic Thread This project again looked at commodification of experience, within an accelerated and intensified contemporary condition of market. It shared thematic threads that runs across other projects, in particularly my year 5 â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Week Cityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; project. My thesis building design embodies a product, referencing universality and placelessness, reflecting the condition of contemporary capital. Retrospectively it very much ties into my year 5 project, both were exploring similar ideas, with the latter exploring them at a more detailed and I hope sophisticated way. Stag Swing, Weekend City Project - Object & Placelessnes

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Final Wall Presentation - Capital Intoxication

Stage 6 THESIS Capital Intoxication Intoxication, Intensities & Trust in Capital

Critical Reflection As my reflective introduction explains, I chose the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Intoxicated Spaceâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; project brief for my thesis project; again, I was interested in unpacking in-between and marginal behaviours and spaces. I was interested in developing an understanding of how architecture induces and prolongs marginal behaviours and interactions. My thesis project developed into a critique of the near future of increasingly liberalised market-trading conditions, in which I propose an intoxicating trading-pit-come-betting shop as part of a refurbishment of Eldon Gardens shopping mall in central Newcastle. The project allowed me to develop upon ideas of commodification and intensification of experience within a critical framework. Throughout all my projects, I have tried out different modes of communication to do this, developing into my thesis primer exhibition that used digital media to form an intensity of experience. In retrospect, I felt the primer was successful, and applying some of the simple tactics from that installation into my final wall presentation would have aided the creation of intensity. Another point in retrospect is that I not only have an interest in intensification but also an interest in digitalization, this firstly has the capacity to accelerate and intensify experience. My projects have been interested in a relationship between the digital and physical, machine and human, through market experience as well as the experience of art. I feel the projects have formed critical provocations in regards to these relationships within the contemporary. In summary I feel the thesis project, has allowed a platform for me to combine all the thematic threads, allowing me time to explore them in a more sophisticated totalizing way.

Abstract Mystery surrounds Hieronymus Bosch, we can only interpret him, his art and the meaning behind each of his pieces. As many have acknowledged, Bosch’s most famous piece ‘Garden of Earthly Delights’ serves as a moral warning of the perils of human temptation and sexual desire. My own reading into the painting, sees water as the facilitator of those sinful traits, it fluid form allows those acts of lust & pleasure to spread uncontrollably.

External Perspective of Flood Landscape

A modern contextual example of ‘water as sin’ is flood defence, which treats water as something to defend from, this leads me to ask; can we change our perceptions of water, can we allow water to flow in the public sphere, not hidden and importantly uncontrolled. This is interesting in the context of Rotterdam, a city known to be under threat but a city that openly projects itself as an example that lives with it, a further strand to this context is that the existing art depositories of the Boijman Museum, Rotterdam’s flagship art gallery, are under threat. This sets up interesting scenarios to reflect on, of how we first save the art collection, how we challenge our engagement with large amounts of water, and importantly in Dutch tradition and the essence of Bosch, how we be playful with all this.

Stage 5 RE-MATERIALIZE Rotterdam, Hybrid Objects Floating Art Depositories - Re-imagining the Consumption of Art

Brief “The aim of this studio is to create an architectural response to the complex space that exists between viewers and objects. This space; a foggy territory where a myriad of meanings can be made, is the zone where projected meanings collide to create a space of betweeness. The result is a hybrid object; constituted from entangled meanings that exist in the space between observer and object.”

Developing Thematic In retrospect, this project brief really ties into the processes I was developing through the master’s course. I really enjoy unpacking meanings, associations and themes from a brief. In addition, in regards to this brief, unpacking a set of ideas from wider contexts associated with a painting, this to inform a design that attempts to embody those ideas at a variety of scales. I developed across the all projects an interest in the material, detail and architectonics and how they can embody meanings, this culminated in my thesis project, where I attempted to materialize trust within capital through the detail but developed through this project. Another developing thematic across the projects is my interest in consumption, consumption of the event of the stag, consumption of the markets (betting & trading) and with this project consumption of art. Each of these projects critically look at the experience economy how we consume and materialize an architectural response to them.

The Garden of Earthly Delights , Hieronymus Bosch, 14-90 -1510

Rigidity vs Moments of Temptation

Formal Chaos

Water a Facilitator of Sin

Sin Spreads onto Land

Damnation vs Cleanse

Unpacking the Story within the Painting Water as Sin

How the brief was set out meant I initially went through a process of unpacking my own interpretative story within the piece, my understanding is that the painting depicts a garden which facilitators lustful sin, through water. The brief allowed me to explore and critically unpack wider meanings and themes embedded within the painting. My strongest interest was with the paintings connection to water, water has a sinful nature here, and my understanding of flood defence has a strong connection to that point, in this context water can also be seen to be sinful, treating water as a force of destruction, something to shelter from and defend against. 100

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Montage reflecting realities for the Boijmans museum art collection

Montage reflecting idea of art gallery alienation

Unpacking Research Strands

Unpacking Research Strands Critical of Art Galleries

The brief asks us to re-imagine the depot as a typology in order to challenge the acceptance of the modern gallery typology. The perceived idea of what a depot is a structure that houses backstage activities such as restoration, transportation and maintenance, which are usually all hidden activities. Depots themselves sit on the periphery of cities hidden from public view. The challenge then becomes how we bring this typology into the public realm and with that disperse the contents of the Boijmans for all to see whilst saving the existing artwork in storage which is under threat from rising water levels.

Inside the White Cube, Brain Oâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Doherty.

Challenging the Depot Typology

â&#x20AC;&#x153;Repression of individual interests in favour of the interests of the group. The essentially religious nature of the white cube is most forcefully expressed by what it does to the humanness of anyone who enters it & cooperates with its premises. We give up our humanness & become the cardboard spectator with the disembodied eye.â&#x20AC;? 101

Artefact created reflecting research ideas + Theoretical underpinning

Artefact

Re-imaging Themes within Artwork At this point at the project, I had begun unpacking the realities for Rotterdam as a city that is under threat from water. The research culminated in a project scenario titled ‘Saving the Artwork’ and the creation of an artefact (above), a physical model which represents my first thoughts on the themes I have extracted from Bosch’s ‘Garden of Earthly Delights’. The artefact created represents a potential architectural form that has the ability to float and reveals itself in some way within water, this could be activated through water and mechanisms.

Consumption of Art Alienation

To aid the process of unpacking the painting, I read over key writings from Berger, J, Elkins, J, and O’Doherty, B. I was particularly interested in the ideas of O’Doherty, who is critical of the in-between space between object and viewer, as well, as how we consume art through the typology of the art gallery ‘white cube’. This idea of consumption and experience, and my interest in that, links back across the entire body of work.

