PORTFOLIO Matéo Drif
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Summary
Study of the Fallingwater house
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Design of a dojo
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Creation of a music school
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Study sketches
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End of L2 housing project
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Study of the Bucharest buildings
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Study of the Fallingwater house During L1, we were asked to study an architect’s house. I chose Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater, which represents, in my opinion one of the most beautiful architectural designs. In order to complete this study, I had to reproduce the original plans of the house by hand. This was an exercise that brought me a lot of skills since I first had to do a research work to find the plans and also the original dimensions. Then, I learned how to redraw plans on white paper and on tracing paper, a skill that is too often left aside in our studies today.
master plan 1/500
sectional plan 1/200
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Redrawing these plans allowed me to better understand the functioning of the house and therewith the choices made by the architect. Indeed, some details only appeared once the whole floor plans were drawn.
ground floor plan
These plans allowed me to understand the circulation within the house and also the relationship between used spaces and served spaces.
first floor plan
Understanding the size of the spaces was a key element in assessing the subsequent creation of an outbuilding almost as large as the main house, as this one offers mostly outdoor spaces and is therefore not habitable throughout the year.
second floor plan
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The study of the building also required the production of a 1/200 scale model. The creation of this model allowed me, in addition to the floor plans and sectional plans, to deeply understand the layout of the house in its environment as well as its relationship to the space, in particular to the waterfall and to the nature of the site. front view of a model
I also had to raise the issue of the materiality of the house which is very interesting in its concept. Indeed, all the cantilevered terraces are made of the same material, concrete, and the vertical parts of black sandstone.
master view of the model
In conclusion, this study allowed me to start my architectural studies with a strong background of skills, thanks to which I can think about design in its functionality as well as in its aesthetic design.
side view of the model
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Design of a dojo This project only focused on design, unlike the previous study. The subject was to design a dojo in a given site in the Parc des Cormailles in the south of Paris. We had to propose a building that would fit into the site and respond to the submitted program. The difficulty was to provide a solution with functional spaces, which clearly express through the plans the relationship between technical spaces and the sport practice area. This project also allowed me to approach the first steps of structural design, since it required the drawing of a structural frame coherent with the project without restricting the light contributions necessary for such a type of project.
ground floor plan 1/200
East side elevation view
3D view of the site
interior view
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Creation of a music school
Following the previous one, this project aimed at creating a music school coupled with a performance hall. It was much more complicated in its conception because of a greater number of requirements and necessary spaces.
exploded axonometry
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The site is located on the Saint-Germain island in Paris, in the middle of a park. The island is accessible by two bridges built at both ends of the island. Few other constructions are located near the site except for the Tour aux figures by Jean Dubuffet.
3D view of the site
In this project, I chose to clearly separate the learning and performance areas: the amphitheater can be recognised in the sloping roof building, while classrooms are located in the flat roof building. The whole facility is organised around a central patio linking both buildings.
3D view of the site
The layout of the various classrooms follows a logical pattern. The dance and theater rooms are located upstairs, while the learning and rehearsal rooms for wind, string and further instruments, are located downstairs. Finally, the administrative area is located away from the learning and performance areas.
view of circulation space
This project made me work on the management of the implementation in a given site without competing with the buildings and the environment already present, and also taught me how to manage the circulation between the different parts of a building.
view of the patio
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Study sketches As part of the design process, we were asked to provide sketches of reference studies to justify our choices in our projects.
This first sketch represents the interior of one of the Kingo House by the architect Jorn Utzon. It was produced during the study of a garden city model proposed by the same architect. This study represented the beginnings of another project of urbanistic nature. The angle studied was the implantation of the house and its relationship with its patio and with the exterior.
This axonometry of the same house shows how the architect plays with the different heights of the walls to frame the view on the landscape while keeping private space.
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This is a building of a completely different register that is located in Rome, Italy, the Tempietto of Bramante : it is a small memorial temple built around the years 1502, located in the courtyard of the monastery of San Pietro in Montorio. This sketch was made for the historical study of the building.
In the same vein we find here a sketch of the Porta Pia by Michelangelo, built between 1561 and 1565. It was made for the same purpose as the previous one.
To finish, I drew the sketch of the villa Savoye by Le Corbusier : the sketch was made during a visit of the house during the L1 year.
