19 minute read
Did You Know?
with Niloufar Emami
Molds 3D-printed with elastic resin prior to removal of supports.
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Q: How can 3D printing be used for making molds for repeatable casting of concrete?
A:
The pursuit of fabricating building components with complex geometries is driving innovation in contemporary architecture. With bespoke fabrication on one end and mass production on the other end of the fabrication spectrum, custom repetitive manufacturing (CRM) provides a solution for fabricating customized and complex yet repeatable building parts in the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industry. Concrete is a building material with excellent structural and architectural qualities which can be cast into any shape. 3D printing molds, into which concrete can be cast, open new avenues for investigating the fabrication of concrete components. Many studies that employed 3D printing molds for casting concrete create one mold per part where each mold is destroyed to release the part. These methods work for creating nonstandard geometric shapes, yet they are not efcient for scale-up for repeatable complex geometries. If these methods are to be scaled, reusability of the 3D printed molds becomes important bec ause it is not efcient to 3D print one mold per part. Advanced design strategies must be employed to create design variability with repeatable parts. To realize those design proposals, fabrication methods that can accommodate the creation of complex geometries while allowing reusability remain elusive. 3D-printed fexible formwork ofers the potential to cast complex geometries while allowing relatively easy release of the parts in multiple demolding cycles.
From a diferent perspective, repeatable complex geometries have been historically used to form arches and vaults. In fact, knowledge embedded in centuries-old techniques ofers unique opportunities in the context of digital design and fabrication. Stereotomy, an artisanal technique practiced by stone masons, allows complex units to be carved out of solids. Considering the assembly of stereotomic modules, a solid whole is composed of unique, discrete, structurally independent units fabricated separately. The principles of stereotomy are seen in the design and construction of Topologically Interlocking Assemblies (TIAs) such as Abeille and Truchet fat vaults.
The 3D printed mold types with the corresponding cast instantiations.
My research demonstrates new approaches to a century-old technique using 3D printing formwork for casting concrete. The development of this method is facilitated by the advanced computational, simulation, and fabrication tools available to architects. I study how concrete may be used in lieu of stone or other solid materials for creating TIA. Inspired by complex geometries seen in TIA stereotomic assemblies, my research contributes by creating 3D printed elastic formwork for casting complex yet repeatable concrete units assembled to compose an interlocking assembly. With the advancement of large-scale 3D printing methods, this research advances innovation in structures where complex customized discrete modules create spatial enclosure, architectural facades, and surfaces.
Niloufar Emami, PhD, LEED GA, is the A. Hays Town assistant professor of architecture. She is a researcher, educator, and designer looking for gaps, intersections, and overlaps between architecture and multiple disciplines, using computational tools and fabrication techniques to provide creative yet performative solutions.
Niloufar Emami, Assistant Professor of Architecture
DESIGN in a Pandemic
- Marsha Cuddeback, Director of the School of Interior Design
When the COVID-19 virus swept the globe in early 2020, it seemed as if the world had changed entirely. As more information about the virus became known, it has become increasingly clear that the concept of space—the physical distance between people; indoors vs. outdoors; the way we use spaces to work and interact—is a crucial consideration for health outcomes. The way spaces are designed, repurposed, and reimagined can literally save lives.
6 FEET APART
Interior designers routinely face specific challenges when designing for particular spaces, but when the concern is viral transmission, the stakes are high: even life or death. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) recommends that to lower the risk of infection from COVID-19, individuals “socially distance”—maintain at least six feet/2 meters apart. So rearranging many interior spaces to more safely facilitate in-person interaction has become vital. “Our role in designing new and adapting existing interior environments will be essential as we begin to plan for healthy interior spaces,” said Marsha Cuddeback, director of the LSU School of Interior Design. “It is too soon to know the extent of the impact this pandemic has brought to bear on our interior environments, but we do know we must be ready for change.”
