Seymour Tseng - Portfolio 2023

PORTFOLIO

CIVIC

Oakland, California, USA

WORK SAMPLES

The Bay Area, California, USA 03

LANDSCAPE

San Francisco, California, USA

04

MULTIFAMILY

Pingtung City, Taiwan

05 RESEARCH

Sagi Island, Mihara, Japan

PIEDMONT AVENUE PUBLIC LIBRARY

Oakland, California, USA IN-BETWEEN SPACES

Risk of Fixation

Randomness is chaos, and design is organization. It is the process of producing logic from the void, crowning meanings to nonexistent figures, a way by which humans relate to the environment.

But randomness is also possibility. It has yet to be given an indentity, therefore without a limit; as cement is to cured concrete, before it become fixed, it possesses the freedom to become any form. While a completed design can be simplistic, the process should be sophisticated. The audacity to create chaos and extract possibilities from them is integral to a bottom-up design approach, which is organic.

Artificial top-down design has left irrevertable failtures, whether the cold laceration of land parcels or destruction of vernacularity by colonial arrogance, proving the value and necessity of more considerate design approaches.

PROGRAM:

Public and elementary school library design that includes classrooms, administration, and static and dynamic collections.

LOCATION: 4313 Piedmont Ave

CLIENTS: City of Oakland

Piedmont Avenue Elementary School

PROFESSOR:

TANGENCY

When the solid attempts to enclose the void, it slips through the slits at the tangency of the circle (atrium) and becomes the surface of the solid. Enclosure and tangency are the nuance for demarcating the interior and the exterior.

Combination Clusters with Dimentionality

Exposed Interior (Atrium)

Enclosed Exterior (Courtyard)

Enclosed Exterior (Roof Garden)

SWEEP

Through the operative strategy of sweeping, the formal syntax creates transitions of the interior and exterior space that are seamless, subtle, and silent; the spaces reciprocate and overlap to produce soft clusters. The sweeping of the surface generates a geometric rhythm of the figures and traverse the void spaces.

BOUNDARY

The concept of sweeping programmatically allows for a softer demarcation between public and private spaces. Users can feel enclosed when being outside of the building structure where the solid contains the void, while feeling open inside where the slipping of the surface releases the void.

Front Entrance

(L) Feature Stairs ; (R) Courtyard

Bay Area, California, USA

4372 26TH ST

Regulatory conditions in residential design, especially in the city of San Francisco where building codes are stricter, led to interesting design possibilities despite limited freedom.

Project Lead & Designer - Seymour Tseng

FF&E Designer - Laura de la Torre

Project Supervisor - William Ogle

541 29TH ST

Remodel of a master bathroom that adopts Japandi design as the basis and emphasizes materiality with the chosen slab surfaces and wood finishes. The functionality of the space is uncompromised with ample storage and luxury lighting.

Project Lead & Designer - Seymour Tseng

Project Supervisor - William Ogle

Second-story ADU and facade redesign that leverages contemporary design strategies including the large horizontal planes and fine screens. The main residence is situated on a hillside and requires precise height arragement of the spaces to comply with strict local regulations.

Interior remodel and exterior staircase and patio redesign that creates an open floorplan to accomodate the client's desire for a more contemporary lifestyle and imporved circulation.

Project Lead & Designer - Seymour Tseng Design Apprentice - Reece Posey Project Supervisor - William Ogle

ARCHITECTURAL LANDSCAPES

LANDSCAPE DESIGN CASE STUDIES

San Francisco, California, USA

I. ENCLOSURE

FORM

The site design derives its circular form from the Native American baskets and the notion of celebrating life around a campfire.

Bridging Landscape and Architecture

The line between landscape and architecture is drawn by enclosure. As architecture becomes the means to sheltering and protection, landscape becomes the "outside," the realm outside of complete human control.

Esssentially, though, both the architectural and landscape environments serve to create a sense of belonging.

To bridge landscape and architecture, experiential design is the common denominator. To allow place-making to lead to the coexistence of the "inside" and the "outside," to elevate the presence of the pre-existed members, to refrain users from the need to control.

PROGRAM:

Landscape architecture triology featuring transformation of sites in iconic San Francisco landmarks, using topography, historical preservation, and programming.

