Idi
syncracities
Idi
syncracities
Natalie Kwee Bachelor of.Architecture May.2013 Advisors Inaqui Carnicero Andrea Simitch
Š 2013. All rights reserved.
arigato (infinite thanks to)
my parents
for their unconditional love + support and bursar bill payments (KLP, CTA)
my advisors
for the guidance + knowledge. sorry for all the texts + emails at ungodly hours (IC, AS)
my mentor
for showing me Japan, and guiding me through new ways of thinking about architecture (TA)
my friends + classmates
for late night crits, group therapy + general hand-holding
my thesis pandas
for putting up with my color pencils + frantic emails (CS, KC, TM, KCL, CS, AB, JB, DC)
mashed monsters (.tumblr.com)
who knew man thighs, and extendable eyes could birth a thesis? (AN) archive of blood, sweat + tears: http://zizizzeziz.tumblr.com/
table of contents
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The House
1
Cultural Context
2
Hybrids
3
Site
4
The four F’s
5
Methodology
6
Phase 1
7
Phase 2
8
Phase 3
9
Outtakes
10
Bibliography
11
Introduction, interest + intentions
Tokyo: Pre-fab victims, family typologies
Fat-free, no nonsense
A case study in smallness + density
Fixed, fuzzy, fluctuating, free
The grid + implementation
Gotta start somewhere
What’s going on?
What just happened?
How it happened + Final Review
Readings, research, precedents
1
The House Introduction, interest + intentions
001
the house
002
introduction
The house
has the ability to transform a person’s way of life, or the relationships between its inhabitants. Through its architecture, the house begins to question the concept of intimacy, new family structures, the demarcation of public/private space, the preciousness of real estate, and the physicality of the structure.
003
the house
004
interest + intent
The NARROW SLIVERS peculiar hybridized structures.
of Tokyo’s real estate are inhabited by
Seemingly unremarkable elements (stairs, vents, potted plants) randomly co-exist in a manner that appears bizarre upon first glance, but in reality are grounded in a logic of functional opportunism. The thesis analyzes the genealogy of the Japanese domicile to propose a new type of housing that embraces the hybrid’s role in contributing to the city’s idiosyncratic personality. Concepts of domestic minimalism and programmatic maximalism are redefined, informed by evolving family structures and the increasing preciousness of real estate in a metropolis that is undergoing perpetual growth, adaptation and transformation.
005
006
2
Cultural Context Tokyo: Pre-fab victims, family typologies + hybrids
007
cultural context
008
urban growth
A CITY
can be seen as a collage that is in constant flux. New buildings are added, peeled away, infilled, etc. This is especially so in Tokyo, where buildings typically have a 25 year life span, after which they are torn down. The modernization of Tokyo has not been accompanied by a profound restructuring of property and traffic patterns driven by organizational ideals or political goals. In essence, the city is an assemblage of modern buildings on a medieval footprint. Nevertheless, Tokyo is said to exhibit a particular expertise in dealing with the amorphous and ever changing, to have a capacity for seamless regeneration throughout its transformation, to provide in its formlessness an unsurpassed degree of urbanity, complexity and programmatic variety. 1
1 Chung, Chuihua Judy, Jeffrey Inaba, Rem Koolhaas, Sze Tsung Leong, and Tae Cha. Harvard Design School guide to shopping. Kรถln: Taschen, 2001. Print.
009
cultural context
010
RESIDUAL LOTS
“The qualities of a city like Tokyo that is parts-oriented to begin with, although appearing chaotic and lacking any principle or order, may at last be appreciated in the coming age.� - Yoshinobu Ashihara.
TOKYO , a city of parts where the individual defines the large scale shows
the elimination of the hierarchical city, quietly dismissing accumulated forms of power in favour of a situation in which everyone is free to realize their possibilities. Tokyo makes it possible for slim segments of the population to generate their own environments in scattered oases of a vast metroscape. What emerges here is the idea of the city of unimposed order, consisting of communal self-determination on one hand and individual freedom on the other. Here authority is practical, rather than absolute or permanent, and based in communication, negotiation.