Buildings, communities, and organizations play a leading role in supporting our health and well-being, as well as our collective ability to prepare for and respond to global health challenges like the one we’re experiencing now, according to the Strategies From Well Building Standard to Support in the Fight Against COVID-19, by the Well Building Institute.
“The way we design interior environments, the materials and furnishings we specify, the arrangement of spaces to meet program requirements, and the spatial characteristics of our designs have a critical impact on health and wellbeing, productivity, comfort and satisfaction. Designers are responsible for creating interiors that improve the quality of our lives while protecting our natural environment.”
Illustrations by Hernan Andres Gonzales.
“We serve as agents for change, in part accomplished by understanding the interrelationship of people and the built and natural environments."
Interior designers will face many new challenges in a post COVID-19 environment. “We have learned a lot about how a pandemic impacts our lives, and we are still learning,” Cuddeback said. “Designers will be challenged to foreground evidenced base design and rethink the theory of proxemics and the boundaries of personal and social space.”
In preparation for the return to in-person learning for the fall 2020 semester, interior design faculty worked on facility modifications to keep students, faculty, and staff safer on campus. It was an exercise in using interior design methods for improved healthcare outcomes right at LSU.
“It made me realize how important interior design is now, more than ever before,” said Amelia Hernandez Aleman, BID 2021.
Even prior to the pandemic, the School of Interior Design had a curricular emphasis on healthcare design that included interior design students working directly with local healthcare facilities to propose improvements. These design projects go beyond aesthetic considerations, critically examining hospital rooms and assessing functionality.
The pandemic has emphasized the critical need for intelligent design. “The pandemic is prompting and accelerating conversations about the importance of health considerations when designing interior spaces,” said Julie Elliott, interior design instructor, who has decades of experience in healthcare design.
ID 3777 Design for Health and Wellbeing explores how the interior environment impacts human health and wellbeing. Students examine the principles and practices of indoor environmental quality, including thermal comfort, acoustic control, and indoor air quality, and explore design theories and processes for improving the quality of life through design.
Health and safety is now a key part of the design planning conversation, said alumna Jill Traylor (BID 1998), Director of Interiors at EskewDumezRipple design firm in New Orleans.
“Clients are looking to us for how they can alter their spaces in response to COVID-19 and the post-COVID world,” she said.
“It has involved a lot of research on our part into all aspects of interior environments including spatial layouts, circulation, furniture, materials, and air quality,” Traylor said. “Since information changes daily as more is learned about the virus, we have to stay on the pulse of best practices. I foresee some of these adaptations being the new standard in the future.”
The Great Outdoors
OUTDOOR SPACES
Landscape architects design a wide array of spaces, from massive city masterplans to private secret gardens. Here are some examples of LSU landscape architecture students’ work.
Site plan by Taylor Fehmel, MLA. Design for urban systems studio course exploring New Orleans public parks and open spaces.
Landscape architects have long been at the forefront of city planning efforts, national and international investment in public spaces, and involved in the growing concern for the future of green spaces. When scientific research demonstrated that transmission of the COVID-19 virus is diminished outdoors, spaces such as parks, yards, and urban greenways were reimagined to become classrooms, offices, meeting locations, and safer settings for in-person interaction.
Landscape architecture has always explored the way outdoor spaces can be modified and used more creatively, but the pandemic has made clearer how absolutely essential well-designed public parks, community greenspaces, trails, waterfronts, etc., are to our health, well-being, and social interaction.
In less than a year we have observed a transformation of many public spaces, said Mark Boyer, Director of the LSU Robert Reich School of Landscape Architecture. “The pandemic may have brought about a shift in the thinking about infrastructural space (streets and parking lots) and how it can be used or repurposed to serve pedestrians and diners rather than vehicles,” he said.
GARDEN
Max Guzzeta, BLA. Proposal for research-based therapeutic landscape design studio specializing in healthcare garden design.
