Mixed Undergraduate Portfolio

Hard Copy Portfolio. 11” X 17 - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009 This is a hard copy print of my portfolio, used for interviews and submissions. I took on two major design problems with this layout: to include separate projects with very specific individual color schemes, and to create a format that is unique and custom yet also easily amended to include more material. Tabs, coloured by the individual projects, provide quick project references without opening the booklet.

Hard Copy Portfolio. 11” X 17 - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009

“China’s New Experience” Cage Gallery Exhibit. 30’ X 15’ OF INSTALLATION - MIXED - 2007 This is a spread detailing the Cage Gallery exhibition of our studio's work for the "China's New Experience" studio. While the photography wall and hat rack was my particular focus, other student work was displayed, such as our Lego Competition entry with Urbanus for "Building Asia Brick-by-Brick" and adaptive reuse projects.

“Building Asia Brick-by-Brick” Urbanus Entry. 36” X 36” - LEGO’S - 2007 One segment of "China's New Experience" had MIami students work with Shenzhen firm, Urbanus, on several projects. One was a design competition to showcase new ideas in Chinese architecture. The studio worked with Urbanus to submit this model, an adaptation of a traditional chinese village into large, affordable housing. Urbanus later expanded this idea and showcased it in "Tulou / Affordable Housing for China."

ASCA Competition Board One. 20” X 20” - MIXED MEDIA PRINT - 2009 (This is a group entry completed for the 2009 Green Community Competition. The project was awarded a project citation, an honor reserved to the 95th percentile of entries.)

"The term “green” is a buzzword tearing through the collective conscience of society by the end of this decade. This is both a boon and a hindrance to the term’s goals; while the popularity of green design is tremendous, the true implications of sustainability have been truncated to make “green” marketable. Smart environmental systems applied to architecture are not sustainable in themselves but rather a key component in a larger picture. Sustainability is holism; the way people live, communicate, commute, and interact create the framework for sustainability.

Therefore, “green” is also a building’s program, lifespan, a block’s zoning, a city’s transportation scheme, and the daily lives of everyone in between. “Green” is marketing for an entirely new way of looking at society: holistic sustainability."

LUKE SMITH

smithla7@muohio.edu - (513) 379-1448 312 S POPLAR ST - OXFORD, OH 45056

ASCA Competition Board Two. 20” X 20” - MIXED MEDIA PRINT - 2009 "Over The Rhine provides the perfect opportunity to apply holistic sustainability. Historically the old German sector, Over The Rhine has hence been vacated by urban decay, leaving dilapidated property for the lowest income residents in Cincinnati. The consequences are tremendous.

The area has been segregated into the home of the poorest community within the city. As crime problems rise in Over The Rhine, the wealthier portions of the city turn their backs against the problem they helped create. Due to its close proximity with the downtown area, developers look to gentrify the district rather than incorporate the existing community. Our scheme takes the smallest unit within the district, an abandoned building in an abandoned block, as the first intervention fit for real-world development."

ASCA Competition Board Three. 20” X 20” - MIXED MEDIA PRINT - 2009 "The basic unit of our intervention is human scale, accounting for the various ways people live to create the most flexible and accommodating model for future development. Mixed use buildings can accommodate a young professional demographic sought after by developers without displacing the existing community. The top floors house market rate units used to subsidize the remainder. First floor and roof space provide semi-public green space lost in urbanity. Courtyard space has been transformed into an operable atrium to reduce heat loss in the winter.

Existing window treatments are retrofitted with an operable light shelf system, aesthetically keeping historic facades intact."

ASCA Competition Board Four. 20” X 20” - MIXED MEDIA PRINT - 2009 "The block is the key component of daily life for its residents. The block interior is closed off to the residents in an effort to improve tenantblock public activity and reduce crime by self-policing the area. The building, whose storefront is a bike conscription store, offers a component of service from which the entire block can benefit. Other buildings on the block will offer services such as daycare, food, clothing, and groceries that serve its residents. This drastically reduces the need for car transport, since daily car trips are negated. Each building shall also offer bike storage and access to the block interior axis. This block-based model provides a flexible, human-based template for holistic sustainability. This framework is then integrated with green systems on a building, block, and city scale. Our approach uses small, deliberate moves to maximize building mileage on a citywide scale." I masterminded the layout of the entry and provided the first two renderings.