011
cultural context
012
scrap and build
IN CONTRAST
to Europe, a Japanese home lasts about 25 years; it is meant to satisfy primarily the needs of a moment and a certain period of a lifetime. When the living situation changes, it is demolished and replaced. The lot, not the house, is considered the real value. Small houses can be adapted simply to the changing living conditions of their owners and hence be seen as the liveliest and most spontaneous elements in the urban fabric. The visual chaos of these constantly changing metropolises usually offers few points of reference for housing, but on the other hand also frees architecture of the obligation to adapt to or even subordinate itself to its urban context. Every building stands alone. Because of the rapid sequence of building and demotion that is typical in Japan, it makes little sense for architects to relate their work to a neighboring building. Many architects thus choose a defensive strategy and cut the building off from the context of the city. As a result, there are lacking relationships between houses, houses and the block, and the block and the city.
013
cultural context
01
02
03
04
05
06
014
building as commodity
Japan’s chronic
shortage of buildable terrain has resulted in a deeply entrenched “myth of land” - the illusion that real estate is an eternal asset. In the period following the Second World War, the Japanese public became such devoted disciples of American-style democracy that possessing one’s own plot of land became a fundamental aspect of the government’s social policies. The entire nation has been swamped with endless arrays of fully detached houses. The impact of these small buildings cannot be ignored. The cumulative effect of their multiplication has been to shatter our sense of authentic space. Our sense of place is relentlessly eroded by the onslaught of information, by communication technologies, and by the volatility of contemporary society. In the field of architecture, we have abandoned our sensitivity to the specificity of place in favor of the neutral freedom promised by Miesian “universal space”. Our former harmoniously integrated sense of place has been regimented and fragmented by modernist rationality; the notion of place no longer refers to a permanent location but to an arbitrary and changeable address. With our sense of place now partitioned to the point where it may be seen as an endless array of objects, these deterritorialized objects contain the potential to be reassempled into unprecedented configurations, resulting in new types of place. A new type of place must be created. Assembled at any arbitrary location and predicated on the ability to freely select materials from the environment, it is the construction of a birds nest. Such a nonhierarchical nest of found objects is a phenomenological mirror that reflects its surroundings. Making a nest is a process of accumulating objects, producing ambiguous boundaries that never result in completely isolated spaces. Here, then, is a new way for architecture to attain a sense of wealth. 1
1
Allison, Peter. Foba/Buildings. Tokyo: Springer, 2005. Print.
015
cultural context
COUPLE
SINGLE ADULT
SINGLE RETIREE
016
NUCLEAR FAMILY (1-2 KIDS)
SHARE HOUSE
MULTI-GENERATIONAL
MULTI-FAMILY
SINGLE PARENT
fluctuating families
AS THE POPULATION of Japan transitions into the next generation,
several new typologies of families have emerged. However, the housing market does not account for these typological shifts. As unit types get smaller and smaller however, land costs coupled with developer driven profit margins have caused small scale housing to become a provisional dwelling type with little social value. Within the span of 30 years, family structures change and shift between one another. The family, as a basic social unit has been changing dramatically in the past decades from the ‘extended family’ to the ‘nuclear family,’ the ‘same-sex family,’ to the ‘single parent,’ or ‘empty nester.’ The need for restructuring the idea of the ‘family unit’ is more crucial. However, as even all of these newer definitions imply a kind of negative disintegration of the family, housing must more progressively and radically define new social situations beyond the outdated idealization of the nuclear family.
