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ALTA VISTA URBAN PLAZA REDESIGN
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CUMBERLAND GALLERY + VERTICAL FARM
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YOKOHAMA COMMUNITY CENTRE
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KANATA LAKES KINDERGARTEN
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CHINATOWN BRANCH LIBRARY
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VISITING ARTIST’S HOME ADDITION
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COMPETITION: WARMING HUT
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COMPETITION: ESCAPE ROOM
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ALTA VISTA URBAN PLAZA REDESIGN The Alta Vista project was a week-long urbanism study of a one-storey vehicle-oriented shopping plaza. The assignment was to redesign the plaza in order to create a more welcoming, pedestrian-friendly environment. The project involved the addition of rentable office spaces above the plaza to generate more traffic, as well as the addition of a Bridgehead Coffehouse (as per the assigned program) to replace the Tim Horton’s that is currently on the site.
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CUMBERLAND GALLERY+VERTICAL FARM This gallery sits in a cornfield in Cumberland, a rural area outside of Ottawa. The gallery is to include classrooms, studios/ workshops, and a residence for an artist. Much of the gallery rests below the ground in order to reduce the footprint on this rural site. The gallery spaces feature skylights for natural lighting of the artwork on display. Rising above the corn field is an Urban-inspired mult-tiered vertical farm. The farm operates using aeroponics to grow its crops. The vertical farm has been designed and optimized in such a way that it produces the same quantity of food as the corn field on which it sits, meanwhile, its footprint is only 1.5% of the original field, promoting the introduction of rural elements into a more urban environment.
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YOKOHAMA COMMUNITY CENTRE Situated on Tokyo Bay, in the city of Yokohama, Japan, this community centre, with its industrial-inspired structure and open floor plan mimics the urban fabric of the surrounding area. Incorporated into the project is a recreation centre, Olympic-size swimming pool, saunas, a library, a cafĂŠ, and a kayak club with related storage and repair areas. The centre features an extensive array of circulation pathways, including a celebrated ramp system for contemplative movement throughout the centre. The circulation pathways seek to permeate the building and invite traffic from the surrounding area to enter and enjoy the many elements brought to the community by the centre. 13
KANATA LAKES KINDERGARTEN Situated on a suburban site to the west of Ottawa, the kindergarten is surrounded by big-box stores. Through materiality and form, the kindergarten pays homage to the neighbourhood of Beaverbrook, the first residential development in Kanata. The kindergarten acts as a filter and border between the big box stores of current Kanata, and the initial residential vision of a fledgling Kanata.
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CHINATOWN BRANCH LIBRARY Located in Ottawa’s Chinatown on Somerset street, the library uses the concepts of a belvedere and a grotto to represent the development of a culturally rich community. Adjacent to the library is a small public plaza. A small splash pad which extends as a boundary off of the distinctive Chinatown Gate contains three lightwells. These wells illuminate the grotto below, an archive on the history of Ottawa and Chinatown and its residents.The grotto is a place of quiet, inward-focussed learning. As one travels into and up through the library, they are exposed to the sites of the neighbourhood and a breadth of literature. Upon reaching the belvedere, a reading room which punches a hole in the large dividing wall that informs the floor plan of the library, they are greated with a spectacular view of the area. The belvedere is a place of external, outward-focussed contemplation and exploration.
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VISITING ARTIST’S HOME ADDITION The Visiting Artist’s Home, a house in Geyserville, California, built by Jim Jennings, sits in a “sculpture garden” and is designed for use by an artist who would live on site while creating a sculpture for the garden. The house was constructed by slicing through the top of a hill to create a trench, then adding two concrete walls. The angle of the walls serves to create a visual experience where the exterior appears to be magnified or demagnified depending on which end of the residence is being occupied. The addition to this project features a lap pool which extends from one end of the home to the lake. This elongated element serves to further amplify the visual effect of the home. The drawings were created via charcoal subtraction to mimic the reductive theme of sculpture and the removal of earth for the home. The 6’x5’ page was completely covered in charcoal before erasure occured to create the plans.
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WARMING HUT COMPETITION In Winnipeg, Manitoba, an annual competition is held to select designs for art installations and warming huts that will then be constructed and featured on the frazen waters of the Red River Floodway. Operating within a budget of $16’500, contestants are to design a warming hut structure that will shield occupants from the harsh winds of Winnipeg, while also providing an interactive or social experience to the skating route for commuters and visitors.
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ESCAPE ROOM COMPETITION An “Escape Room” is an interactive puzzle activity in which a group of people are locked in a room and given 60 minutes to escape. The group must follow clues and solve puzzles in order to unlock the door and exit before the time ends. The purpose of the Escape Room competition was to design a puzzle room to be constructed in Ottawa. The room must contain a variety of challenging puzzles which include physical and intellectual elements to be solved by the group. The Trapper’s Cabin was designed to be solved in 60 minutes by 4-8 people.
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