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Painting

Theory

Chaos Museumpark Site

Diagram, site, theory, chaos & painting.

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1078 BH

1512

1553 1616

WATER

2145 BH

3200 BH

3453 BH

FOREST

WATER

5600 BH

5932

8944 BH | HH * 8 = BH |

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Montage of process of unpacking measuring & Situating on site.

Body proportion research - A way into measuring renaissance painting.

Mapping Bosch Landscape onto Measured Site

Deconstruction of Painting

I looked at how I could map the painting onto Museumparkâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s car park, this initially required research into measuring theories which would allow me to map the painting in a measured way. I couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t take overall height proportions as a way into measuring the painting as all the figures were either submerged in water or flexed in unmeasurable positions. The only constant throughout the piece was the heads of the figures, following research I used the renaissance painters eight head proportion painting principles to setup parameters, from that I could measure across the painting.

The heads of the figures were the only constant in the painting. I used the - to scale people across the piece. Using the head height | HH | I multiplied that figure by eight to give an overall person height | BH | at certain moments across piece. The results from that process were very interesting, the tree line ended much higher up and the follies are not as symmetrically positioned as what is seen on the painting.

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Depositories set in fixed positions mapped out on site

Rigid/Formal pathways & connections

Depository positions sunk further into landscape

Measured landscape set out & Cut into ground plane

Existing infrastructure amended to suit

Sunken Landscape & Storm Management System

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‘Axon’, Park de Villette, Bernard Tschumi Architects , 1987.

Site strategy, ‘After the Flood’ Depositories dispersed across park.

Site Strategy

Museumpark Carpark Narrative Diagram The strategy diagram on the left sets out the different layers that make up my site strategy for dealing with the existing carpark. With my intention to challenge the art depot and gallery typologies and expose the thousands of art pieces to the public. My intervention looks to disperse the Boijman’s art collection across Museumpark, the design becomes less about a centralised landmark, instead about nodes, follies and connections. With that design intention for site and brief, I read around the ideas from Bernard Tschumi, and influenced by his Parc de Villette scheme (above), designed around points, lines, and surfaces. The design, which looks to induce exploration, movement, and interaction, fits into my intention to intensify the experience of the consumption of art, as well as challenging the art gallery typology. The lower image reflects my initial decentralised design intentions. For my scheme, I see water as a facilitator and activator of site through the power of flooding & in doing so recreating the themes unpacked from the painting. 106

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Year 2015 Water Level

Year 2100 Water Level

Year 2200 Water Level

The set of diagrams above reflect the projected rise in water levels in central Rotterdam, illustrating current and future key dates. Rotterdam has a strong branding campaign full with many documents & strategies, which project the city as a place that lives with water, even engages with the reality of flooding, with more and more city projects, from water plazas to green roofs.

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Benthemplein, Rotterdam, Totality, Detail & Aftermath - Living with water.

Unpacking Context

Living with Water City Branding Rotterdam has positioned itself as a model city to other delta cities, putting initiative and emphasis on learning to live with water instead of fighting it. The city projects itself, having grand and ambitious plans, setting out city scale water strategies. Along with that are large scale branding campaigns, which showcase city projects that attempt to capture, store and expose the presence of water to the general public, creating public consciousness with water & living with it. Around ninety percent of Rotterdam is below sea level, what further compounds that fact is there appears to be not enough room in the densely built up centre of Rotterdam to dig additional ditches/moats to prevent the cities streets from flooding during extreme rainstorms, as well not having enough porous green space around the central areas. The growing impact of climate change has meant Rotterdam has looked to position itself as a model too other delta cities.

Changing Perceptions

Water in Public Space & Water a City Rethink The photos above show a water plaza in Rotterdam, its design approach sums up my research & subsequent strands of thought on how water and more importantly flowing water can be seen to be part of accepted public life, rather than something to hide and defend from.

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Taxonomy of Water Towers - Forming Hybrid Objects

Water Tower - Materiality, Connections & Experience

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Diagram - Re-imagining the water tower typology through criticality.

+ Bosch Object

Water Tower

Water Towers & Bosch

A Hybrid Thematic Relationship Water towers serve a practical water storage/management function. As well as a clear signifier of the presence of water and its importance, being elevated structures. What is important about this typology is rather than just visual concealers of water they are instead visual markers, this fact makes them a very fitting typology to engage with for my thesis idea. The image of the water splash (C, left) has been included to try to sum up Rotterdam’s paranoia with water, as water appears to be always around Rotterdammer’s, almost part of their sub consciousness, this is something I later go on to exploit and embody through design, particularly with my ‘Tell the Tale’ detail. The Diagram above illustrates my thinking, at this point I ask whether we can re-imagine and challenge how this typology stores, pumps and uses water. Can we create an architectural experience from this rethink, a response that playfully challenges our preconceptions of what water towers do? 110

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Innocence

Paradise

Temptation

Greed

Indulgence

Foolishness

Lust

Damnation

Reckoning

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Taxonomy of Bosch Deconstruction & Unpacking Above is a taxonomy of the potential architectural moments in Boschâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s artwork. All have folly like forms, though each object has very individual characteristics, later leading to differing outputs from the process of deconstruction and re-imagination. Depending on where they are positioned within the triptych, (Heaven/Earth/Hell) influences how they are inhabited. The individualistic qualities of each of the nine objects allow for a rich process of deconstruction and form re-imagined, reprogrammed moments.

Taxonomy of Floating Art Depositories Hybridity

To the left is a taxonomy of my final art depositories, each one has been heavily influenced by each of the Bosch characters above. The characters have informed the overarching form, influenced my thinking on how art would be viewed within each one, as well as how each one is entered and interacted with by visitors. All are made up of two floors of gallery space as well as workshops/private art collector space below, these lower spaces are activated through water buoyancy, as they rise they become accessible. The processes involved in the design of these really brings to the fore my interest in unpacking meanings and ideas and embodying them within my architectural response at multiple levels, from programmatic decisions to aesthetics and form. This will be summed up in the following pages, as a brake down this very process in which I took.

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Depository H - Design development & Sketch process

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A C

H Process - (A) Position on Painting (B) Bosch Object (C) Deconstruction of Bosch (D) Embodiment of Bosch (E) Water Tower Hybrid Object (F) Design Development (G) Final Form (H) Internal Experience - Damnation & Working for the Art

Art Depository H - Damnation Object, Hybridity & Embodiment

The page illustrates the process undertaken for art depository H, these processes of unpacking object specific themes and realizing a designing that embodies them was a process taken across all of the nine objects. I first took the Bosch character and selected a water tower that could potentially relate to it in regards to form; I then undertook a de-constructing process, re-imagining the Bosch character, in the Museum Park context. The development sketches on the left show my sketch process & critical strains of thought. Reflecting ideas of how we view art, how visitors enter the depository, how art is loaded into the space from below, how the building floats, and its connection to site. 114

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Bosch Object

Water Tower

Location on Site

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Axonometrics of Art Depository H Damnation

The Design The depository is located in the hellish part of the Bosch triptych, hence its name â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Damnationâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;. This has influenced how people view art, they need to pull the art down from above via pulleys (working for it). Also how people enter, they have to push a pot of water up the stair entrance, giving the building a measure of water before they are allowed to enter. The entrance is deliberately set below the internal floor level, this to exaggerate the buildings height. The raft is made from a more man made, appearingly fragile construction. This links back to the character who is ominously supported by swaying boats.