017
cultural context
0
COUPLE
SINGLE ADULT
SHARE HOUSE
018
5
M: 25, F: 23
M: 30, F: 28, f: 0
Stats: No children New home
Stats: Family structure change 1st child born Child sleeps with parents
Needs: Larger kitchen Living room
Needs:: More storage Potential expansion
M: 30
M: 40
Stats: Lives above workplace 1DK, no living room
Stats: Buys a car Shop expands
Needs: Small space Occasionally has bible study group over
Needs: Needs parking space
M’: 73, M: 48, F: 45 m: 18
M’: 78, M: 53, F: 50
Stats: Multi-generational family living together (5 people)
Stats: Family structure change Son moves out Grandfather passes away
Needs: Large space Barrier-free living
Needs: More income: converts house into sharehouse
family evolution
10
15
20
M: 35, F: 33, f: 5, m: 0
M: 40, F: 38, f: 10, m: 5
M: 45, F: 43, f: 15, m: 10
Stats: 2nd child born First child goes to school
Stats: Children share a room
Stats: Kids split rooms Larger living room
Needs: New room for 1st child
Needs: Potential expansion Outdoor space for play
Needs: Potential expansion Outdoor space for play More storage
M: 45
M: 50, F: 45, m: 18
M: 55, F: 50, m: 23
Stats: Takes Ikebana class
Stats: Family structure change Sister moves in with child Downsizes shop
Stats: Both adults retire Child
Needs: Tatami room expansion Larger living room
Needs: Separate rooms for sister and child
Needs: Studio for artwork Garden space
M: 58, F: 55, f: 21, f: 22, f: 21, f: 21
M: 63, F: 60, f: 26, m:22, m: 24
M: 68, F: 65, M: 38, F: 35, f: 14
Stats: 4 young female students with similar interests move in
Stats: 3 of 4 women move out 2 young men move in (no personal relationship)
Stats: Son + spouse + child move back into house
Needs: More bedrooms Larger common space
Needs: More private space Co-ed showers
Needs: Individual room for child
019
cultural context
0 M: 25, F’: 52, M’: 55
M: 30, F: 28 F’: 57, M’: 60
Stats: Recent working grad Parents own shophouse extension
Stats: Family structure change Son gets married Moves in with spouse
Needs: Divide public/private
Needs: Additional bathroom Separate living areas Bigger bedroom
M: 32, F: 30, m: 6
M: 37, F: 35, f: 11
Stats: Child in school Still sleeps with parents Mother works from home
Stats: Child has own room
Needs: Potential expansion Office space for mother
Needs: Expansion for room
M’: 76, F’: 72
M’: 81, F’: 77
Stats: 2 retirees living in a 2LDK Son + spouse recently moved out
Stats: Grandfather has accident Can no longer climb stairs
Needs: Smaller space Garden
Needs: Barrier-free housing
MULTI-GENERATIONAL
NUCLEAR FAMILY (1-2 KIDS)
SINGLE RETIREE
020
5
family evolution
10
15
20
F’: 62, M’: 65
F’: 67, M’: 70
F’: 72
Stats: Family structure change Son has first child Moves out of house
Stats: Father retires Sells/rents shophouse Mother starts gardening
Stats: Family structure change Father passes away
Needs: Smaller space
Needs: Larger outdoor space Quiet environment Barrier-free housing
Needs: Space for entertaining Smaller house
M: 42, F: 40, f: 16
M: 47, F: 45, f: 21
M: 52, F: 50
Stats: Mother teaches piano lessons from home
Stats: Family structure change Child moves out into sharehouse
Stats: Family structure change Mother starts gardening Grandma moves in
Needs: “Public” area for students
Needs: Father wants a study
Needs: Bathroom for grandma Barrier-free access
M’: 86, F’: 82
F’: 87, F: 55, f: 25
F: 60, f: 30, m: 33
Stats: Grandfather’s health ails Nurse moves into house
Stats: Family structure change Grandfather passes away Daughter + child move in
Stats: Family structure change Grandmother passes away
Needs: Bedroom and bathroom for nurse (near elders)
Needs: Separate bedrooms for all Daughter gives piano class
Needs: Child gets married, husband moves in
021
cultural context 1977 # bedrooms
2
022
1983 # bedrooms
3
1987 # bedrooms
3
1977 # bedrooms
2
2002 # bedrooms
1
flexibility + inhabitation
STUDIES HAVE SHOWN
that families living in apartments that allowed for expansion and modification occupied them for significantly longer periods than those who could not. Within the apartment, rooms are not just added on, but their programs change frequently - living room as bedroom, closet as study). The lengthening of the life of a house is believed to be useful to reduce the consumption of natural resources and the economical burden of housing expenses for families. This is the inevitable approach for future housing in Japan. As the number of people in households has been decreasing and most of the housing in large cities in Japan is occupied by only one or two people, the necessity for adaptability may be different from what it used to be. Nowadays, much housing in Japan requires remodeling to meet the needs of young, small families as well as those of senior families without children. 1 The family dwelling can no longer exist as a singular entity within a city block. The house must be modified along with the changing needs and structures of the families that occupy it.
