“It’s a magical world, Hobbes, ol’ buddy ... let’s go exploring!” - Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes
RESUME |
MICHAEL JOSEPH SANDERSON mjsand@umich.edu | 616.510.6953
EDUCATION
RECOGNITION
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning | Ann Arbor, MI Master of Architecture 2013
+ Thesis Charrette with Tatiana Bilbao | Honorable Mention 2012 + Architecture Student Show 2013 | Vindicating Vegas + Architecture Student Show 2012 | [Auto]nomous Wall + Graduate Student Instructor Grant for Teaching | 2012 + Wheeler Family Memorial Scholarship Recipient | 2012 - 2013 + Schafer Family Scholarship Recipient | 2011 - 2012 + University of Michigan Graduate Grant | 2010 - 2013 + University of Michigan Undergraduate Grant | 2006 - 2009 + University of Michigan Sustainability Scholarship | 2008
+ 3.7 GPA Graduate High Honors + Graduate Student Instructor: Arch 425: Sustainable Systems + Architecture Student Show 2012, 2013
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN School of Natural Resources and the Environment | Ann Arbor, MI Bachelor Fine Arts 2009 | Sustainability + Urban Planning
+ Sustainability Scholarship to pursue green building/farming in Cartago, Costa Rica
PROFESSIONAL
PUBLICATIONS
STUDIO FOR ARCHITECTURE | Ann Arbor, MI Project Assistant | 2013
EMPTY PAVILION [PAVILION] | Detroit, MI | 2012
+ Participated in the preparation of design drawings, physical models, and renders + Assisted in design and development of office, store, and showroom for NY location
IS-OFFICE | Chicago, IL / Ann Arbor, MI Project Designer | 2012
+ Design / Build ‘Empty Pavilion’ funded by U of M’s Research Through Making Grant + Renderings, Drawings, & Development of research book, exhibitions, and press
HLW INTERNATIONAL | New York, NY Intern | 2011
+ Facade studies for Fiat & Maserati Flagship Store NYC + Helped develop site plan for Chinese Business Campus
FINCA LA FLOR AGRO / ECO FARM | Cartago, Costa Rica Intern | 2009
+ Research / Experiments in sustainable building techniques, water collection, waste management and re-use, urban gardening, and rainforest regeneration + Learned communication in Spanish
Archinect, Architect’s Newspaper, Architizer, Moco Loco, suckerPunch
GENERAL MANIFOLD [INSTALLATION] | Chelsea, MI | 2011
ArchDaily, Arch-Times, Architect’s Newspaper, Allhitecture, Contemporary Homes, Design.fr, Luxticker, Fierth Magaizine, Gooood. hk [China], Style of Deisgn, Plataforma Arquitectura [Chile], International Magazine of Space Design – BOB [Korea]
RUE DE NOYER [ARTICLE / PHOTOGRAPHS] | Paris, Fr | 2011 Civic Friche Zine
SKILLS DIGITAL MODELING + PRODUCTION AutoCAD, Rhinoceros, 3DS Max, GIS, VRay, Grasshopper, SketchUp DIGITAL DRAWING / INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Premiere Pro, Acrobat, Apple Final Cut Pro, MS Word, MS Excel, MS PowerPoint
contents / 001
Vertical Cities Asia Comprehensive Studio
WI 2012
002
Vindicating Vegas Options Studio
FA 2012
003
Lafayette 148 Office + Showroom
SUM 2013
004
Empty Pavilion Research Through Making
SUM 2012
Outliers Personal Work / Electives
2010 - 12
005 - 008
001 Vertical Cities Asia Winter 2012 | Comprehensive Studio Professors: Geoffrey Thun + Jen Maigret Partners: Joey Filippelli + Catie Truong As the world population exceeds 7 billion, the density of housing becomes an ever more essential reality. Upon closer statistical inspection, much of the population boom is not triggered by births but rather the increase in life expectancy for those over 60 years old. This residential housing project tackles the issues of housing for the aged in Seoul, South Korea. The design of the project necessitates the negotiation of competing desires across a wide range of scales. Housing constitutes the basic makeup of all cities and yet it is inclined to the subjectivity of domestic values. In a dense city such as Seoul, greenspace is limited. Thus, the interior courtyard is densely populated with various ecological species native to the region. The courtyard gives residents an opportunity to escape the concrete jungle that is Seoul and give an aging population a sense of peace and tranquility. However, within the building are two programs designed to keep the residents feeling young: a youth center and a library. The close proximity of children will give two different generations the opportunity to mix, providing an opportunity for the young to interact with the elderly. The library is meant to work as a cultural center of knowledge for the residents of Seoul while providing a location for the elderly to easily attain reading materials as well as interact with modern technology. The large box located in the tower is a multi-story dining area meant to bring the residents to a collective space, affording them an opportunity to meet and socialize with other residents, while providing an engaging view of the nearby river and surrounding skyline.