On Reflection The design process created hybrid relationships and formed embodied meanings and themes drawn out from the painting as a whole. As well as from each individual object within the painting in which I de-constructed and re-imagined within a new context. The processes of unpacking,

deconstruction and embodiment developed here then were taken onto to my thesis project, to form critical research.

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Bosch Object

Water Tower

Location on Site

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Location of object within painting - Hell

Internal Perspective, Object & Detail Moment

Art Depository I

Internal Perspective

The folly is located in the hellish part of the Bosch triptych, hence its name â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Reckoningâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;. In the piece the character appears to consume people and drop them out as waste, visitors are made to walk up the suspended stair, pumping water up the building with each step using their own weight. The waste has informed my environmental strategy, this art depository focuses on the digitalization of art, and I propose to use the waste heat from servers to heat the pool above.

Within art depository I the visitors are immersed within the artwork. After a walk up the suspended staircase visitors can bathe within a heated pool. The walls of the pool are lined with a layer of LED panelling, which can map art onto the space through LED lighting technology, allowing the visitors the opportunity too not only be fully immersed in the world of the artwork but also view art in new ways, showcasing the potentialities of digitalizing art. This feeds into to my overarching critique of the modes of viewing art, re-imagining a way of viewing through digital media.

Reckoning

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Swimming in Art

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Above - Server Towers (Digitalisation of Art) Left - Integrated Section - Heated Pool

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Art Depository I Technical Strategies

Re-imaging London Olympics LED system

Embodiment of Themes, & Meanings

Technical Overarching Strategy My design strategy sits within a paradox between a playful provocation of public realm preconceptions with large amounts of water whilst also showing its looming threat at the same time. My technical strategy forms part of my deconstruction of Bosch. With this depository, I try to take those unpacks meanings and ideas and integrate into my technical thinking and strategies, forming a totalizing integrated embodiment of the painting for each depository.

An Immersive Art Experience Using LED modules embedded into panels, we can create colour changing capabilities, animated effects & patterns, the panels are connected to a server and midi controllers, which can cleverly interpret information, and in this context artwork, it could map the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Garden of earthly Delightsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; onto the walls, & floors of the space, created a fully immersive visitor experience, swimming in the artwork itself, importantly it re-imagines the art in a very different digital way.

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Wall Construction: Transparent Waterproofing Layer Embedded LED Panel System 100mm Rigid Insulation Board Steel Fin Structure Horizontal Cladding Rails Vertical Perforated Cladding Panels

Reflection & Thematic Thread The project research reflects a contemporary condition of artwork that is increasingly digitalised, the project engages with this to create new experiences with art. This is done through integrated technical and design strategies that are critical and form a re-imagination of our experience of art. This process undertaken through the project has strong ties to my thesis, in which I explored the contemporary digitalised condition of trading. I looked to produce a critical design response to the contemporary market experience, forming new relationships between the physical & digital as I did in this project.

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Pool Area

Liquid Cooling Equipment Storage Unit & Heat Exchange Plant Room

Pool Equipment Chlorinator, pump & sand filter Louvred Wall System Added Plant Room Ventilation

Server Heat Pipe to Heat Exchanger Server Unit Racks

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Pool at the Butte aux Cailles centre, France.

Adjacent and underground data centre to raise and maintain pool water temperature.

Plant Room Components - Pool Filter, Pool Pump & Motor, Water Pipes, Chlorinator, Server Units and Heat Exchanger. A liquid cooling process - server heat to warm water.

Art Depository I Technical Strategies Embodiment of Themes, & Meanings

Environmental Strategy (Waste & Consumption) The Bosch character has influenced my environmental strategy; the creature appears to consume people and pushes them out below as waste. My overarching intention is to digitalize the Boijmanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s collection, providing a platform for art to be consumed and experienced in new ways. This art depository highlights the digitalization of the collection. Focusing on waste and bringing it into another context of digitalizing the collection, servers are obviously needed and waste heat will be a product of that reality. The heat produced will be used to warm up the bathing pool within the depository above. The cooler pool water can in turn be brought down the structure to cool the servers below.

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A| Weight |B| Air Pressure |C| Water Flow

|1| Steel Beams & Joists |2| Metal Floor Deck |3| Ply-Board Deck |4| Rigid Insulation |5| LED Panel |6| Waterproofing Membrane

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Re-Imagine the Gym Stepper

Timber Tread Finish

Non return Valve

Inflatable Sits between Tread & Casework

Gutter System

Metal Case Work

Springs Sit Between Tread & Casework

Axonometric of stair case + Bosch object & design

â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Tell the Taleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Detail

Staircase Foot Pump - The Looming Threat The detail tests our relationship with water by creating a paradox between being playful with the event of flood whilst exposing its looming threat. It re-imagines the gym stepper within a new context, to bring water vertically up depository, instead of relying on a pump house norm. The detail uses simple principles of weight and removal of weight, as the visitor climbs the suspended staircase to reach the pool, water gets pushed vertically through a visible guttering system, with each step, until it reaches a water tank at the very top of the depository. The tank holds water until a point in time where it allows the water to drain; using gravity pressure it floods and activates other areas of site. 124

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â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Tell the Taleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Detail - Depository Scale

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The stair detail forms part of my ‘Tell the Tale’ detail, this section embodies the totality of the ‘Tell the Tale’ visitor experience. Water first is collected through the roofs of the depositories & walkways, then is pumped and stored within tanks. Water then is pushed through water walls, allowing the water to cascade down stepped landscape. The depository pool floods, its buoyant raft structure starts to float, parts of the depository then become accessible, changing visitor experience. Water then is forced up structures by visitor participation, using gravity water is allowed to fall and flood other areas of the site. 126

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Long Section

Site Activation Through Water Section through site, indicating site levels, above and below ground, as well as water marks for keys dates |2015 Current| and |2100 Projected|. Section illustrates the sheer extense of undulating landscape, and how each depository and art storage unit sits within the flooded landscape,

Reflection A major part of this project was about time, how over time the site is activated through water forming differing experiences for visitors between themselves, site, art and water. This section illustrates a moment of an active site, and only offers a small insight into that activity. To emphasize this idea of activity and change over time, I would have liked to of produce a section titled â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;After the Floodâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; emphasising the changing site dynamics, and reflecting the inevitability of my idea, which is to flood the polder within Museum park, creating a flooded dispersed landscape, very different to the section above.