1 Minami, Kazunobu. “The new Japanese Housing Policy and Research and Development to Promote the Longer Life of Housing.� Changing Roles 1 (2009): n. pag. Changing Roles 09. Web. 3 Feb. 2013.
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cultural context
024
introverted housing
Boxed in by identical plaster-masked apartments, the entire area is a grey maze. Windows here and there must mean someone lives inside those tiny expressionless quarters, but to look up from the street every opening is curtained against straying eyes, betraying no sign of life. Any outsider would surely lose their way here. The occasional delivery truck passes by, but it’s a wonder how they manage to navigate successfully through these tiny streets. Tokyo is surrounded by these sprawling residential suburbanscapes, largely populated by singles or couples with no real connection to the place. Theirs are perfectly anonymous interior spaces, the city shut out behind a single-thickness wall plastered over flimsy wooden frames. 1 - Akira Suzuki
1
Suzuki, Akira. “A Gathering of Fragile Rooms.” Domus.it 8 (2006): n. pag. Domus Web. Web. 12 Mar. 2013.
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cultural context
026
victims of pre-fab
IN THE 1960S , a shortage of post-war housing resulted in tate-uri (ready built) homes. A slew of gigantic building conglomerates (Misawa, Mitsui, Daiwa) grew out of this demand, and their success resulted in the continued industrialization of building techniques and the standardization of the exterior and interior features of Japanese homes. With imported Western ideals, these pre-fab houses are inflexible and introverted; severely disengaged from their context. Their relationship with the exterior is black and white By the 1990s, the number of homes being scrapped and rebuilt on-site using customized construction techniques accounted for 75% of new-build detached housing. Although scrap and build represents a cultural practice, embedded in the perceived non-durability of construction materials and cycles of housing renewal, its proliferation has been facilitated by the construction industry in context of post-war conditions. 1 As Japanese housing requires expensive maintenance and a cycle of rebuilding in order to maintain quality standards, housing units have functioned as consumption rather than investment goods. Since the 1990s, housing values have hung on the age and quality of the built unit, which declines rapidly: new-built houses are typically worth less than they cost to construct within 10–20 years and normally require to be completely rebuilt within 30 or 40 years.
1 Privatization, commodification and transformation in Japanese housing: ephemeral house - eternal home:. New York City: Blackwell Publishing, 2009. Print.
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028
3
Hybrids Fat-free No nonsense
029
hybrids
+
=
030
monsters + mutation
“A monster is nothing but a combination of elements taken from real creatures, and the combinatory possibilities border on infinite.” 1 - Jorge Luis Borges
BUILDINGS SHOULD NOT be constructed in order to remain static, even though many of them are built with that intention in mind. Adaptation is something that is yet to be successfully accomplished in Architecture. Buildings will eventually have to adapt because of the constant changes that occur around them. One must uncover the layers of modification that a building undergoes, looking specifically at addition and infill of architectural space as the means of the modification that is being investigated. There exists a constant changeover of functional necessities; buildings begin to mutate according to the urban demand whilst working with preexisting conditions. This also starts to designate what the current demand for additional space is, and what the different types of construction that are being executed to solve the problem of requiring additional space. Mutable architecture is slowly making its way up, and soon we will be able to accomplish buildings that can successfully adapt to our ever-changing conditions. 2
1 2
Borges, Jorge Luis, and Margarita Guerrero. The book of imaginary beings. [1st ed. New York: Dutton, 1969. Print.
Al-Kouh, Hanan . “Urban Palimpscest.” Freecell Architecture. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Mar. 2013. <http://www.frcll. com/risd/spring_2006/w
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hybrids
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maximize / customize
WHILE THE INTERIORS remain fixed and inflexible, the Japanese have found several ways of creating â&#x20AC;&#x153;hybridâ&#x20AC;? structures in order to maximize and customize their exterior spaces within the dense urban fabric. Both financially and spatially economical, these structures take seemingly insignificant elements and fuse them together, enhancing their value as a whole. Rationally related, the slight deformations of these individual elements (garden, entrance, stair) make their result greater than the sum of their parts.