SECOND FLOOR
GROUND FLOOR
SEVENTH FLOOR
APPROACH RENDERING
ABOVE: air flow / cooling diagram of housing units BELOW: exploded axonometric of housing unit
UNIT VENTILATION DIAGRAM
FACADE + UNIT DIAGRAM
WALL SECTION
SECTION A
YOUTH CENTER RENDERING
SECTION B
FINAL MODEL 1:400
002 vindicating vegas. Fall 2012 | Options Studio Professor: Perry Kulper Featured in University of Michigan’s Architecture Student Show | 2013 In a society dictated by capitalism, economics trumps sustainability. Nowhere is this more true than Las Vegas, a city of exuberance and wealth built in the middle of a desert. It’s one of the last places in the US that would be concerned about renewable energy, yet it has two resources that could easily facilitate it: an almost endless supply of flat space and consistent sunshine. This, along with the inordinate amount of energy the city requires makes it the ideal location for solar panels, just not the ideal culture. I’m asking the question: what if the capitalistic and competitive nature of Las Vegas could be brought to renewable energy? A market driven sustainability. Las Vegas receives a million visitors a week. A large portion of these million arrive via the 300 mile trip from LA along the I-15. For 5 hours nothing but the desert has the undivided attention of these travelers. I’m proposing is a new type of infrastructure to be brought to Vegas. A multi-functional utilitarian grid of solar panels to power Las Vegas that also functions as a revenue generating advertising canvas. The proposal calls for the city of Las Vegas to lay down a hexagonal grid system that would establish the initial framework and facilitate the creation of large solar arrays. The hexagonal shape is easily adaptive to new additions and changes to the system. Every business, casino, club, neighborhood, etc would purchase and install solar panels that would provide enough energy to fulfill their own power demand. During the day they sit idly and collect power. However, like Vegas, at night they come alive. Each panel is outfitted with LED lights. Each company and organization can advertise their place of business, or if they wish, can sell it to the highest bidder. The entire desert becomes a horizontally expanded Times Square with each panel representing a business and the overall system becomes a diagram of the energy usage of Las Vegas. These ad towers are completely run by the free market. There is no controlled growth or limit to expansion. Each business competes to have the biggest ad space and therefore the biggest solar panels. For the travelers that arrive via air, the horizontal panels become enormous advertisements one watches out their window as they arrive in Vegas: ads the size of towns. These ads can be seen from a great expanse and therefore are stared at for as long as minutes, giving each ad more advertising potential than that of a TV commercial, but with less distractions. Animations, short stories could be played out on these lights, the possibilities are almost endless.
PHASE 1 | DOWNTOWN
The initial iterations of the work involved the installing the structure in downtown Las Vegas.
STRUCTURE SURROUNDS + INVADES CONTEXT
ADVERTISEMENT TOWER
PHASE 2 | DESERT The second phase of the work involved situating the project on the approach to the city
SITE PLAN
APPROACH TO LAS VEGAS (AS SEEN FROM PLANE)
003 Lafayette 148 New York Office + Showroom Summer 2013 | Studio for Architecture Following the cue and desires to maintain an open, well-lit showroom and sales offices, three schemes were developed which logically occupy similar zones within the space. The clients desired the prime floor space to be used as the showroom while the sales offices remain adjacent to it on the NW and SE corners. What was previously the sales directors/assistants offices are now divided into three separate functions; the special exhibition/meeting area, the model’s dressing room coupled with the photographic studio, and the pantry. This area occupies the center of the floor and the challenge was to provide fluid circulation from the back corridor to the showroom - all the while allowing this center zone to function properly. An expressed desire from the sales team was to have natural lighting for the office space. Due to the rounded windows which are not intended to be divided, we devised a configuration where the sales directors’ offices were pulled back as a group, leaving the area next to the window to be open and spacious. The assistant workstations are situated there as an open work zone. This layout allows everyone to have access to light and provides a more collective shared work environment.
VIEW INSIDE SHOWROOM
PLAN PERSPECTIVE
FLOOR PLAN
VIEW INSIDE NW OFFICE AREA
VIEW OF PROPOSED SHOWROOM
004
empty pavilion
2208 14th Street Detroit, MI 48216
Summer 2012 | Research Through Making Grant Professors: McLain Clutter + Kyle Reynolds Students: Michael Sanderson, Ariel Poliner, + Nate Van Wylen Published: Archinect, Architect’s Newspaper, Architizer, Moco Loco, suckerPUNCH The Empty Pavilion is a meditation on Detroit’s evacuated urban context and an experiment in architecture’s ability to activate a latent public in the city. The project aspires to distribute just enough material across empty space – an element Detroit has in excess – to make that space legible and promote interaction. From a distance, the project engages the onlooker in a visual game of fleeting figuration. The pavilion is conceived as a collection of architectural figures drawn-in-space. From certain vantage points, and only momentarily, the project recalls familiar architectural elements that may entice memory – like the roof line of house, a chimney, a hallway, or a staircase. From other vantages, the project presents clear, and yet unfamiliar, architectural figures – thus soliciting projective association. Up-close, the pavilion is meant to encourage physical interaction. Elements within the design suggest differing modes of occupation, such as seating, lounging and climbing. Constructed of bent steel tubing, foam and rubber, the pavilion is counter-intuitively soft to the touch, begging tactile engagement. Photography: Michael Sanderson, Ariel Poliner, Nate Van Wylen, Kyle Reynolds, Sasha Topolnytska
LEFT: the six pieces elicit elements of various residential units that were once found on the site
part 1 | design
part 2 | build
CONSTRUCTION DOCUMENT portion of CD set for ‘stair’ piece
FOUNDATION PLAN
concrete footings used to anchor pavilion
PAINTING PLAN paint shows orientation of the pavilion’s shadow at 3pm on October 30, 2012 the date of the opening
part 3 | grand opening
Located in an empty field that was once divided into a series of residential lots, the project loosely describes the volume of the house that once sat in its place.