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Diagrams - The effects of flood over time + Water activating site, depository and visitor experience.

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Floating art depositories

New stepped landscape

Vehicle access ramp

Existing columns (Level -1) Clipped to suit new stepped landscape above

Existing floor plate (Level -1) Punctured at depository locations

New art depository walls Existing columns (Level -2) Vehicle access ramp

Existing floor plate (Level -2)

Existing columns (Level -3)

Vehicle access ramp

Existing carpark walls & floor plate

Axonometric - structural strategy & a re-appropriation of carpark

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B C

4 D E 5

1 - Sunken landscape, 2 - Loading of art(-1), 3 - Backstage Activities (-2), 3 - Carpark level (-3), 4 - Additional base of column restraint

A - Waterproofing layer, B - Steel re-bars, C - Pre-cast concrete step, D - Existing columns, E, Steel head of column restraint

Stage 5 Hybrid Objects Site, Museumpark Carpark, Rotterdam

Thesis Project Site, Eldon Gardens, Re-imagining Failing Shopping Zone

Technical Strategy

Thematic Thread

The Sinful traits of humans depicted within Bosch’s piece can be re-imagined through the ‘Sinners Garden’ Carpark. On the right hand side of Bosch triptych is the portrayal of hell, which appears to show the torture of the damned by exaggerated man made instruments. The excavation and the excessive mounts of concrete can be viewed as sinful, and very much man made. The location of my site serves a practical purpose too, it’s an existing excavated site, it also its directly adjacent to the Boijmans, so can be accessed from within the gallery. The existing hard landscaping is not permeable and goes against the premise of my project.

For this project, I re-imagined the existing carpark and surrounding area into a sunken-flooded landscape. I compiled a close study of the existing in order to form a re-imagination of it. This close study of the existing, to form a re-imagination of it goes across my body of work. My thesis project saw me reinvent site (Eldon Gardens) into a trading, betting zone, this was born out of a thorough and close study of the existing, including its existing structural and material integrity.

Reappropriating Existing

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Re-imaging & Embedding

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Art Collection Dispersed Across Landscape View from Swivel Path

Perspective depicts lovers kissing, reference to the sinful love gardens depicted in Bosch’s ‘Garden of earthly Delights’. Depositories D, F & G can be seen within landscape, connecting elevated walkways as well as the art storage units which are loaded with the rest of the Boijmans collection.

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Art Collection Dispersed Across Landscape View from Flanking Water Bridge

Perspective depicts a visitors view from the flanking walkways that run up the side of the site. Water is seen to be collected above you, it flows past your field of sight, collected immediately below you and flows across sunken landscape below that, activating art depositories through buoyancy.

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Montage (2015 Celebration of Bosch - Museumpark)

Montage of Scenario (2100 Celebration of Flood - Museumpark)

Site Over Time - The Flood

A Changing Water Activated Landscape (Current & Future Events) The site plan deliberately highlights water within site but also the existing water ways within Musuempark, which can become potential future connections following the inevitable flood. Following the removal of the polder defence of Museumpark the project envisions a projected future scenario where the floating art depositories save the Boijmans Museum collection from rising water. This could then form part of cities â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Delta Cityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; branding campaign, attracting people from afar.

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GC3 - 3.1/3.2

Final Wall Presentation - Hybrid Objects

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Stage 5 RE-MATERIALIZE Rotterdam, Hybrid Objects Floating Art Depositories - Re-imagining the Consumption of Art

Critical Reflection What initially drew my interest to the brief for â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Hybrid Objectsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; was its emphasis on the in-between of viewer and object. This sparked a previous interest from my undergraduate course, in-which I looked at in-betweenness in terms of derelict, non-space, with the goal of re-imagining existing space, ideas and perceptions. With this process, I attempted to unravel themes from the piece, which would then lead onto a developing architectural response. As previously mentioned, the skills of critically unpacking objects and contexts developed through the project brief, were taken into my thesis project. Within this project, I found it hard to represent the intensity and changing landscape across my final presentation, at this stage of my degree I wanted to explore how I could portray time, and intensity through a successful mode of representation. I felt the presentation of this project would of been aided by an exploration into representation, intensity, in an attempt to really sale both these ideas of change over time and an ominous threat of rising water. As previously mentioned this challenge appears across all my projects, and in differing ways, I tried to explore that within multiple representation modes.

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Abstract “Live projects ...exist in complex, unpredictable spaces where skills of negotiation, fleetness of foot, resourcefulness, time management, and ability to deliver within changing) constraints to a range of audiences are at stake and of value.”

Wildlife Hide, Window cladding detail

In the context of this project, the term ‘Live Build’ is not only associated with a change in architectural pedagogy, but also relating to a specific kind of research methodology. This methodology of ‘research by design’ becomes an important idea to discuss, challenging the thought that research in architecture is just “a structured investigation of which the goal is communicable knowledge”

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Stage 5 & 6 LINKED RESEARCH Live Build Project

Testing Ground 2017

Brief “This Linked Research project will give you the opportunity to participate in an ongoing programme of live build projects. The main project will be the design and construction of a bird hide at Kielder, Northumberland where you will work with a variety of organisations including the Kielder Art and Architecture programme. You will also collaborate with engineers and utilise innovative new hygromorphic materials. You will have the opportunity to produce the world’s first permanent building integrated demonstration of these technologies.” Location: Kielder Forest and Park Client: Northumbria Water PLC Overview: Bakethin Masterplan Budget: 25,000 from HLF Heritage Lottery Fund & 10,000 from Newcastle University The project involves the development of three structures surrounding a site of potential osprey nesting within the Kielder National Park, Northumberland. The three structures (Welcome, Bird hide and Viewpoint) will form part of a wider Bakethin Masterplan scheme, from Kielder Water & Forest Park Development Trust and Kielder Art & Architecture.

Developing Thematic & Realities The project required a set of very different demands and skill sets in order to undertake it successfully. However, it did allow me to keep developing my interest detailing and materials, how within design applications they can embody meanings and associations. The extensive detailing demands and conversations with the client body allowed us to deliver community intent through a close and detailed focus on materials.

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Live Build Project Responsibility Matrix

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A - Sketch design for all three structures, B - Client meeting, C - Design of wildlife hide including thematic ideas, D - Photo of through sketch process.