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End of L2 housing project The last project of L2 was a long project in pairs which aimed at implementing all the knowledge we had gathered during the first two years of study. The program was to design a housing project in a plot of land on rue Oberkampf, located in the 11th arrondissement of Paris. We were instructed to plan a certain number of flats of different typologies.
master plan 1/500
The project evolved significantly to finally arrive at this model. We chose to design three boxes of different heights: the highest, on rue Oberkampf, and the lowest, on passage Saint Pierre Amelot. This choice is significant because it follows the height of the existing buildings on both streets and proposes an intelligent transition between the heights. Moreover, our project proposes a passage between both streets, thus a transition as well pedestrian as architectural. On the side of the Pierre Amelot passage, quieter than the Oberkampf street, we chose to add a park to the project in order to bring space into it.
3D view of the site
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In the design of our apartments, we first have a strip of twostorey workshop houses along the created passage. Then we added our boxes on top. The choice to avoid a gap all along is assumed because it allowed us to provide most of our flats with crossing light and thus to offer a better quality of living.
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The flats are arranged around a central core that serves as a circulation for the stairwells and elevators. The choice in the orientation of the interior spaces has also been thought to offer a southern exposure to the living rooms. Finally, one can observe on the plans, according to the color, the size of the apartments. It was important to vary these in order to offer a solution for all types of households.
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longitudinal section 1/200
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When it comes to the exterior of our buildings, we wanted the function of the room to be recognisable by the type of façade. Thus, bedrooms and the living room do not have the same type of glazing, and stairwells have a vertical sunshade that clearly shows the difference between circulation and living spaces. The choice of putting the stairwells on the façade comes from our desire to offer luminous circulation spaces that are not lit artificially.
3D view from the staircase
model view of the façade
3D view of the façade
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3D view of the walkway
general 3D view
This project brought me a lot of benefits in terms of teamwork and the ability to move a project forward with ideas other than my own ones. It was also the first project in which I participated that required the creation of a housing complex while respecting the standards of circulation and dimensioning of spaces. It was also my first long-term project, so I was able to improve my critical thinking abilities as regards my own ideas. Moreover, this project required me to boost my knowledge on software like Revit or Lumion.
general model view
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Study of the Bucharest buildings
This is my latest projects and it is even still under study. The purpose of this study is the creation of an exhibition on Bucharest city and its architecture. To prepare this exhibition, a large group was chosen, then divided into several smaller groups each studying a different theme. The theme of my group is the analysis of the places of power in the city. This takes into account places built for the Romanian monarchy as well as for the communist power or even the religious power. To present our work, we chose to produce a study notebook in the form of a small newspaper. We decided to produce only drawings, diagrams and other sketches in order to picture our subject.
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One of the interesting elements to remember in this study is the requalification of some buildings. For example, this building was originally the private mansion of a rich Romanian nobleman; later, it was seized by the communist power of Ceausescu dictatorship and converted into Securitat facilities (the Romanian secret police). Since its rehabilitation and extension this place has become the headquarters of the Romanian Order of Architects. This example is therefore a model for the theme of urban rehabilitation, one of the major themes of our studies and surely one of the most important activities of architects today.
In other cases, such as this one, the building is left abandoned, with no new function or redevelopment project.
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To better understand the location of certain buildings and their relationship to the city, we also drew more general views of Bucharest.
It was important to understand that this city is not designed in the same way as other large European cities. Indeed, some places of power are located away from the historical city center, which allows us to find major buildings in the middle of an extremely green space next to a lake on the periphery.
The historical center is invaded by architectural collages mixing the communist era and post modern construction of all kinds. The heritage is hardly preserved in Bucharest and must often make way for the omnipresence of the car.
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The most astonishing thing is perhaps the construction of new administrative buildings even today while many buildings are left abandoned and could be rehabilitated.
To explain the location of some of these buildings, it is necessary to understand their function within the dictatorship’s regime. Indeed, the choice of positioning certain buildings in the center or on the outskirts is motivated by their function.
In addition to teaching me how to work within larger teams, this latest project taught me to think in the long term in the context of a future exhibition and thus to think of my presentations with the aim of passing on my knowledge in a way that everyone understands it
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