033
red stair garden 034
035
forest house curtain 036
037
concession courtyard 038
039
curb garden 040
041
awning vent 042
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multiple personality disorder garage 044
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sign building 046
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carved tunnel 048
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ad house 050
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outdoor / indoor stair 052
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puzzle wall 054
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miniature farm 056
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engawa 058
059
vending entrance 060
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street seating 062
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shop extension 064
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the ostrich 066
067
park / “park” 068
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door in a door 070
071
airing dirty laundry 072
073
door shop stair 074
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hybrids
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urban occupation
BORN OUT OF functional necessity, these hybrids are opportunistic by nature. They allow for the personalization of the generic pre-fab homes, and contribute to Tokyo’s idiosyncratic nature, allowing the city to exist as an accumulation of its inhabitant’s activities and personalities. However, these hybrids do not occupy a legitimate zone within the urban context. Instead, they inhabit a zone of “fuzziness”; a sliver of space between between the hard wall of a building and the public space of the city. Tacked onto facades and squeezed between cracks, the hybrids provide no mediation between the interior of the house and Tokyo’s streetscape. Their time and space are not served by anyone or anything: an irreplaceable condition.
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hybrids
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Human(e) tokyo
FUNCTIONING AS
micro-monuments, the hybrids become witness to the transformation of the city. Emerging out of specific contexts, where new or enlarged streets cut through old urban fabric, or, in spaces where the geometry of railways encounter orthogonal street patterns, they appear at very unique points where such interventions occur. 1
In viewing them as a whole instead of individual parts, an unintentional landscape is created. The living urban fabric becomes mainatined by daily small-scale interventions that are essential for organic growth. The hybrids cannot exist as independent closed-off systems, but must be helped by other buildings. In this manner, a new type of architecture is born; one of generosity, informality, and individuality.
1 White, Mason. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Atelier Bow-Wow: Tokyo Anatomy | Features | Archinect.â&#x20AC;? Archinect | Connecting Architects Since 1997. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Mar. 2013. <http://archinect.com/features/article/56468/atelier-bow-wow-tokyo-anatomy>.
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080
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Site A case study in smallness + density
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site
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yokoso miyoshi
in studying
the urban fabric of Tokyo, a generic block is selected to function as a microcosm of the city. Located in Miyoshi, Tokyo, the block is used as a site for opportunistic growth and the redefinition of site boundaries. The block is studied as a â&#x20AC;&#x153;work in progressâ&#x20AC;?: a site of speculation for the new Japanese house. Through a genealogical case study, issues of seriality + transformation, smallness + density will be addressed.
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site
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t occupy it.
creating a balance between the individual and the commun
CITY BLOCK: CITY BLOCK: CASE STUDY CASE STUDY yokoso miyoshi a microcosm a microcosm of the city; of the collage city; collage at various at various scales: scales: city, house, city, rooms, house, rooms, elements elements
AGE
elements
age
AGE
PROGRAm residential vs commercial
SITE vs Varied residential/commercial, residential building heights / materials / ages / commercial
AGE
PROGRAm PROGRAm residential residential vs vs commercial commercial
building footprint / green space
BUILDING fOOTPRINT 1, 2, 3, 4 storeys open space available
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086
5
The 4 F’s Fixed Fuzzy Fluctuating Free
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the 4 fâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s
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geneaology of a japanese house
the traditional Japanese domicile was an indetermindate, userdependent, transformable space. Based on a standard and guided by a loose set of principles, its components could be adapted and customized. Fixed: (infrastructure) Standard utilities required by every family Plumbing, heating, irrigation, drainage FUZZY: (facade) Constant negotiation between street and house Gradient of grey (vs. black + white) fluctuating: (interior) The tatami as ultimate flexibility FREE: (no build zone) Garden/green space Allows for light + air
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the 4 fâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s
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the good old days
space within Japanese architecture is made of up transitory units,
each unit serves, in essence, as a bridge between the foreground and the deeper interior, and space consists of a series of such units, like the links of a change… It is endlessly fluid. Ever shifting “boundary spaces”. Removable sliding doors and screens regulate the internal boundaries of Japanese homes, reflecting qualities of ambiguity and cultural spatial orientation. These create and define a sense of difference between rooms, and are often moved/removed according to shifting routes of life over the year. The materials used for interior partitions vary in density and translucency to establish different tones and levels of connectedness between two regions. Traditional houses provided a softened link between interior and exterior. Latticework doors and windows shaped the look and feel of houses and streets. From the outside they softened the boundary and drew the onlooker in, while those on the inside were more aware of their environment.