Client & Planning

Iteration, Discussion & Compromise The project allowed for a very much hands on approach to design and construction, allowing us to interact with multiple job roles: contractors, clients, consultants, as well as working as a large design team. The responsibility table (left) shows the number of roles involved in the project delivery. Photo B above, taken of one of our multiple client meetings, these meetings were very helpful exercise for progressing the design. Offering a chance for all parties to come together around the table, and discuss the intentions for the project, and at this point conservation around planning.

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GC1 - 1.1/1.2/1.3

GC4 - 4.3

GC6 - 6.1/6.2/6.3

GC7 - 7.2/7.3

GC8 - 8.2/8.3

GC9 - 9.2

GC10 - 10.1/10.2/10.3

GC11 - 11.1/11.2/11.3

A - Exploded axonometric showing multiple layers of wildlife hide structure, B - External charred larch cladding sample

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A - Prototyping in workshop, B - Detailed design of forest hide tall windows

Detailed Design Stage

Prototype, Iteration & Embodiment Following multiple meetings with the client body, and public consultations we agreed that charred larch would be used to clad the entirety of the structure. Having been part of both the design process and subsequent design meetings with client, I saw how as designers we could influence client intentions. Originally, the client was not keen on the charred larch, but through discussions, they soon felt it could represent the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Kielder Brandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;. Again, I involved myself in associated meanings with materials, going through the process but within real and live project circumstances.

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GC1 - 1.1/1.2/1.3

GC4 - 4.3

GC6 - 6.1/6.2/6.3

GC7 - 7.2/7.3

GC8 - 8.2/8.3

GC9 - 9.2

GC10 - 10.1/10.2/10.3

GC11 - 11.1/11.2/11.3

Photo taken of on site contractors laying the ground works and pad foundations for structure.

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A - Cladding battens fixed, B - Wall Hangars Metal Workshop, C - External Cladding nailed in battens, D - External roof joist fixing

Construction

Phasing, Time Management & Changing Weather Conditions A process of ordering materials was underway from mid-way through the technical design stage, this allowed us to have a steady and phased run of materials to build the different components of the structure. Works on site commenced with the ground-works contractor starting on the 13th of December 16. A week was dedicated just before the Christmas break, to prefab the substructure and one of the pods off site in the workshop. In the New Year the second pod was assembled and erected on site. The roof, cladding, flooring and installation of windows and doors followed just before Easter.

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GC1 - 1.1/1.2/1.3

GC4 - 4.3

GC6 - 6.1/6.2/6.3

GC7 - 7.2/7.3

GC8 - 8.2/8.3

GC9 - 9.2

GC10 - 10.1/10.2/10.3

GC11 - 11.1/11.2/11.3

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Final Outcome The final outcome of the project in the scheme of things was successful, the majority of it finished just in time, with only tweaks to do following the completion of the course. I personally feel the photos show a high quality construction and finish, and and a developed understanding of materials and material relationships. The project fell within the ÂŁ25,000 budget and the public now has full access to enjoy the building.

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GC1 - 1.1/1.2/1.3

GC4 - 4.3

GC6 - 6.1/6.2/6.3

GC7 - 7.2/7.3

GC8 - 8.2/8.3

GC9 - 9.2

GC10 - 10.1/10.2/10.3

GC11 - 11.1/11.2/11.3

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Stage 5 & 6 LINKED RESEARCH Live Build Project

Testing Ground 2017

Critical Reflection The project required different skill sets as well as extensive demands on time. It also did not share many thematic threads with the rest of my work. Despite these realities, I really enjoyed the challenge of the project, particularly when taking on a leading role in the detailing stage. As previously stated, over the two years I have developed an interest in material and detail, this project allowed me to push this interest in a very real way. As a group, we had to embody both the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Kielder Brandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; and local community through material choice but also then go through a process of sourcing those selected materials. This was real learning curve, and the lessons learnt here will only develop upon this interest with materials and detailing.

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Photo taken - Eldon Square, Site for Thesis & Report

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Figure 1. Location Plan

Stage 6 ARCHITECTURE & CONSTRUCTION

Process & Management

Intu Centre, Newcastle - Dealing with the Existing

Brief â&#x20AC;&#x153;The module aims to develop students skills, understanding and critical awareness of the issues involved in practicing architecture and in realising architectural designs as finished buildings.â&#x20AC;?

Developing Thematic & Realities This module allowed me the opportunity to learn about the core issues that would be associated with a live existing site as Intu Centre is. I have always been interested in intervening within existing structures, throughout undergraduate, into practice and then developing that interest over the last two years. The site of my thesis project, offered many real constraints, issues and incentives for many to write a report on.

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Professional Practice Report Eldon Gardens, Intu Centre, Newcastle A1 - Project Description My project brief is to develop a 21st century late-capitalist trading floor; the intention is to embed a financial trading space within a shopping environment, situated within the existing Eldon Garden Zone of Eldon Square, Newcastle (Figures 1 & 2).

A1 - Project Description Continued The client body is a joint venture between Intu Properties plc (shopping centre management company) & Box Options Exchange, director Ed Boyle (Trading Firm). The project envisions a future Northern Stock Exchange, following continuous dissolved powers and financial de-regulation. Lengthy research in the preparation of brief stage reflected Newcastle as a beta testing place, for new goods and consumables. Following discussions with client, Newcastle (Eldon Square) became a viable location for such a scenario. This proposal will include the following facilities: a trading floor and subsidiary spaces for trading; additional bar and restaurant units; the renovation of existing shops within Eldon Gardens; as well as a new atrium, in order to better link all of the existing programmatic elements of Eldon Gardens, as well as linking Eldon Gardens as a zone, to the rest of Eldon square. This will form a stronger ‘total environment’ and re-establish Eldon Gardens as a well-connected thriving zone. The quality objectives are to produce a new financial destination, requiring a highly finished building in order to entice global trading firms to further expand their office capacity and locate themselves within Newcastle. The client is keen for us as designers to take a reuse approach within our design strategy, and form a response to the existing building, instead of a complete demolition. The approximate project cost is projected to be 35 million; this is based on a sqm comparison calculation of Intu’s previous project, the refurbishment of the Grey’s Quarter within the Eldon Square complex, which totalled a figure around 25 million. It will be a traditional contract, one reason for that is due to client desiring a highly finished financial destination; this means that a traditional procurement route with its added contract administrative roles and checking procedures is the most appealing to the client. A special consideration for the project is that it’s an occupied building, the client has obligations to its existing tenants, to reduce disruption and provide a safe environment for shoppers. The intention is to get the build works that directly affect the existing shopping area finished before next high shopping period; this will be the responsibility of the site contractor to phase construction appropriately.

