PORTFOLIO LUIS B L A NC O Á LVA R EZ 2 0 1 4
Surname/First Name _ Blanco Álvarez/Luis Address _ Calle O’Donnell 10, 5ºA 28009 Madrid (Spain) Telephone Number _ (+34) 670 30 29 82 _ (+34) 91 575 89 95 E-mail _ luis.bajb@gmail.com Nationality _ Spanish Birth Date _ 15 October 1989
Having just recently completed my architecture studies in ETSAM, this portrait tries to summarize all the experiences and work that have marked all this years of evolution and growth. As the main highlight in this academic career the final diploma project reflects a whole series of architectural and design concerns that have been defined by my experience and resulted in the maximum grade given by the school. Through these selected works I demonstrate an increasing aptitude when facing each different project both inside academia and in personal projects. The various competitions entries have been possible due to great collaborative team work and interest on solving challenging problems. Great analytic skills and complex problem solving through multiple creative solutions are the foundation of my training and you can appreciate it in this portfolio. September 2014
CULTURAL TOWER IN PORTA TICINESE, MILAN Final diploma project ETSAM - june 2014 Tutor - Jose Manuel López-Peláez Grade - 10/10 summa cum laude The building is an itinerary. There are not plans. There are platform cycles that build a landscape around a void. A building where landscape and city coil into a tower. The tower suggests entrance and experimentation, to go all over and discover the unusual spaces that start existing in relation to the visitor. In a neighborhood characterized by the gothic substrate I display an industrial container. A light structure that establishes a great difference between the fragmented interior and the powerful exterior image. Porta Ticinese now has its museum in the concrete and steel palace. Each one of its inhabitants visits it, each one of its inhabitants wants to dwell it, but all of them choose the route according to their desires. The tower doesn’t have the attribute of staying in memory dot by dot like a clear sequence of the visited spaces. Each visitor organizes spaces in a different way. A thousand visitors mean a thousand memories.
I. Milan. Location in the territory.
II. Porta Ticinese. Description of the surrounding urban fabric.
III. Plans, elevation and geometrical system.
IV. Plans and arrangement of program.
V. Programmatic cycles.
VI. Programmatic cycles
VII. Model series - 3d space studies.
VIII. Detailed cross section and elevation – construction details.
IX. Geometry and structural analysis of steel structure and glass roof.
X. Geometry and structural analysis of concrete platforms.
FESTIVAL CENTRE IN BATH, UK Fourth year final project - University of Bath - june 2011 Tutors - Daniel Wong and Martin Gledhill Grade - 73% Living in Bath I developed a growing interest in the composition of public space and its different variations. This project is therefore a response that emerges from an extremely personal attitude and an almost obsessive questioning about the characteristics of successful public space in the 21st Century city. The structure of the course allowed me to understand the History and Theory essay as part of the previous research into the topic. The essay became the needed theoretical background, the starting point, the condensed boiling pot of ideas before the final project. This transition from the conceptual to the practical is noticeable in the choice of an existing trust in the city as the client and the development of a comprehensive brief that enables a programmatic support for the civic space. The programme evolves from the need to create a congregational space for social interaction, which allows that needed spontaneous spark; and the necessity to improve connections in a pedestrian city and connectivity of the public space network.
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TECHNOLOGICAL FIREPLACE III Steelcase competition - homeoffice - april 2013 Team - Cristina Jódar When faced with the challenge to rethink a home office space, we went back to the concept of home as a vital space that drove our design. Home isn’t just an object or a building; it’s a complex and diffuse condition that integrates memories, images, desires and fears; past and present. A home can’t be built in an action, it has a temporal and continuous condition and it’s the product of the gradual adaptation of the family and the individual to the world. A set of rituals, personal rhythms and daily routines form a home. Work is understood as one of the daily activities, a routine that is cyclically repeated. The technological heart is the centre of the house, a focal point that holds all the serving elements needed in the daily routine. Homework efficiency is achieved due to the spatial organization of the house around this service core. The home office has been conceived as a whole, which expresses individuality of the inhabitant and enables connection to create landscape.
VIP LOUNGE FOR ARCO, MADRID International contemporary art fair competition - september 2011 Team - Guillermo Corella The competition provided the opportunity to build the new VIP lounge for the international contemporary art fair, ARCO. It became the opportunity to take a risky approach, as risky as the art installations and pieces that are exhibited around this construction. Our approach was to create a space that was private, but not completely. The celebrities are safe but they are always being watched. They are separated but permanently monitored. This double intent is the key of the project and the materialization of it is through a system of flat wooden planks separated by wooden blocks that create a woven see-through structure. The provocative design doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t forge functionalism so the interiors are furnished and decorated with soft fabrics.
INVERSE CITY SIKA student competition - may 2010 Team - Constantino Baranda and Guillermo Corella This competition allowed us to search for a provocative alternative to solve the urbanism problem in a world that is on the way to complete collapse either because of global warming or the unplanned urban developments. Our project returns the earth surface into its natural development proposing to take the cities to the sky. Seen only as a concept it digs into the main problems of current society, like water supplies, space availability and clean energy production. All the project is programmed in a timetable that would lead us into a concept of city where we leave the earth breathe so that we can still use is as the big home it is for us all. Keeping in our minds the impossibility of this project allows us to propose a radical solution that shakes the ground. Just the first 3 or 4 steps of the inverse city provide a giant leap for a better future.
LOGO DESIGN AND BRAND BUILDING A designer can’t ‘make’ a brand; a designer forms the foundation of the brand. Working in different projects and initiatives I have been involved in designing their visual identity and logos. I have kept in mind that the brand becomes the property not only of its owners and employees, but of the extended network of users and general public. These exercises have been valuable in forcing me to aligning elements which contribute to how the brand is experienced and the visual essentials that represent it.
CULTURAL TOWER IN MILAN Final diploma project - june 2014 My final thesis project became an opportunity to touch on many fields of interests that I have developed since I started Architecture. I wanted to concentrate in a logo the strong visual identity of this industrial container that combines heritage, functionality and community in the neighborhood of Porta Ticinese, in Milan. The rubber stamp of the logo reflects the tailored design of every aspect of the tower, from its urban importance to the smallest furniture detail.
SOMBRERO DE APRENDIZ ACTUAUPM startup competition - september 2013 Sombrero de aprendiz is the name of the initiative that I developed with Alfonso Llamas (computer engineer) to enter ACTUAUPM, a recognized technological focused startup competition.This contest provided us through its various stages with education, great tools and skills to lead a startup from idea to fund raising. The need to stimulate childrenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s innovation capacities and promote diversity of talent turned into a web based search engine to connect users and providers. In the process of getting to the final stage of the competition we realized that a pivotal change of business approach was needed, so we decided to reassess the project and put it on hold.
OBLIQUE Creativity and cultural student association - may 2012 Oblique was born as a platform to take advantage of lateral opportunities, cultural activities and the creativity enhancers that Madrid has to offer. The name honors ‘oblique strategies’, Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt’s deck of cards to fight creative block. Even though we started as a group of architecture students from ETSAM, we have welcomed creative and curious from different fields.
PORTFOLIO LUIS B L A NC O Á LVA R EZ 2 0 1 4