- Mark Boyer, Director of the Robert Reich School of Landscape Architecture
“Hopefully, those who are decision makers in city government will realize the importance of investing in the development of public space in historically under-invested neighborhoods and communities who bore a disproportionate burden of loss of life during the pandemic.”
about infrastructural space.” “With more people working from home and less time commuting, people are using green spaces like parks and trails to exercise and safely socialize more frequently,” said Haley Blakeman, assistant professor of landscape architecture.
Blakeman has spent her career advancing city planning efforts from the community to national scale. During her ten years in leadership roles at the Center for Planning Excellence—a nonprofit honored with ASLA’s 2009 Olmsted Award—she dedicated her work to resiliency in climate change. In Louisiana, she has led essential work in over 25 communities. She has a progressive view of landscape architects as community leaders.
NATIONAL PARK
Perspective by Xu Lin, BLA. Project for “Culture and Design: Exploration in New Territories” advanced topics studio that worked with Denali National Park in Alaska and an agricultural tourism site in Chengdu, China.
“Access to these outdoor spaces is now, and will continue to be, critical in the future,” she said. Many LSU landscape architecture alumni firms are now leading the design of public works projects with long-term implications.
The pandemic has impacted how people are using personal outdoor spaces as well. People are turning to their yards for comfort, as safe social meeting spaces, for solitude—everything—said Joseph Richardson (BLA 2008). His firm, Joseph Richardson Landscape Architecture (JRLA), in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan region focuses on residential landscape design, and has seen an increase in business since the pandemic hit the U.S.
WATERFRONT
Student design from “Shifting Sands” studio exploring site designs for New York City’s barrier beaches.
“With vacations on hold and families spending so much time at home, many of our clients wanted to move forward with turning their outdoor spaces into entertainment sanctuaries,” he said.
“If anything, landscape architects are more in demand because clients are more comfortable conducting meetings outdoors. We’ve incorporated a number of putting greens and bocce courts into our designs this past year and have some exciting projects in the works for 2021.”
Private outdoor spaces have been transformed into retreats, during a year in which many have been in isolation. Even after the pandemic has passed, designers anticipate that this experience will have permanently altered the way we as a society work and play.
One thing is for certain: outdoor spaces will not be overlooked in the future.
“A Place to Wait” by Amelia Hernandez Aleman, BID. LSU Design Building courtyard sketch from Design for Heath and Wellbeing course.
THE ARCHITECTURE OF HEALTH & SAFETY
A building’s design can “make or break” whether it’s conducive to social distancing and other health best practices. Many densely packed urban cities were the earliest places the virus cases surged, as the existing infrastructure forced people closer together.
But New Orleans’ historic architecture is uniquely suited to pandemic living, according to National Geographic, in a recent interview with Lake Douglas, LSU College of Art & Design associate dean of research. Historical architectural styles of Louisiana homes are more befitting to social distancing, with classic verandas and sweeping porches from which people can interact.
New designs are following suit, finding innovative ways to bridge connections between interior and exterior spaces. And architects have adapted quickly to the challenges of designing during the pandemic, said Christine Cangelosi Redmon (BArch 2010), architect at EskewDumezRipple.
“As a design team, we have all learned how to utilize our online platforms to collaborate better and grow in our communication styles,” she said. “We take for granted all the casual conversations in our shared spaces, so when we lost the ability to all be together, we had to learn quickly how to make sure everyone was communicating effectively. Being more facile in the online collaboration mediums has allowed us to still work as a team, harvesting the best ideas from everyone, while following safety guidelines.”
- Christine Cangelosi Redmon, BArch 2010
Christine Cangelosi Redmon
- Christine Cangelosi Redmon, BArch 2010
“As advocates for healthy environments, the pandemic helped make our case to many clients. We often push for higher ventilation rates, operable windows, access to nature and fresh air as well as environmentally responsible finishes that can be easily disinfected, but it was not always a priority for each job,” Cangelosi Redmon said.
“Now it is the first thing most clients want to discuss, which is refreshing and exciting for all end users. I think the future is full of healthier environments because of this pandemic.” “The pandemic has made us all more aware of the range of personal comfort around health and safety,” she said.