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the 4 fâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s
fixed
fuzzy
fluctuating
free
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new and improved
the concepts
taken from traditional/existing Japanese domiciles are distilled and represented to be part of a larger organization (the city block): Fixed: (infrastructural core) Plumbing, heating, irrigation, drainage, electricity FUZZY: (facade) Zone that engages the street Acknowledges and celebrates the hybrid fluctuating: (interior) Non-programmed, user-defined space When not utilized, site boundaries begin to flucuate FREE: (no build zone) This becomes a percentage of the site Allows for light and air
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the 4 fâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s
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intent
updating principles: The thesis aims to create a softened link between interior and exterior in order to re-engage the house with the urban fabric and create connections between the block and the city Embracing hybrids: By providing a legitimate framework for the hybrids to exist, a set of loose guidelines will be established, allowing for the natural growth and development of the house, the block, and the city. Indeterminate flexibility: By anticipating change instead of predicting certainty, a form of opportunistic growth is encouraged, allowing the house to be small in terms of square footage, but big in terms of experience.
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the 4 fâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s
270 135.0
250.0
125.0
90.0
250.0
80.0
1) fixed
66.2
90.0
90.0
270.0
270.0
42.0
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fixed
DEVELOPMENT OF A GENERIC UNIT: The “FIXED” exists as an inserted bar of program perpendicular to the street. It functions as a “ruin”, present from the onset and slowly decaying over the development fo the block. PROPOGATING ARCHITECTURE: The “FIXED” is a dense block with inherent architectural properties that begin to sponsor potential spaces. As a single entity, it contains all necessary functions that are common across the multitude of family typologies.
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the 4 f’s
2) fuzzy
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FUZZY
AN EXTENSION OF THE HOUSE: The “FUZZY” exists as an expanded zone of influence. It has the properties of furniture, allowing for manipulation over time. Located perpendicular to the “FIXED” zone, it faces the street, and becomes inhabited by hybrids. It serves as a demarcation of real estate, and becomes a framework for the sampling of randomnes, encrusting itself over time. AN EXTENSION OF THE INDIVIDUAL: The “FUZZY” is the representation of the house towards the city. It allows the facade to become a by-product of its interior spaces, and its inherent transparency begins to foster connections between interior and exterior, filtering the city into the house (and vice versa).
099
the 4 fâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s
3) fluctuating
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fluctuating
REJECTION OF PRE-FAB: The “FLUCTUATING” serves as flexible space. Based off notions of the tatami room, this component consists of non-prescribed, user-defined spaces can hold multiple functions. OPEN-ENDED GROWTH: In line with its opportunistic nature, the “FLUCTUATING” space can be borrowed and built upon, allowing the house to increase and decrease according to the needs and desires of its inhabitants.
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the 4 fâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s
4) free
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free
NO-BUILD ZONE: The “FREE” zone draws from aspects of the traditional Machiya (shophouse) typology. Garden courtyards were required to allow for light and air. The “FREE” zone is a percentage of the site; a mutable space that adapts itself according to the shifting programs of the house.
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6
Methodology Implementation + The Grid
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methodology
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intent
the HOUSE provides what is essential to live, and through its development also creates “prototypes” with solutions that are outside the conventional concepts of the home. The strategy aims to identify a set of principles and demonstrate their relevance in a range of situations while remaining open to further development by its inhabitants. The variations of the “prototype” will develop on their own to reveal possibilities that the prototypes themselves did not envisage.