B1- I - Architects Responsibilities My professional obligations to client as an architect are set out in the arb code of conduct and my scope of services are set out in the RIBA standard agreement. The documents set out an expectation of architects to undertake reasonable skill and care across all work. Before any work is done, as a professional service it will involve the creation of a contract (form of appointment) between architect and client that sets out what both parties are to do.1 It is also my duty to keep client informed to any changes, this is a vital professional obligation in order to avoid potential misunderstandings between clients and myself as architect.2 An added project specific professional obligation due to the traditional procurement route and subsequent principal designer role taken on means I undertake all principle designer

Figure 2. Site Plan

duties under CDM. As the Health & Safety Executive Body points out, my responsibility to client from the onset due to CDM2015 Regulation is to make them aware if they are not already, that a principal designer should be appointed as early as possible in the design process. As the architect it’s our professional duty to not begin work until convinced that the client understands their duties under the regulations. I would advise client that they would need to notify the project to HSE with an F10 notification.3

B1- II - Client Priorities To establish client priorities, ambitions and terms of appointment as architects we need to engage and query client to form a thorough initial architectural brief. As commercial clients, they are likely to be more familiar with this process. Despite their previous experience, it is still important at the initial brief development stage that we obtain a large level of information from the clients. Due to the client body being a joint venture, which have no previous working history, this is an added risk implication. The establishment of terms of appointments, and fee structure for all parties at an early stage is important. The clients have envisioned the project as a destination, which will entice global trading firms to set up an office within Newcastle. They have prioritized value on building finish to embody a destination. This priority has influenced the decision to undertake the project through a traditional procurement route. This is due to a number of reasons, firstly with this procurement route, it allows for more drawing information to be produced pre-site commencement which the contractor needs to sign off and build to. Also as lead designer the procurement route creates a contract administrator role, which allows us as architects to regularly check on site build work, and retain high quality build standards, a point I talk about later. 1 RIBA Standard Agreement 2010 (2012 revision): Architect, RIBA, RIBA Publishing, Oct 2012. 2 The Architects Code: Standards of Professional Conduct and Practice 2017, Architects Registration Board, 2017. 3 The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015, Health & Safety Executive, 2015

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B1- III - Site Constrains

B1- V - Professional Input

One site constraint is the reality that the site has existing business responsibilities, therefore has significant time constraints. This will affect our appointment strategy, and see us appoint a consultant contractor within a consultancy role early on to inform our design process and strategy of mitigating disruption and time addition. This can be achieved through construction phasing measures and establishing a strategy that responds to the delivery and opening hours of site. To further mitigate time as risk, we may advise the inclusion of large liquidated damages clauses in the contract; in case the contractor runs over.

As project architect I will compile a resource plan to be drawn up before the commencement of project, in order to address the staffing requirements in relation to the design program. With my duty of care as an architect, I need to ensure that I have the sufficient technical resources within house. I will advise client to appoint other professionals at an early stage, either as designers or acting within a consultancy role to best obtain successful statutory approvals. It is important that as an architect I emphasize to client the value in other consultants, and what they offer at an early stage.

Due to it being an existing building it is my duty to make the client aware that adverse constructability issues can be numerous. My obligation would be to advise them to appoint other professionals where appropriate to inform the design and mitigate future risks. One potential risk is that when the contractor commences work on site, they may find discovery items, which could potentially delay program and increase costs through making good. To mitigate this particular risk, it is important that we request a thorough package of survey information at the start of the project.

I would advise the client on the appointment of a structural engineer early into RIBA stage 1, to achieve a competent understanding of the existing structure. This appointment will inform our feasibility package, allowing us to competently explore different design possibilities. Due to the project being a new programmatic typology, the studies will determine whether it is feasible to achieve the client aims within the defined constraints (existing structure).

In summary both site constraints add extra layers of risk, which increase the amount of information required, thus affecting the project implementation. However involving other professionals early on has the potential to achieve value through mitigating unforeseen added costs and time later on into the project.

B1- IV - Statutory Approvals On behalf of client I need to obtain planning approval from the local statutory authority, Newcastle Planning Authority. My statutory obligation is to be aware of all guidelines set out by the local planning authority and my intention would be to advise client on pursuing a pre-application process undertaken by us, due to the numerous site constraints.

Other advisement on appointments would include an acoustic consultant, who will provide an initial study of the acoustic qualities of the existing structure, informing our initial massing strategies. Further into the detailed design process, when spaces become more specific, this appointment can provide us with specialist advice on the acoustic issues between public and private areas of the design. It is important then that this consultant is included in design team correspondence and attends design meetings with the wider team. This importance can be added to a competent service engineer, who if appointed early will allow us to obtain a greater understanding of what the existing provides in terms of M&E and how we can potential utilize this through clever design.

Along with the architects D&A statement and associated drawings, I would also expect additional documents to be produced by relevant professionals to validate the planning application. This may include an environmental noise report, due to its built up inner city location and close proximity of existing housing stock. Despite Eldon Gardens not being listed, it falls within the Leazes Conservation Area (please see figure 3 below), which would result in a conservation area character appraisal report, produced by the appointed planning consultant on behalf of client. The planning application will also cover the programs additional A2 use (Financial and Professional Services). Following the successful planning application, as lead designer I would need to start correspondence with the Local Authority Building Control, resulting with a full building regulations application. Throughout the planning and building regulation process it is my duty to client that I keep them informed on guidelines and statutory requirements. Another legal requirement, related to CDM, states we would assume to take on principle designer role within this procurement route; which means that we need to inform client of their duty to notify the health and safety executive (statutory body) that they are planning to undertake construction works.4

Figure 3, Leazes Conservation Area Character Statement, Newcastle Council

4 The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015, Health & Safety Executive, 2015

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GC6 - 6.1/6.2/6.3 GC10 - 10.1 GC11 - 11.1/11.2/11.3