“Before the pandemic, the conversation was limited to user experience, whereas now we are talking about user experience within the context of a range of health and safety protocols,” she explained. “The broadening of this discussion is leading to more inclusive, diverse and rich conversations about the environments around us.”
The EDR team has remained positive in the face of tough times. “One of our principals and fellow LSU alum Mark Ripple went the extra mile to bring joy to our faces by dressing as ‘Caution Man,’” she shared. “His 6 feet of separation cape brought many laughs and smiles. When I asked Mark about ‘Caution Man,’ he reminded me that it is the role of design leadership to make people feel safe so they can create. He knew we would be okay despite the pandemic—after all, the firm did survive Katrina.”
Art at a DISTANCE
ART IN THE TIME OF CORONA
- Stephanie Cobb, MFA 2021
Many artists have turned their practice inward and focused on expressing and processing the experiences of life during quarantine, a global pandemic, and the many other challenges people have faced in the last year.
“When we engage ourselves in creative activity, we don’t feel alone. Instead, we become engrossed in the act of making, which engages the senses and focuses our attention, creating calm,” said LSU art therapy instructor Tiffanie Brumfield.
LSU art students, faculty, and alumni have created pieces across a range of mediums documenting this existential experience. As with previous times of significant change, the events of 2020 have prompted many creative responses.
MFA candidate Stephanie Cobb’s practice focuses on connection, her paintings illustrating snapshots of human interaction and isolation. She selects subjects that are closely tied to personal experiences to create a visual language of both vulnerability and intimacy.
“My work is a private moment made public. My interest in image making has always been predominately fgurative, selecting subjects that are closely tied to personal experiences. Only closeness between artist and sitter will allow for intimacy in a portrait. My hope is to evoke with clarity our closeness, or our distance.”
Cobb’s series Closeness / Distance explores the concepts of distance, connection, and emotional space with exquisite lucidity. Her painting The Garden depicts people seated apart in a lush tropical garden, socially distanced and eyes averted. The scene captures the physical distances between individuals, the beautifully haunting spaces between us. The piece will be featured in the Spring 2021 issue of New American Paintings.
Her painting At Rest was included in the virtual exhibition Art in the Time of Corona, a title evoking the Gabriel García Márquez epic novel Love in the Time of Cholera. The exhibition includes works from painters across the globe, expressing in different styles the singular experiences that all people face. Featured on Artsy, “The goal of this innovative project is to record and exhibit (in real time) defining artwork created during civil uncertainty. The hope is to unite viewers and help them find the sanctity, comfort, and inspiration needed to heal a world in turmoil.”
Garden by Stephanie Cobb, MFA 2021
MFA candidate Diana Patin focused her 2020 spring virtual exhibition on the quarantine experience, stating:
“These images document my exploration of the home as an extension of self. Home to me, in addition to shelter, is comfort. It is non-judgement. It is acceptance. It is letting my guard down.”
Her photography documents seemingly mundane details of everyday life at home, which have become crucial parts of her emotional experience during the pandemic. “By engaging with familiar objects and activities such as journaling and reading, I was able to maintain a sense of calm,” she stated.
“The composition and tone of the images overall reflects this pursuit as well,” Patin said. “They are direct, meditative, and observational. The silhouette of a single tree in my yard against a moving night sky, and the shadows cast by a house plant at just the right time in the afternoon allude to a sense of time passing. Though the daily movement of light might be predictable, the particular sense of beauty and calm it evokes is not, which makes me wish to document it.”
“Recording this calm within the home has become tangible proof of its existence in myself as well,” she said. “Quiet and contemplative, these images encourage the viewer to fall into the moment and take a deep breath, soaking in the gentle comforts that come with a safe space created by one’s own hands and mind.”
Art can serve as a means of connection, both for viewers and fellow art-makers.
Art history alum Blaire Brown Stroemple launched Box of Art, a virtual painting party business that brings people together to make art while socially distancing—in the time of COVID-19 and beyond.
