Portfolio Selected Works 2014-2018 EMAIL: yw65@rice.edu TEL: 832 660 6015
YAO WANG
Yao Wang | Rice University | School of Architecture | MARCH
CONTENTS 01 TRANS-PROGRAMMING Campus High-rise NJU Core Studio | Nanjing, China
02 Growing Archipelagos Urban Design Rice Core Studio | Houston, US
03 MEANDERING NARRATIVE Art Gallery NJU Core Studio | Nanjing, CHina
04 CRISSCROSSED STREET
Community Center NJU Core Studio | Nanjing, China
05 DISSOLVED INTO FOREST Branch Library Rice Core Studio | Austin, US
06 WALL HUB
Mix-use Hub Rice Totallazation Studio | Paris, FR
01 TRANS-PROGRAMMING Nanjing University Core Studio / Highrise Design / Fall 2016 Tutor: Xiaoning Hua The layout of traditional Chinese campus is dramatically dominated by hierarchical system, which is strict and symbolized that both space and education are limited. Students always follow existing disciplines while buildings always follow the boring mode. In order to break this hierarchical system and enclosed space, this design deconstructs and rearranges the different spaces to create a more free and open campus. Hence, rebuilding the relationship between people in university. Furthermore, the building, which locating in the boundary of campus, can also act as a medium to interact with the city and present the new campus system to the city.
Traditional Campus Layout ------- Hiearchical System Gulou campus is a ypical traditional Chinese campus layout with a strict hierarchy. Buildings are symmetric around the central axis, the administration building is always the center of school, and the dormitory are often arranged in order, public spaces are divided from each other. Hence, spaces in campus are boring and homogenious.
Rethinking the Tradition ------- Deconstruct and Rearrange Deconstructing and rearranging the box is a new method to break the old institutionalized system. Spaced are mixed with each other and the hiearchical system would disappear.
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02 Growing Archipelagos Rice University Core Studio / Urban Design / Spring 2018 Tutor: Naomi Hanakata Houston sits just under 50 feet above sea level and is among the flattest major metropolitan areas in the U.S and subsequently, the city is under a high risk of flooding. My project proposes a constructed topography as a strategy to mitigate flooding, to create recreational and ecological resources, and accommodate Houston’s expected population density increase. Hills ranging from three to eight meters are situated in different locations of the site, providing a higher ground for houses and open spaces. Next to each hill, lower-lying lands serve as retention ponds for flood condition, and the excavated soil serves as materials to construct the elevated topography. With a widening of the bayou channel on terraces will also help to reduce flood damage and to restructure the site’s topography. The lower-lying lands and terraces serve as water run-off or overflow catchment areas during flooding while providing recreational amenities during normal weather conditions. All of the lower-lying lands are connected by ditches to drain the impoundment to the bayou.
Hurricane Harvey Hurricane Harvey of 2017 is tied with 2005’s Hurricane Katrina as the costliest tropical cyclone on record, inflicting $125 billion in damage, primarily from catastrophic rainfall-triggered flooding in the Houston metropolitan area and Southeast Texas. In a four-day period, many areas received more than 40 inches (1,000 mm) of rain as the system slowly meandered over eastern Texas and adjacent waters, causing unprecedented flooding. The resulting floods inundated hundreds of thousands of homes, which displaced more than 30,000 people and prompted more than 17,000 rescues.
Water Basins of North America The North American water system basins delineate edges and boundaries that sometimes define to and at other times disregard political borders. To the South-East, Texas is defined by the Gulf of Mexico, to the South-West, by the the Rio Grande. The scale and geometries of the water systems and the subdivision of their water sheds do not conform to orthogonal survey lines and grids, visible both on the local scale of Houston’s bayous, as well as the continental scale.
Topography of USA The topographic range of the United States spans from negative eighty-five meters below sea level in California’s Death Valley, to 6,150 meters at its highest peak at Alaska’s Denali. At an average elevation of twenty-four meters above sea level, Houston falls within the lowest elevation category, in both Texas and the United States.
Site Location Located at the junction of Brays Bayou and the 610 loop at one of Houston’s lowest elevation points, the site is positioned almost entirely within the hundred year floodplain (and if assessing by post-Harvey floodplain re-mapping, within the five hundred floodplain). Riverine and run-off flooding is thus the largest physical challenge this community faces.
Figure Ground Map Depicting the built structures on our site, this figure ground map accentuates the amount of unbuilt space in our residential suburban site. The amount of unbuilt spaces can be largely attributed to the prevalence of front and back yards on large lots as well as two shopping centers with large parking lots and a large wastewater treatment plant.
STRATEGY ANALYSIS
WEAKNESS ANALYSIS Imperviousness Percentage Analysis Different land cover has different capility to absorb water, the map shows that hardscape such as parking areas and freeway are the most impermeable area and it is terrible for flood condition.
OPPOTUNITY ANALYSIS
Market Value Analysis Factors that may contribute to plot value include but are not limited to: the quality of built property, location relative to environmental nuisance and commercial convenience, and school district boundaries. The plots adjacent to the train tracks appear to be of lower value than their neighboring plots further from the train.