GA2 - 5

B2 - I - Controlling “Risk” (Potential Obstacles to Achieving Value) on this Project Statutory approval is an obvious risk and obstacle for all architectural projects due to the reality as architects, that we cannot guarantee obtaining it. To reduce the risk as Newcastle City Council state that the architect should acknowledge all local authority guidelines and statutory requirements to obtain the optimum chance of success. This is a professional obligation for the architect, in order to mitigate the risk of a decline application, and subsequent disruption to project schedules. As this is a complex project with a number of risks associated, I would advise the client to allow us to submit a pre-application with the Local Planning Authority as soon as possible. Though it is not required, it helps us to identify a potential need for specialist advice early on; it helps the preparation of the following full planning application, whilst also starting an early form of correspondence with the local planning authority. Newcastle City Council aids the planning process with their provided validation checklist, which sets out when and what information is required. To ensure as the project architect that I have submitted the correct amount of information for my application on behalf of client, it is key with this application that I familiarize myself with the guidelines, and completion of the pre-application process will aid with that. 5 As stated previously, the adaption and reuse of the clients existing building premises poses a number of obvious risks, and generally has a greater risk profile than an equivalent new-build project. This will require me as the architect to contact relevant bodies, organisations and professionals in reasonable time to form early correspondence and obtain the relevant advice to form successful statutory applications. Throughout the process of compiling the relevant information on the existing condition of the building (i.e. structural and M&E reports), it is my obligation to notify client of the development. One potential risk due to it being an existing building, is the production of an asbestos survey, due to the demolition and refurbishment and striping back to the structure of some areas of Eldon Garden. As part of the principle designer role, as set out in the Health & Safety Executive’s ‘Asbestos: The Survey Guide’, it falls under my obligation to advise client on obtaining a relevant specialist survey, identifying whether or not there is any risk, and then to share that with the building contractor.6 Due to the site being a shopping centre (live environment) and the plan to maintain the on-going running of existing tenant businesses whilst site construction takes place, it poses additional issues and risks. There is also likelihood for potential public interaction with site due to the refurbishment of an occupied building. As the ‘Good Practice Guidance for Refurbishing Occupied Buildings’ sets out, the programme for refurbishment should be coordinated with occupants and tenants activates from the beginning of the project to mitigate existing disruption. One obvious disruption for existing occupants is from noise and dust pollution of site works; a strategy needs to be set out to control disruption, this can be formed through early discussions with building contractor and a subsequent production of a phasing strategy.

5 Validation of Planning Applications in Tyneside. 1st ed. Newcastle: N.p., 2016. Web. 18 Apr. 2017 6 Good Practice Guidance for Refurbishing Occupied Buildings (C621), W Fawcett, J Palmer July CIRIA 2004

Dealing with an existing occupied building creates many additional risks and makes it critical that principle designer responsibilities are carried out from the onset. It is essential to distinguish risks and take measures to control or eliminate them if possible early on and this is done through a thorough health and safety assessment process that should be integrated across the design process, in order to adhere to all health and safety legislation. As principal designers within the traditional procurement route and under client duties stipulated in the recent CDM2015 regulations, we gain the responsibilities to identify pre-construction, construction and post construction potential risks. This relies on our professional judgment when considering the best way to control and manage potential risk. It falls under our obligation within this role to consult with or bring in any relevant others to advise on the CDM risks and implications. Within this role, as principle designer, we are obligated to produce a risk register. This is produced within the design process following the compilation of the single document. We are obligated under the regulations to hand the document over along with all relevant drawing information to site contractor before site commencement. For this project, part of that document should include the specialist survey information (i.e. asbestos survey).7

B2- II - Achieving “Value” (Success in the Client’s Terms) on this Project As previously stated the clients have envisioned the project as a destination, to attract global trading companies to invest in Newcastle as one of their trading office locations. This would inherently imply a value in the finish and quality of design. As the job running architect, and lead designer, it falls within my obligations to establish a thorough brief and provide the duty of care throughout the project to achieve this value for client. Client value in quality and finish can often influence the procurement route chosen by client. To ensure this, as the architect I would recommend a traditional procurement route, with a JCT 2016 standard building contract, as a traditional contract can often keep tight control on quality for a number of reasons. Firstly with the nature of how the traditional procurement is set up, the drawing information package is completed before the site contractor signs the precommencement contract. This means that there is the detailed set of drawing information at contract signing stage, which puts in place a substantial legally binding engagement between builder and the client to complete the project, and build as the drawing information shows. The site contractor is responsible for ensuring the project is built in compliance with the building contract signed off between themselves and client, this is set out in the RIBA Architects Services document.8

7 The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015, Health & Safety Executive, 2015 8 RIBA: Explaining an Architects Services, RIBA, RIBA Publishing, 2008.

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A2 – Gantt Chart Retrospective Commentary

As lead designer, regarding professionalism in relation to clients demand for quality of finish, I would recommend the use of certain subcontractors of whom I have dealt with before and whom have provided professionalism and a competent level of skill. If selected by client these may be named in the building contract with the contractor so the contractor knows whom the employer wishes to use pre site commencement. Though one of the clients has recently and successfully completed other projects in the wider Eldon Square site, they might wish to reuse consultants and subcontractors and as an architect I can assist with the comparison and selection of these. The procurement route has the potential to also affect the construction phase in regards to finish quality. As lead designer it will also set me up with a contract administrator role. As stated in the RIBA Plan of Work 2013 document, the role gives me an added responsibility to client, which involves me carrying out repeated site checks to oversee progress, and to ensure what contractor builds is identical to what the design drawing information signed off sets out.9 If I were to notice something built on site that is not as what the signed off drawings set out, as the contract administrator I have the powers to uphold the clauses in contract between client and site contractor to have it removed and made good. This ensures an extra level of build quality throughout the build process, and ensuring that the client’s value in finish is maintained. By maintaining a high quality design and build process, it increases the chances of post completion long-term success. Despite this projects obvious risk as a new typological proposition, an architecture that embodies a destination and landmark can be physically materialized. In regards to time, traditional procurement is potentially the longest procurement option from a projects start to finish. This is generally due to more time being given to producing more information before site commencement. As well as this, the procurement route does not make the project inevitably less costly. The likelihood is that a different form of co tract and procurement, such as Design and Build, will potentially generate the cheaper cost. Quality of finish may be inevitably sacrificed through a Design and Build route, as the contractor may potentially try and keep costs lower by sacrificing areas of quality, due to less information being signed off recommencement. There is value added in appointing a Quantity Surveyor early on into the project to allow accurate costs to be established in our process of generating pre-construction drawing information to go in our tender submission to ensure we have an accurate appreciation of costs for the project. This is important as the project has numerous other risks, and with this early appointment it can mitigate cost as a one of the potential risks for client later into the project.

Having produced a Gantt chart for the live build module it allowed us to begin to break down the project, responding to milestones across the year, an obvious one being the February completion of Wildlife hide (main structure). One issue though, that wasn’t fully reflected in the Gantt chart, was the realistic expectations of completing the other structure (welcome point) before the commencement of the main structure in November. We never managed to complete the structure before the commencement date set out in the chart. This risk management mistake resulted in a project overrun, which needs to be resolved in the summer.

Bibliography The Architects Code: Standards of Professional Conduct and Practice 2017, Architects Registration Board, 2017. RIBA Standard Agreement 2010 (2012 revision): Architect, RIBA, RIBA Publishing, Oct 2012. The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015, Health & Safety Executive, 2015 Validation Of Planning Applications In Tyneside. 1st ed. Newcastle: N.p., 2016. Web. 18 Apr. 2017 Health & Safety Executive: Asbestos: The Survey Guide, Health & Safety Executive, HSE, Second edition 2012. Good Practice Guidance for Refurbishing Occupied Buildings (C621), W Fawcett, J Palmer July CIRIA 2004 RIBA Plan of Work Overview 2013, RIBA, RIBA Publishing, 2013. RIBA: Explaining an Architects Services Document, RIBA, RIBA Publishing, 2008. Chappell, D. and Dunn, M. (2016). The Architect in Practice, 11th Edition. 1st ed. John Wiley & Sons.

