Evolution of light The Shadow of Downtown
Chosen Text
In Praise of Shadows
In making for ourselves a place to live, we first spread a parasol to throw a shadow on the earth, and in the pale light of the shadow we put together a house. There are of course roofs on Western houses too, but they are less to keep off the sun than to keep off the wind and the dew; even from without it is apparent that they are built to create as few shadows as possible and to expose the interior to as much light as possible. If the roof of a Japanese house is a parasol, the roof of a Western house is no more than a cap, with as small a visor as possible so as to allow the sunlight to penetrate directly beneath the eaves. There are no doubt all sorts of reasons—climate, building materials—for the deep Japanese eaves. The fact that we did not use glass, concrete, and bricks, for instance, made a low roof necessary to keep off the driving wind and rain. A light room would no doubt have been more convenient for us, too, than a dark room. The quality that we call beauty, however, must always grow from the realities of life, and our ancestors, forced to live in dark rooms, presently came to discover beauty in shadows, ultimately to guide shadows towards beauty’s ends.
Downtown Auckland
Prologue
Walking the busy streets under the giant marvels of the capitalist empire, life seems to all but surround you, engulfing you within its tight grip. However it is not until you examine, and look within the eyes of those around you that you do not see life, but the fading light of the burning candle as it approaches the end. You may find solitude within your life, but as you gaze around these at the lives that surround you, you must question your own morality, your own existence in this futile environment.
Life does exist here, yet it is rarely seen in its unique form. We get the business men and women, caught up in the world of ever increasing personal fortune, to only realize you escalation the fortune of other. The students or youth occupy this small part of town, with glaring ignorance for the greater world beyond their small existence. One may envy this ignorance but if we indulge too far down the rabbit whole we may find ourselves never returning. The shopper seems too caught up in spending money they altogether forget the world they live in and transcend into a blissful aura of unconscious thought to the world around them. The tourist pleasurable indulging in the superficial values surround this area. The homeless man talking away to himself, laughing and the seemingly unknown. Life does exist here, but it forms as a collective. These people partake in the same mechanism every day, continuing to move the machine along, obliviously to the part they play in the wider world.
To lose yourself into the shadows of your mind begins a dark process of self-evaluation. You question your own existence. Your own morality even, to try and discover your reality. It is here in the darkest parts of your mind you can start to move forward. While it may be dark here you are under your own control, you have complete autonomy over yourself. For we become comfortable in darkness, within the shadow of light, and it is here we rely on ourselves to progress onwards.
We as humans evolved from the cave, from darkness itself. We rose from the deep ashes of black to form a life beyond. So why do we find ourselves now filling every void with light, with every crevice uninhabited by shadow. We convince ourselves that we feel threaten if we are not lit, if we are not overwhelmed by the warm glow of light, but we forget of the beauty hidden within the contrast of shadows. Not superficial beauty, but that which cannot be found within lights grasp.
To become human again, we must forget all that is sold to us, and remember and embrace all which is provided. Nature has created us, and it is within nature we will find our answer to solve this loss of life.
The Shadow of Downtown
Sinking into the Shadows
Vulnerable 1. Able to be easily physically, emotionally, or mentally hurt, influenced, or attacked
Within the shadows lies much of the forgotten world, one lost to the light of modern man. Much can be discovered within the darkness that cannot be found within the grasp of light. The notion that we are unsafe within the shadows is the by-product of vulnerability growing within our mind. We live in a world so bright, we have forgotten all of which is not lit, and so it is left behind and forgotten. We have left not only the shadows behind but the experience to be had with it. For there is much to be discovered not only about space and light within the darkness of the shadows but also within our own mind.
To place man back within the shadows require delicacy, because purely putting him into darkness can cause great discomfort. This notion of the shadows is to allow people to become vulnerable, not anxious, for when we become vulnerable we rely on ourselves to guide us through. We want to bring life back into the eyes of the occupants of the ghastly buildings currently called office towers and through the shadows the people will bring life.
Sinking into darkness reveals what was lost with light, the shadows, the darkness, all begin to expose the weary traveler to the beauty in the shadows.
As you descend towards the doorway of darkness you start to become hesitant, finding yourself within the grasp of the earth. Surrounding you are walls of earth and wood scorched by fire. The smell starts to surround you, while it is only faint it leads you on.
Darkness embraces an unknown, for when viewed from light, appears pure black, but viewed from shadow it will appear light. This area of threshold shall be the entrance, the point in which you pass through and as transferred into the realm of shadow.
With a tremor down your spine, you slowly adjust to the landscape below, finding yourself merging with the life within the darkness, becoming a shadow yourself. Around you are those who descended, each with a mark of darkness visible in the wearing eyes of each form of life down here. Feeling lost within this underground landscape you begin to move towards your hope of escape, you find yourself following nature’s path. For it is light that will save you, it is light which shows you the way forward. It scatters this busy landscape, occasionally illuminating this shadow ridden landscape.
Looking back you see the outside world, but now it is just a glare, so unnatural. It blinds you with its brightness, evermore terrifying than the darkness ahead.
Continuing on, you start to relax, you adjust to the shadows within this landscape, and you start to feel at ease with the light within. Light breaks through the ceiling above you, bringing down with it columns of the structure that towers above, you walk with the giants, these giants walk with you. Each column brings down the light which guides you. As you walk on, you realize it is now not just light which guides you, but shadow. A sense of depth becomes visible to you that gives sense to the darkness. Now it is something not to be afraid about, but something to find pleasure in.
Shadows become rehabilitated, no longer do they make am occupant feel vulnerable but rather at ease. You flip the conventional world on its head and show the truth to the modern human, you reveal to them a world lived in not long ago.
