a collection of works
MICHAEL MEER
01
Eugene Market Hall
02
Mixed-Use Development
03
Heath Ceramics Gallery and Warehouse
04
Hand Drawing
05
Urban Grove
06
Lake Calhoun Community Pavilion
Eugene, OR Fall 2015
St. Paul, MN Spring 2014
Minneapolis, MN Fall 2015
Creative City Challenge Competition Perkins+Will Team: Corey Bandelin, Dave Keonen Minneapolis, MN November 2015 Minneapolis, MN Fall 2013
01
Eugene Market Hall Eugene, OR Fall 2015
The market is a place of character where goods and people refl ect life in the community. As a new Market Hall for Eugene, the design refl ects its surroundings while materials and spacial organization accommodate and enhance the market experience. Careful study of pedestrian, vehicular, and bike circulation are translated into site entry and circulation. The original park block design is refl ected and enhanced through major design moves, refl ected in both the building and landscape. The new Market Hall will be a hub of activity and gathering at the center of the Eugene community.
park blocks
great streets
adjacent buildings
pedestrian circ.
bicycle circ.
vehicular circ.
Site analysis of surrounding infl uences speak to a building form responding to site needs. The most important infl uence, the Eugene Park Blocks, create a need for public plaza space at the site’s southeast corner. The city’s Great Street Master Plan, identify surrounding connecting corridors of community importance. Existing buildings speak to building form, height and setbacks, while circulation infl uence from bikes, pedestrians, and vehicles, call for organized entries and spaces.
The northeast atrium is not only an entry hub of the market hall, but it directs visitor south, into the courtyard, market space, and beyond.
building height
transparent /solid
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A cut through the site frames the central focus of the existing park blocks, the fountain.
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In order to maintain site activity on all days of the week, rather than just market days, incorporation of restaurant, cafe, and oďŹƒ ce programs will attract visitors throughout the week. Dynamic interior and exterior market spaces will allow for program  exibility across the seasons, without restricting building uses.
The cut through the site not only frames a view into the park blocks, but also creates a drawing view into the site, from the south.
Midway
02
Mixed-Use Housing Development St. Paul, MN Spring 2014 A new Light Rail stop at the elbow of University Ave, between St. Paul and Minneapolis, has turned a once unvalued parking lot into a site of great opportunity. This new mixed-use development will capitalize on the opportunity by combining housing, commercial and various other uses to attract people from all over the metro area.
St. Paul Minneapolis
Commercial and professional spaces are distributed throughout the site’s ďŹ rst and second levels. Additional public spaces, consisting of a series of interior atria surround an outdoor space to form a dynamic and welcoming central square. This square will allow for various programming opportunities. Housing units, wrapped in a copper panel facade, extend from the second level up, allowing for separation of privacy, while still appreciating connection to other functions on site and beyond.
midway neighborhood
residence
visitors from
twin-cities area
Pedestrian movement and entry of visitors from various viscinities, were an important factor in design decisions. Through easily accessible apartment lobbies, heirarchy of entry, and movement from all directions, pedestrians circulation  ows with the building program.
The housing blocks’ facades are wrapped in porus copper panels which swing and fold open to reveal various window and balcony spaces. This design tuns the otherwise simple facade organization into an ever dynamic and changing one. A wide variety of changes, from seasons, to time of day, to programming of the site public spaces, would all contribute to a transition in the building appearance.
03
Heath Ceramics Galler y and Warehouse Minneapolis, MN Fall 2015 As a studio focused on material exploration and their limits when considering space, the project objective was to design a ceramics gallery and warehouse using materials from concrete to steel trusses. After beginning with a simple MDF box form, we broke, cut and altered material, discovering both its limits and possibilities. After transitioning to a concrete box, new diagnosis of capabilities established a new rule set. Enlarging the scale from a small box to a ceramics gallery instituted a connection to architecture and full scale materiality.
An adjacent warehouse was then placed adjacent to the gallery, erected with a steel truss structure. Working with yet another new material, the ďŹ nk steel truss, new beauty and capabilities led to new discovery.
Extrusions for building programs and exploration of truss spacing became important design elements between the two complimentary buildings.