Elements within the design suggest differing modes of occupation, such as seating, lounging and climbing. Constructed of bent steel tubing, foam and rubber, the pavilion is counter-intuitively soft to the touch, begging tactile engagement.
part 4 | exhibition
005 VORONOI LAMP Fall 2011 | Generative Design Computing Professor: Glenn Wilcox The 3D printed voronoi lamp is designed as a lighting fixture with surfaces which overlap and interweave into each other in order to create an organic and intricate form. The use of parametrics allows one to adapt and adjust both the shape of the lamp and the number and size of the openings. This allows the lamp to be adaptable to any desired size, form, and lighting condition. The voronoi lamp was created using a grasshopper script which takes a set of points in a given space and creates cells whose distance to any given point cannot be greater than their distance to another. The lamp can utilize attractor points to vary the thickness in particular areas in order to better contain or distribute light. For this lamp, three different voronoi diagrams were used and projected onto each modulating surface. These surfaces overlap and intertwine into each other to maintain a structure that can create light and shadows with the ability to invigorate any given space.
TOP: diagram showing forming and structural technique BOTTOM: grasshopper script for lamp pattern RIGHT: various iterations and other lamp designs
006 General Manifold
Federal Screw Works Chelsea, MI 48118
Summer 2011 | Meta Friche Research Professors: Anya Sirota + Steven Christensen Team: Virginia Black, Melissa Bonfil, James Chesnut, Peyton Coles, Nathan Doud, Jean Louis Farges, Joey Filippelli, Bruce Findling, Brittany Gacsy, Jeeeun Ham, Kyung Jin Hong, Jennifer Komorowski, Jordan Johnson, Brian Muscat, Chris Reznich, Ash Thomas, Catherine Truong Published: ArchDaily, Arch-Times, Architect’s Newspaper, Allhitecture, Design.fr, Contemporary Homes, Luxticker, Fierth Magaizine, Style of Deisgn, Plataforma Arquitectura [Chile], International Magazine of Space Design – BOB [Korea], Gooood.hk [China] General Manifold is an immersive architectural environment installed in the abandoned Federal Screw Works factory complex in Chelsea, Michigan. General Manifold reacts to the derelict context of the former industrial site, providing a moment of surprise and punctuation to the event. A mysterious magenta void is carved from the perceived solid of the factory’s central work area, generating a space of geometric complexity, chromatic contrast, and optical distortion. A series of precise cuts in the conjoined truncated pyramids produces an effect of perspectival inversion, causing the visitor to question the depth, dimension, and scale of this aberrant environment. After experiencing the interior and exploring the other areas of the factory, the visitor is guided to the exterior of the inserted pavilion and allowed to see the space turned inside-out, an unanticipated opportunity to inhabit the poche.
ABOVE: site plan + axonometric of project within Federal Screw Works factory
007 Beach House
Grand Haven, MI
Winter 2012 | Representation Professor: James Macgilivray The premise of this project was to design a residence to fit the context of our hometown. The first step was designing a series of tourism posters which set the framework of our representational style and were to become the inspiration for the project. The second step involved designing a home or larger residency adapted to the context of the city we knew well. On the shores of Lake Michigan, this Grand Haven beach residency is adapted to the dunes and natural setting. The house is oriented towards the lake and takes advantage of the view with numerous balconies, windows, and cantilevers. The frequent cuts through the concrete walls frame views of the horizon and the sunset, while the large overhangs and cantilevers become enormous light shelves which shade the residents from direct Southern sunlight. The path down to the shore becomes a series of large steps and platforms built into the dune. As the dune changes from wind and erosion, so too do the size and shape of the platforms. These plinths create a ruin-esque quality and the residency becomes part of the shifting dunescape.
LEFT: promotional posters for Grand Haven, MI TOP RIGHT: beach residency at night BOTTOM RIGHT: framed view of horizon from 2nd floor balcony
008 Thermal / Light Studies
SANAA - Toledo Glass Pavilion Mies Van Der Rohe - Neue Nationalgalerie
Winter 2012 | Building Systems Professors: Craig Borum + Vivian Lee Partners: Scott Claassen, Chris Mascari, Ryan Ormberg
SANAA - Toledo Glass Pavilion
Mies Van Der Rohe - Neue Nationalgalerie
SANAA - Toledo Glass Pavilion
Mies Van Der Rohe - Neue Nationalgalerie
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