“I pushed myself to make this happen when coronavirus started,” she explained. “Since my ‘bread and butter’ is my live event painting business, I felt the financial burden of wedding cancellations. Instead of panicking I tried to learn from it and evolve.”
Box of Art offers group and private classes for adults and kids, with themes including abstract painting, sweet tea, or unicorns. The slogan is “Paint together, miles apart.” Brown takes pride in having evolved her businesses to meet the demands of the current world, while offering people a way to connect and find solace in making art.
She hopes that others will find joy in art-making, as she does.
“When I fnish a painting, there’s a feeling that’s hard to describe and it cannot be replaced by anything else.”
BATTLING THE LEVIATHAN
- Malcom McClay, Professor of Art/Sculpture
“Battling the Leviathan” Mardi Gras house sculpture by Professor Malcolm McClay.
Though traditional Mardi Gras parades were cancelled across Louisiana for the 2021 season due to the COVID-19 pandemic, New Orleans residents kept the Mardi Gras spirit alive through the Krewe of House Floats “Parade in Place” initiative. New Orleans-area homes have been decorated like Mardi Gras floats for spectators to view, as a safer option to the large crowds of the usual parades.
The Krewe of Houses has granted an opportunity for local artists to showcase their talents—including many LSU art alumni, students, and faculty—and even stimulate the local artisan economy. Most of all, the art spectacles are meant to raise spirits in a challenging time, and send the collective message that we are a united community and hopeful for the future. “The house float gave us an opportunity to continue our participation in Mardi Gras; however, we felt strongly from the beginning that we needed to do something different this year,” said LSU art/sculpture professor Malcolm McClay.
“It has been such a challenging time for so many people; and New Orleans has been particularly hard hit because the economy is so reliant on tourism; and many of the city’s artists and musicians cannot perform at their typical venues.”
For the Mardi Gras House Float, McClay and his wife, fellow artist Chicory Miles, designed sculptures that conjured a sense of history. “From the beginning, we agreed that we wanted to create something beautiful that hearkened back to Mardi Gras of the past. Our house was built in the 1890s and we live in a historic district. As you walk through our neighborhood in the Bywater, it is easy to imagine yourself living in another time.”
The sculpture is modeled to evoke a flag design from il Palio, a Medieval horse race in Siena, Italy. The Onda (wave) flag features the image of the leviathan, a mythical sea creature mentioned in both the Torah and the Bible. It is also the title of a political book by the philosopher Thomas Hobbes, written in 1651. In Leviathan, Hobbes uses the image of the leviathan to represent absolute power. The McClays decided to title the house float sculpture “Battling the Leviathan” as a nod to the mythologic and historic representing our modern-day challenges.
WE HOLD THESE TRUTHS
2020 was defined not only by the global pandemic, but also by the widespread political unrest across the United States. In fall 2020, Jeremiah Ariaz, professor of photography, debuted his exhibition We Hold These Truths, a selection of photographs he made across the U.S. during the Trump presidency. “Drawn from the Declaration of Independence, the title implicates ‘We’ the viewer as an active participant, acknowledging the collective responsibility shared in our democracy,” he said.
“The photographs reveal the anxiety felt across the nation and speak to this historic moment, as tensions run increasingly high in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election.”
We Hold These Truths by Jeremiah Ariaz, Professor of Art/Photography
With the November 2020 U.S. election looming, LSU art students engaged potential voters through an online exhibition with an empowering message: Get Out the Vote. Art students in Applied Typography: ART 4527 designed posters for the AIGA Get Out the Vote Campaign, which debuted as a virtual exhibition in October 2020. Taught by professor of art/graphic design Courtney Barr and graphic design instructor Meghan Saas, the course focused on gaining an understanding of typography in terms of its history, application, and aesthetic considerations.
“Voting is often easily pushed aside or dismissed as unimportant. The Get Out the Vote campaign serves as the perfect reminder that it is our duty as citizens to use our voice and demand change,” said BFA candidate Julia Lesage.
- Morgan Growden, BFA 2021