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a series of
1.5” x 3” collage studies were conducted. Both spatially and compositionally, they began to inform facade/hybrid occupation and interior plan layouts. Collage is neither a closed nor a final act - it is a continuously incomplete act…It argues for a loss of control, for the amplification of the sensual, for an awakening to the unexpected, the found, the hidden, the neglected, and the discarded, all saturated by the potential of the re-imagination. It rejects the already known, the complete, the fixed, the controlled. 1 “If one sees two or more figures overlapping one another, and each of them claims for itself the common overlapped part, then one is confronted with a contradiction of spatial dimensions. To resolve this contradiction one must assume the presence of a new optical quality. The figures are endowed with transparency: that is they are able to interpenetrate without an optical destruction of each other. Transparency however implies more than an optical characteristic, it implies a broader spatial order. Transparency means a simultaneous perception of different spatial locations. Space is not only recedes but fluctuates in a continuous activity. The position of the transparent figures has equivocal meaning as one sees each figure now as the closer, now as the further one.” 2 - Gyorgy Kepes
1 2
ARCH 4509.01 Collage: A Process - Andrea Simitch Spring 2013 Rowe, Colin, and Robert Slutsky. “Transparency: Literal and Phenomenal.” Perspecta 8 (1963): 45-54. Print.
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methodology
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collage studies
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methodology
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collage studies
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methodology
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collage studies
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methodology
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collage studies
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methodology
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collage studies
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methodology
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collage studies
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methodology
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collage studies
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methodology
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collage studies
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methodology
fixed
fuzzy
site
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components
Fixed: (infrastructural core) Plumbing, heating, irrigation, drainage, electricity FUZZY: (facade) Zone that engages the street Acknowledges and celebrates the hybrid fluctuating: (interior) Non-programmed, user-defined space When not utilized, site boundaries begin to flucuate FREE: (no build zone) This becomes a percentage of the site Allows for light and air
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methodology
128
potential growth + urban occupation
what characterizes healthy communities? 1 Individuality: Communities are individual; they allow space for the personal and unique, creating a secluded and discreet counterpoint to the constant gaze of collective living. Individuality is based on freedom of expression through ones living space. Flexibility: Communities are flexible; they accept the inevitability of changing needs and wishes over time. Flexible communities are extensible and adaptable, which allows them to be responsive to immediate needs using the resources available as prototypes for future possibilities. Evolutionary growth: Communities evolve. Their overall character is determined by an incremental process of adaptation, and the optimization of local conditions. Their development is organic and bottom-up, reflecting the changing needs, wishes and habits of the people who shape their environment over time. Human-scaled: Communities are human-scaled, offering a proportional, material and spatial intimacy that is appropriate for dwelling and organizing daily life. Human-scaled spaces are spaces of social encounter and engagement; the foundations of a healthy civic sphere. Publicness: Communities are public; they are free an dopen, offering space for social activities, collective debate and even dissent. Wellconsidered public space carries the power to reinforce the democratic values of an open society, even in the face of a less tolerant political sphere. Informality: Communities are informal; they accept the spontaneous and improvised additions and modifications made by their inhabitants. These modifications are necessarily relaxed and small in scale, reflecting the desires of individuals, functioning within - but often challenging - the guiding principles of an overall plan.
1
The Vertical village: individual, Informal, Intense. Rotterdam: NAI Publishers, 2012. Print.
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methodology
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potential city block development
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methodology
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phase 0: the grid
phase 0: the ultimate generic Sets a cadence and rhythm for the site Tabula rasa: the most generic situation overlaid No acknowledgement of existing buildings or site boundaries
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methodology
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phase 0.5: the grid, adjusted
phase 0.5: the grid, adjusted Phase 0 is overlaid and adjusted to the site. The absolute minimum dimension is provided as a base zero.
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7
Phase 1 Gotta start somewhere
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phase 1
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welcome to the neighborhood
phase 1: Phase 0.5 is overlaid and adjusted to existing site boundaries. Each site is individualized and consists of all 4 “F” components. The “ruins” are formed (complete and intact).
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Phase 2 Whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s going on?
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inhabitation
phase 2: Phase 1 becomes inhabited. The site is populated and the cores are adapted by the individuals. The structures are infilled and the streetscape is brought in. “Fixed” and “fuzzy” begin to blur vis-a-vis the expression of the individual. Spaces fluctuate between public and private. Views extend; borrowed + shared.
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Phase 3 What just happened?
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FRAGMENTATION
phase 3: Site develops and grows. Fragmentation of all components. Only traces of previous site boundaries remain. The block is read as a whole, instead of the sum of its parts. Each unit is now reliant on another, none exist in isolation. Every house contains unpredictable operations and transformations.