“Spaced Raider” Wavves Poster. 18” X 24” - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009 This is one of the posters created during my internship at The Southgate House. The House is somewhat unique in the fact that it has a small budget for print advertising specific events, such as creating posters and flyers for bands whose labels don't supply venues with materials to be distributed.

“Independence Day Throwdown” Banners. 4’ X 14’ EACH - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009 This is one of the posters created during my internship at The Southgate House. The House is somewhat unique in the fact that it has a small budget for print advertising specific events, such as creating posters and flyers for bands whose labels don't supply venues with materials to be distributed.

LUKE SMITH

smithla7@muohio.edu - (513) 379-1448 312 S POPLAR ST - OXFORD, OH 45056

Preliminary Loft Axon for OTRCH. 12” X 36” - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009 This drawing, part of an adaptive reuse project presented to Over-the-Rhine Community Housing in Cincinnati, served to show how to combine two small units of an abandoned apartment building into market-rate lofts. By combining simple, accurate modelling in an exploded axonometric drawing, the audience can understand dimension, floor-to-floor relation, and building program neatly in one drawing.

Queen City Art Racks Submission “Keyracks.” 17” X 11” - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009 (These two boards were submitted to the design competition, Queen City Art Racks, which is to be announced in February. The project gives a budget for a series of bike rack installations to be installed across Cincinnati.)

"Keyracks" aims to create affordable, site specific bike rack installation by linking bike racks with an abstracted map of downtown Cincinnati.

With differences in perforations for each location and painting within the thickness of the sheet-metal, riders can clearly identify their proximity to downtown as well as the color of the nearest bus route. This effort aims to make bike travel easier in Cincinnati for a more sustainable city model.’

Queen City Art Racks Submission “Keyracks.” 17” X 11” - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009

“Adaptive Kit of Parts” Case Study. 8.5” X 11” - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009 Aside from visual communication, I also pursued as many sustainable design courses as I could at Miami University. Mary Ben Bonham's "Sustainable Design" course allowed me to focus a semester on a technical design problem culminating in a research paper with a graphic layout. The layout serves to explain an idea that is inherantly visual; I created graphics not just to supplement text but integrate it into a visual explanation.

“Adaptive Kit of Parts” Case Study Poster. 36“ X 24” - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009 This poster, detailing the thesis of my paper, was presented at the Spring 2009 End-Of-The-Year Show. The design intent was to highlight the importance of user operability, and then dissect the thermal chimney to show how operability can be included in the previously-inoperable system.

LUKE SMITH

smithla7@muohio.edu - (513) 379-1448 312 S POPLAR ST - OXFORD, OH 45056

“Northside Passive House” Ground Floor Plan. 17” X 11” - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009 This project was the studio application of my research on the thermal chimney effect. The visual style of the drawings are meant to be easily read and material-specific to the client void of the uneasy realism often attributed to architectural rendering programs.

“Northside Passive House” First Floor Plan. 17” X 11” - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009

“Northside Passive House” East Elevation. 17” X 11” - DIGITAL PRINT - 2009 This project was the studio application of my research on the thermal chimney effect. The visual style of the drawings are meant to be easily read and material-specific to the client void of the uneasy realism often attributed to architectural rendering programs.

Hillside Apartment Rendering. 17” X 11” - MIXED MEDIA PRINT - 2009 These are a series of renderings combining ink drawing, digital modeling, and computer illustration. Throughout my undergraduate career, I have been looking at how to take computer graphics away from harsh photorealism and toward the type of communication evocative in hand-drawn media. By combining a series of overlays, holistic information about the design can be percieved beyond the typical "experience" in a perspective.

Hillside Apartment Rendering. 17” X 11” - MIXED MEDIA PRINT - 2009

LUKE SMITH

smithla7@muohio.edu - (513) 379-1448 312 S POPLAR ST - OXFORD, OH 45056

thank you for your consideration.

LUKE SMITH

smithla7@muohio.edu - (513) 379-1448 312 S POPLAR ST - OXFORD, OH 45056