To exit this space you must transcend. You followed shadows to find your destination, but now you, a reborn life, rediscovered in the shadows, must transcend into light to revive your life. You must now inject yourself within the framework of society with the refreshed appreciation of the shadowed world.
As you rise up through the light, passing through the glimmer of water, you look around at this bright world surrounding you. Reemerging you see the faces of many, hurried through their day, and you see yourself out there, and you look, pondering his existence wondering where his place in the world lies. As you rise up, you continue to contemplate your life, and the shadows that you have just risen from.
As a human we forget. We forget the beauty in life, we forget the glorious world we live in. We lose sense of how lucky we are to be here, on this planet, standing on this piece of earth, just breathing. All context of life has been removed, and installed in place of that, an artificial life. A life so caught up in the world of money, run and dictated by those it suits best. While it would be easy to disgrace this world and leave it behind for a modern utopia, one realizes this cannot exist. So many are lost, lost into this life that they cannot escape. So while we may fantasy about the utopia of architectural dreams, far away from the cooperate greed, its realized we must modify the ideals into the modern city agenda, and help reinstate the beauty of life into the city.
The Shadow of Downtown
The Site
The site is the heart of the city. With current transport infrastructure and planned development for the network, this site is one of the busiest in down town Auckland and is only set to grow. Planned developments are happening around the site, leading into an ever more intensified Auckland. While Auckland is moving into an urban dense city, suburbs still continue to sprawl, with family’s still buying in large the postage stamp section with the great big house. This post World War 2 endeavor is still with us 70 years on, hindering our social growth. This site then becomes a beacon for those traveling into the city every day for work, those slowly becoming another zombie confined in there aluminum car, trawling the asphalt day in, day out.
QWR
Waterfront
Queens Wharf Redevelopment
FBD
WA
Ferry Basin redevelopment
QW
Queens Wharf
BUS
Bus Infrastructure
BUS QU
Queen St Upgrade
ST
Quay St Street-scape Bus Infrastructure City Rail Loop Britomart Central
CRL BRI BRI
Park Residence Saffron Apartments
PA SA
Britomart Galway
HOT
Sofitel Hotel development
ANT HOT
Antipodean Apartments Maritime Apartments
Auckland is growing, and the city must grow with it.
Precinct Properties - Commercial Bay
Current Proposal
So what does Auckland need? Another fucking skyscraper. AFS for short. Seriously, why do we go through all of this? This penis measuring contest, trying to see whose is bigger, whose is flashier. Why couldn’t all the men in the board room just get out a ruler and sort it out there and then, rather than messing everyone around with the construction of this monster. The commercial bay answer all but one problem. This is a singular one‌ Money. It addresses no issues relating to the city in which it rest, but rather the bank accounts of its funder. This skyscraper sits there , trying to embed itself within the city, but it’s there as a big middle finger, like a child in the playground, calling out slur and trying to tell you he is better at everything than you. Auckland has gone through this time and time again, and yet we do not do anything differently. This tower provides nothing to the social fabric of society, and it is truly the embodiment of everything wrong with capitalism.
Look around at the current tower livestock of Auckland and you see outdated, outgrown, blocks. Nothing more than a window into the fleeting past. This tower is no different. When you compete of levels of technology, you’re never going to win. Maybe in the short term gain, but not long term. It will become, in 30 years, just like its neighbors, an outdated block. So why do we keep pushing along this path? Money. Instead of investing more capital, we get low life buildings. Buildings so obsessed in the now, that they will soon become forgotten as they are over taken by the next big thing!
So what do you do if all hope is lost in the capitalist corner? We look into the people. A building which identify urban issues facing the city now, will become a solid foundation in which to build upon in the future. Creating an icon now will shed light for future generation to follow. Architecture must work within its fabric, it must become a part of the city, and it must aid its occupants throughout life. We must collapse this idea of a vertical tower and allow this architecture to flow through the city, the harbor, the people and out of all this will rise the solution.
To find our solution we must remove ourselves from the light and explore the shadows of those around us. We must sit within the land to find our true purpose. We must work with the people to provide a life forgotten.
Shadows of Evolution
Proposal
1. Current site framework 2. Demolition Map 3. Site Access 4. Workable site The site sits in the shadows of it past with HSBC casting its shadow across the site. It makes sense to demolish this aging building as it only hinders the aim of project. The floor area lost can easily be made up from the large site it once stood over.
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Waihorutiu stream has been in the shadows of urban growth for over a century. Running down the spine of the city, the stream drew a hard line in the face of rapid growth in the 20th century. It became a open canal to only be closed in years later. Entombed away from the public, it has been out of sight and out of mind. This proposal seeks to bring back this stream to help bring life back into the downtown area.
The new proposal will occupy most of the site, with buildings opting to stay low within the framework of the city, rather than reaching into the clouds. Due to the new transport arrangement, much of lower queen street can be reclaimed back as public space. It is here an engineered channel forms in Britomart’s civic space, drawing reference to the reclamation of Commercial Bay. Planting of representative coastal sedges and rushes running adjacent and within the Waihorotiu to perform storm water treatment functions and to support life.
Two lower levels are retail space directly connected to the street. A total area of 16,000m2, 2000 more than the current proposal. The underground environment separates workers from the general populous in the retail sector as they try and ascend into the tower. A central circulation core provides the access for both wings. Once at the desired floor, workers must circulate around the exterior of the building, exposed to the elements. It is from here they follow streets to their office.
It is here Horotiu lay, resting in this sleepless stream, ever flowing through the heart of the city. Resting in the shadows the Taniwha has lurked through the caverns protecting the life within. In the heart of the city, it shall revitalize the life once lost. The life within this stream will flow, it will enlighten us all, for the Taniwha will not only bring its presence, but with it, life.
Read Write Architecture Connor Tennent - Book 3 2911975