THREAT ANALYSIS
Phase One: 2020
Phase Two: 2040
Phase Three: 2050+
City Strategy
Site Strategy
Probe Strategy
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Build Place Analysis :
Housing Analysis :
Flood Analysis :
Hills ranging from three to eight meters are situated in different locations of the site, providing a higher ground for houses and open spaces. Next to each hill, lower-lying lands serve as retention ponds for flood condition, and the excavated soil serves as materials to construct the elevated topography. With a widening of the bayou channel on terraces will also help to reduce flood damage and to restructure the site’s topography. The lower-lying lands and terraces serve as water run-off or overflow catchment areas during flooding while providing recreational amenities during normal weather conditions. All of the lower-lying lands are connected by ditches to drain the impoundment to the bayou.
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03 Meandering Narrative Nanjing University Core Studio / Fu Baoshi Art Museum Design / Fall 2015 Tutor: Pingping Dou The museum follows a audience method in which architect is as participant instead of creator. It combine the form of traditional Chinese garden and the experience of seeing traditional Chinese landscape painting to create a narrative space. Just like variable perspectives in landscape painting can set up the ways of seeing, the clusters combined by the alley can attract visitor to participate in the visiting route and experience the layers of space.The circulation conflate the exhibition of Fu’s paintings and narrative space as a whole so that the space can be shared and perceived.
Concept: Combination of form and experience
Form: Adaptation and reference of form language in traditional chinese garden
now
Qing dynasty
The site used to be the place of Suiyuan Garden, one of the most famous garden in China. Unfortunately, it is not preserved today. The design of the museum pick up some elements from the layout of it to express the memory of the past garden space.
Experience:
Ways of seeing through paintings-view composition in traditional chinese painting Fu Baoshi (1904-1965)was a Chinese painter. He held many personal exhibitions in China and had won favorable comments. Fu’s reforms were followed by a group of artists in Nanjing where he then lived. The site of the design is just near where he lived in and the museum exhibits the artwork and introduces the life of Fu.
View from above
Up on the roof
View from inside
In the room
View from below
Under the eaves
Clusters
Visiting Route
Scenery
South Elevation
North-South Section
Ground Floor Plan
Second Floor Plan
04 Crisscrossed Street Nanjing University Core Studio / Community Center Design / Spring 2016 Tutor: Kai Wang The design aims to revitalize the community by building a path network in the community center. Spots are inserted into the intersections of the paths and characteristic space environment are created by this way. The vertical public promenade provide many communal space and shared space, where interesting conversation can be happened between building and its surrounding city and nature. Based on the analysis of human activity and building typology of the site, the community center provides the programs that are required by the resident and the active public space that can be utilized by people. Neighborhood relationship would be reshaped by this building in this closed district.
05 Dissolved into Forest Rice University Core Studio / Branch Library Design / Fall 2017 Tutor: Carlos Jimenez Tree is the departure point of this project. There are many oak trees in the north of the site and I hope the library can be an extension of the forest and dissolved into the environment. Thus, several extractions are created to bring north forest space and south city space into library. The curve shape being inspired by sprawling branches of the oak tree helps to create a fluid and connected space, while the rectangular boundary keep consistent to the surrounding context. As the growth of a tree, the ground floor contains the dynamic programs while static functions are located in the upper floor. The open access library is divided into large archive library and small reading areas just like the trunk and branches of a tree. The straight facades towards city view and the curve facades towards yard scenery provide an unique and changing experiences for users and visitors.
Second Floor Plan
East-West Section
Elevation Collage
North-South Section
06 Wall Hub Rice University, Paris Program Totallization Studio / Chateau Domain Design / Fall 2018 Tutor: John.J.Casbarian Inspired by a housing type that exists on the stone wall which surrounds the domain, we initiated urban development at the border of the domain to preserve the natural conditions within it. Our building is the gate to the domain of Chateau de Chambord. It is a hub for trains, monorail, cars, bikes and people. The project defines two different world inside and outside the wall. On the outside of the wall, it is a train station, a parking lot with pedestrian walkways on the level of the major ticketing and information lobby, a monorail station and a hotel tower in a field of concrete column and beam system, featuring exposed structure enhancing the clarity, rationality and efficiency of the structure system. However, on the inside of the wall, shops and resting platforms are scattered horizontally and vertically in a field of plants. It is a completely different world.
Master Plan for Domain The density, scale and type of urban development varies according to its relationship to the local shape of the wall and its distance to the nearby towns. A monorail is built at the full length of the border, making connection around the border fast and easy. When there is a break between two groups of ribs, a large scale major public space is developed. The chateau’s nine grid plan and objects on a nine grid plan are copied and enlarged which becomes four objects of potential artificial landscaping and a bike lane. The shape of the bike lane marks the division between UNESCO natural preserve and UNESCO heritage preserve. It takes away the centralized power of the chateau, making it an object in a field.
Master Plan
Ground Floor Plan
Wall Section Detail
Monorail Layer Plan
Hotel Layer Plan
East Elevation
East-West Section
West Elevation
Summer Condition
Winter Condition
Bio-climatic Strategy
There are an array of chimneys in the central corridor of the tower, which can not only works as ventilation system but also light well to let natural light into the building. Two different facade designed bio-climatically to meet various requires of two direction. The west facade, towards outside city, has double skins, which function as another chimney with different methods in summer and winter. The east facade, towards the inside forest, has several vertical glass boxes function as public spaces and vertical gardens.
Other Work 1/
Before
Practice + Internship
After
Other Work 2 /
Handsketch + Exhibition + Photograpfy
Yao Wang | Rice University | School of Architecture | MARCH