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model
the flexibility that derives from this principle is one of indeterminacy. The actual flexibility and adaptability of the house is thereby fully dependent on the active participation of the users. The block responds to the physical constraints or freedoms of a specific site and to the contradictory desires of the owners for openness and enclosure, intimacy and distance. The closure is incomplete: spatial and visual connections are maintained through the visual, programmatic and structural opportunistic overlaps. The block becomes a single entity comprising of a choreographed functional interior and complementary exterior spaces.
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INDETERMINANCY
Housing is volatile ; subject to a range of cyclic, non-cyclic and trend changes. If it is not able to respond to these changes it becomes at best unsatisfactory, at worst obsolescent. Yet, despite the fact that dwelling is inevitably dynamic, it is too often framed intellectually and physically as a fixity.
The world has come to accept the built-in obsolescence of consumer products, largely persuaded by the manufacturers that it is desirable to continually upgrade our lifestyles through endless consumption. Rather than prescribe certain uses to specific rooms, plans should allow the user to decide how there home is occupied. Where the vernacular house could interact successfully with the changing needs of those who lived in these spaces, the modern house typically cannot cope witha ny specific circumstances; it is inaccessible and ultimately alienating to the user. Flexible housing is most successful as a response to real and pressing needs. It becomes counterproductive when treated as a self-contained credo, employed by architects as an end in itself, as opposed to a means to an end. The philosophy behind the notion of flexibility is that the requirements of modern life are so complex and changeable that any attempt on the part of the designer to anticipate them results in a building which is unsuited to its function and represents, as it were, a â&#x20AC;&#x153;false consciousnessâ&#x20AC;? of the society in which he operates. The challenge is not just to respond to immediate pressures, but to accept the uncertainty of what might happen in future demographic trends (All buildings are predictions. All predictions are wrong) The only way is to anticipate change, rather than predict certainty.
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Outtakes How it happened + Final Review
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final presentation
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outtakes MAY 08 2013 HARTELL GALLERY 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM
FACULTY CRITICS: Andrea Simitch Inaqui Carnicero Mark Morris Lenny Mirin
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final review
VISITING CRITICS: Simon Herron Jane Murphy Tuncer Cakmakli
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MID TERM STUDY MODEL
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help along the way
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help along the way
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preoccupations
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preoccupations
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IN BETWEEN
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real estate
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late nights
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animal shirts
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mashed monsters .TUMBLR.COM
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aftermath
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Bibliography Readings, research, precedents
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bibliography
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things to read
Allison, Peter. Foba/Buildings. Tokyo: Springer, 2005. Print. Bow-Wow from post bubble city. Tokyo: Inax, 2006. Print. Hasegawa, Yoko. Kazuyo Sejima + Ryue Nishizawa: SANAA. Milan: Electaarchitecture ;, 2006. Print. Idenburg, Florian, and Iwan Baan. The SANAA studios 2006-2008: learning from Japan : single story urbanism. Baden: Lars Müller, 2010. Print. Ishigami, Junya. Small images. Tokyo: Inax, 2008. Print. Kuroishi, Izumi. Kon Wajiro: a quest for the architecture as a container of everyday life. Tokyo: Wajiro Kon, 1998. Print. Pet architecture guide book. Tokyo: World photo press, 2001. Print. Privatization, commodification and transformation in Japanese housing: ephemeral house - eternal home:. New York City: Blackwell Publishing, Ronald, Richard, and Allison Alexy. Home and family in Japan: continuity and transformation. Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2011. Print. Rubio, Agustín, Sam Chermayeff, Tomoko Sakamoto, and Luis Galiano. Houses: Kazuyo Sejima + Ryue Nishizawa, SANAA. Barcelona: ACTAR ;, 2007. Print. Suzuki, Akira. “A Gathering of Fragile Rooms.” Domus.it 8 (2006): n. pag. Domus Web. Web. 12 Mar. 2013. 20091231. Print. The Vertical village: individual, Informal, Intense. Rotterdam: NAI Publishers, 2012. Print. White, Mason. “Atelier Bow-Wow: Tokyo Anatomy | Features | Archinect.” Archinect | Connecting Architects Since 1997. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Mar. 2013. <http://archinect.com/features/article/56468/atelier-bow-wow-tokyoanatomy>.
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