Time management can be aided through utilising shared Building Information Modelling software, in accordance with other consultants from an early stage, to allow the easier transfer of building information across work stage, and legal authoritative milestones. As the architect, the use of BIM should be discussed with client from the start; due to the complexity of the project I would advise upon it. In summary, it falls under my professional obligations to establish with client the realistic balance between cost, time and finish intentions, and these discussions are to be had at an early stage.

Project Time Table, Live Build Project - Time Management 9 RIBA: Plan of Work Overview 2013, RIBA, RIBA Publishing, 2013.

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GC6 - 6.1/6.2/6.3 GC10 - 10.1

GC11 - 11.1/11.2/11.3

GA2 - 5

GC1 Ability to create architectural designs that satisfy both aesthetic and technical requirements.

GC5 Understanding of the relationship between people and buildings, and between buildings and their environment, and the need to relate buildings and the spaces between them to human needs and scale.

GC1The graduate will have the ability to:

GC5 The graduate will have an understanding of:

1.1 Prepare and present building design projects of diverse scale, complexity ,and type in a variety of contexts, using a range of media, and in response to a brief;

5.1 The needs and aspirations of building users;

1.2 Understand the constructional and structural systems, the environmental strategies and the regulatory requirements that apply to the design and construction of a comprehensive design project;

5.2 The impact of buildings on the environment, and the precepts of sustainable design; 5.3 The way in which buildings fit into their local context.

1.3 Develop a conceptual and critical approach to architectural design that integrates and satisfies the aesthetic aspects of a building and the technical requirements of its construction and the needs of the user.

GC2 Adequate knowledge of the histories and theories of architecture and the related arts, technologies and human sciences.

GC6 Understanding of the profession of architecture and the role of the architect in society, in particular in preparing briefs that take account of social factors.

GC2 The graduate will have knowledge of:

GC6 The graduate will have an understanding of:

2.1 The cultural, social and intellectual histories, theories and technologies that influence the design of buildings;

6.1 The nature of professionalism and the duties and responsibilities of architects to clients, building users, constructors, co-professionals and the wider society;

2.2 The influence of history and theory on the spatial, social, and technological aspects of architecture; 2.3 The application of appropriate theoretical concepts to studio design projects, demonstrating a reflective and critical approach.

GC3 Knowledge of the fine arts as an influence on the quality of architectural design.

6.2 The role of the architect within the design team and construction industry, recognising the importance of current methods and trends in the construction of the built environment; 6.3 The potential impact of building projects on existing and proposed communities. GC7 Understanding of the methods of investigation and preparation of the brief for a design project.

GC3 The graduate will have knowledge of:

GC7 The graduate will have an understanding of:

3.1 How the theories, practices and technologies of the arts influence architectural design;

7.1 The need to critically review precedents relevant to the function, organisation and technological strategy of design proposals;

3.2 The creative application of the fine arts and their relevance and impact on architecture; 3.3 The creative application of such work to studio design.

7.2 The need to appraise and prepare building briefs of diverse scales and types, to define client and user requirements and their appropriateness to site and context; 7.3 The contributions of architects and co-professionals to the formulation of the brief, and the methods of investigation used in its preparation.

GC4 Adequate knowledge of urban design, planning and the skills involved in the planning process.

GC8 Understanding of the structural design, constructional and engineering problems associated with building design.

GC4 The graduate will have knowledge of:

GC8 The graduate will have an understanding of:

4.1 Theories of urban design and the planning of communities;

8.1 The investigation, critical appraisal and selection of alternative structural, constructional and material systems relevant to architectural design;

4.2 The influence of the design and development of cities, past and present on the contemporary built environment; 4.3 Current planning policy and development control legislation, including social, environmental and economic aspects, and the relevance of these to design development.

8.2 Strategies for building construction, and ability to integrate knowledge of structural principles and construction techniques; 8.3 The physical properties and characteristics of building materials, components and systems, and the environmental impact of specification choices.

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GC9 Adequate knowledge of physical problems and technologies and the function of buildings so as to provide them with internal conditions of comfort and protection against the climate. GC9 The graduate will have knowledge of: 9.1 Principles associated with designing optimum visual, thermal and acoustic environments; 9.2 Systems for environmental comfort realised within relevant precepts of sustainable design; 9.3 Strategies for building services, and ability to integrate these in a design project.

GC10 The necessary design skills to meet building users’ requirements within the constraints imposed by cost factors and building regulations. GC10 The graduate will have the skills to: 10.1 Critically examine the financial factors implied in varying building types, constructional systems, and specification choices, and the impact of these on architectural design; 10.2 Understand the cost control mechanisms which operate during the development of a project; 10.3 Prepare designs that will meet building users’ requirements and comply with UK legislation, appropriate performance standards and health and safety requirements.

GA2 With regard to meeting the eleven General Criteria at Parts 1 and 2 above, the Part 2 will be awarded to students who have: 1. Ability to generate complex design proposals showing understanding of current architectural issues, originality in the application of subject knowledge and, where appropriate, to test new hypotheses and speculations; 2. Ability to evaluate and apply a comprehensive range of visual, oral and written media to test, analyse, critically appraise and explain design proposals; 3. Ability to evaluate materials, processes and techniques that apply to complex architectural designs and building construction, and to integrate these into practicable design proposals; 4. Critical understanding of how knowledge is advanced through research to produce clear, logically argued and original written work relating to architectural culture, theory and design; 5. Understanding of the context of the architect and the construction industry, including the architect’s role in the processes of procurement and building production, and under legislation; 6. Problem solving skills, professional judgment, and ability to take the initiative and make appropriate decisions in complex and unpredictable circumstances; and 7. Ability to identify individual learning needs and understand the personal responsibility required to prepare for qualification as an architect.

GC11 Adequate knowledge of the industries, organisations, regulations and procedures involved in translating design concepts into buildings and integrating plans into overall planning. GC11 The graduate will have knowledge of: 11.1 The fundamental legal, professional and statutory responsibilities of the architect, and the organisations, regulations and procedures involved in the negotiation and approval of architectural designs, including land law, development control, building regulations and health and safety legislation; 11.2 The professional inter-relationships of individuals and organisations involved in procuring and delivering architectural projects, and how these are defined through contractual and organisational structures; 11.3 The basic management theories and business principles related to running both an architect’s practice and architectural projects, recognising current and emerging trends in the construction industry.

ARB CRITERIA 156

LAURENCE WILLIAM ASHLEY