04
Hand Drawing Drawing is one of the most under utilized ways of observing architectural forms and their experiential qualities. Qualities of material, light, space, shape and endless others are what make architecture beautiful.
The Colosseum, Rome
depiction
When transferring these experiential qualities onto a 2D surface, all of these qualities somehow become more real. Spending time to analyze and interpret experience is the best way for one to truly feel submerged in a space. Whether it be examining various nostalgic locations of the Eternal City or studying the subtle beauty of Rapson Hall, taking time to depict views and experiences onto paper, exposed the hidden beauty most would not ďŹ nd.
Piazza Repubblica, Rome
St. Peters Square, Rome
Rapson Hall Stair Case, University of Minnesota
05
Urban Grove Creative City Challenge Competition Perkins+Will Team: Corey Bandelin, Dave Keonen Minneapolis, MN Minneapolis is a woven fabric of culture, connection, and extraordinary history. The city grid represents the organization in a place of chaos, while also symbolizing its connection to surrounding neighborhoods. The Creative City Challenge was an opportunity to express and interpret unique connecting qualities like this. With the goal of developing an installation, which is programmable, intriguing, and engaging to the community, we created an Urban Grove gathering space. A series of trees surrounds an open space, surrounded by seating elements forms an intimate space to accommodate a programmable staging area. A colorful glass and metal canopy re ects an ever changing ground plane shadows extending to all parts of the light spectrum.
One of the cities most common and native plants, the Red Sumac, grows in extensive colonies, which are centered around an initial parent grouping. Each shrub or tree is intertwined with the next through overlapping canopies and connecting root systems. This colony structure conveys many similarities, both literally and fi guratively, to Minneapolis and its expansive growth, around the downtown city center. Dichroic glass squares at the end of each branch are emblematic of the bright color of the sumac. I helped explore this glass’ capabilities. We learned Dichroic fi lm diff racts only certain colors of the spectrum as light passes through. When the light angle changes, this color also changes. This leads to a change in the light which is refl ected off the glass, thus the changing of glass and shadow colors throughout the day.
shadow study
North-south extensions are interpretations of the surrounding neighborhoods, which change, yet stay connected to downtown
The diagonal grid which covers a public gathering space represents the downtown grid, oriented toward the Mississippi River.
As aacrucial team member, I contributed to the city to As crucial team member, I contributed grid and river orientation inspiration, as a way of the city grid and river orientation inspiration, organizing our gathering space and trees. The as a way ofoforganizing gathering space development all graphics, our drawings and pictures was also taken on by me, as part of our ďŹ nal and trees. The development of all graphics, submission.
drawings and pictures was also taken on by me, as part of our ďŹ nal submission.
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06
Lake Calhoun Pavilion Minneapolis, MN Fall 2013
Inspired by the layers and their interactions at Lake Calhoun Park, the pavilion melds into the  at landscape through emerging roof planes, overlapping materials, and interweaving of building and site programs. The site’s often unnoticed layers, and their interactions become not only a way to connect site and building activity, but also a way to enhance sustainable thinking. This miss of ideas reacts to layers of grass, path, sand and water.
Not only does the building physically  ow along the site, but landscaping elements such as local plantings, tree distribution and various pathways help the design meld into the park harmoniously. Minnesota limestone decking and reclaimed wood slats also help contribute to a more sustainable environment.
Layers taken from the site are extruded from the ground plane to create a building form. Horizontal cuts are sliced through the building to created glass covered interior spaces.
Incorporation of a bike workshop and design of a bike path which cuts between building forms, encourages and enhances a gas saving and opportunistic form of transportation. Other elements such as local vegetation, Minnesota limestone decking, and reclaimed wood slats also help contribute to the pavilion’s decreased carbon footprint.
Trees provide shade while helping to defi ne the building fl ow across the site
Lake Calhoun bike path
Community bike workshop
Green roof made of local plantings
Paved stairs and path to defi ne roof circulation
Inhabitable green roof
Continuation of the park corridor
Layers of interior spaces, comprised of mostly glass, allows for visual connection to Lake Calhoun from the road and beyond. This also allows for the enhanced experience of each program and space.
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