LOCATIONS:

I. Sutro Baths Ruins

II. Cruize Terminal Plaza (Pier 27)

III. Aquatic Park

PROFESSOR: Karl Kullmann (LDARCH 102)

UC Berkeley | Spring 2023

SPACE COMPRESSION

By gradually decreasing the widths and heights of the cascading roofs (and therefore the width of the pathways), people experience spatial compression as they traverse the alternating light and shadows, also funneling traffic.

By accelerating pace using the graded slope, the footsteps of the people become louder and more frequent as they descend, creating an auditory perception of time compression.

II. GROUND III. PROGRAM

DERIVING LANDFORM FROM SITE CONDITIONS

Elevating the areas affected by the negative stimuli (wind, vegetation, and noise), which inductively produces a landform that amplifies the positive stimuli (hillslides for sunbathing and looped deck platform.)

PROGRAMMING AS ACTIVATION CATALYST

By introducing activities involving the creative and cultural industries, in addition to reorganizing the circulation of the existing park, the design attracts people, who are the true activating agents of the landscpae that instill life, energy, and stories to the space.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING PROJECT

LOVE APARTMENTS

From the Beginning, Designed with Love

Settlement created congregation; agriculture catalyzed land occupation; industrialization leds to urbanism.21st century living is inseparable from the liveliness of the city, which is shared by diverse people; at the interesection of these differences is the engenderment of a distinct urban landscape.

By compromising privately owned spaces, the collective of city dwellers shares a richer living experience. Affordable housing is "incomeindexed" housing, encouraged by varioius incentives, whether political or ethical.

Quality and affordable living spaces can be designed by maximizing spatial efficiency and promoting community ammenities, prioritizing the wellfare of the residents.

PROGRAM:

A concept redesign proposal aimed for Taiwanese traditional veranda-style row houses to produce more housing units, better affordability, and higher quality of life.

LOCATION: General Urban Taiwan Settings

INTENDED CLIENTS: Regional Developers City of Pingtung

Self-proposed Design Project | Summer 2022

Pingtung City, Taiwan

The apartment maximizes the spatial efficiency of units and allows the capacity for community ammenities, imrpoving the collective quality of life as well as keeping the rent affordable for the city. This reduces the cost of living to facilitate affordability and promotes neighborhood bonding that is otherwise more difficult to achieve in an urban setting.

BALCONY

BEDROOM

INTERNATIONAL RESEARCH:

COMMUNITY-ENGAGED DESIGN

DECON-RECON: VERNACULARITY

Sagi

To Design "With," Not "For."

This research and design for Sagi Island's vernacular social spaces is devoted to a bottom-up approach and the principles of decon(struction)-recon(struction).

By using only locally-sourced and recycled agricultral and residential materials and inventing structural systems, the social space is not only mobile and environmentalfriendly but also meaningful and adaptable to the lives of the villagers.

STAGED INTERVIEWS

Pampacampani (Design Company in Hiroshima)

" Cultural tradition of welcoming and bidding farewell to visitors."

"Using a motif that becomes an icon of Sagishima could be a good idea [to create a public space] attractive to visitors and integral to the daily lives of the island residents... such as, orange crates."

FIELD SURVEY

Michie Tsuchida & Yukiyo Okuno (Sagi Island Welcoming Comittee)

"We want the children on the island to grow up with the elderly..." "We used to set up large tables on the verandas after agricultural work to enjoy the evening breezes, [using] those as both tables and chairs, common to invite passersby for tea and have conversations."

Yoshishige Kawamoto "Isso" (Poet & Farmer; Mr. Everything)

"There used to be an izakaya in the Sagi district where residents could gather and socialize."

"[It is possible] that community interactions among the residents have become more active due to the reduction in infrastructure caused by depopulation."

PROGRAM:

Design of a mobile and recyclable vernacular social space using only locallysourced materials by engaging islanders in the design process as well as construction.

LOCATION: Sagi Port

CLIENT: Sagi Island Welcoming Comittee

DESIGN TEAM MEMBERS:

Seymour Tseng (UC Berkeley)

Ryo Kawamoto (Tokyo University)

Cynthia Cukiernik (Univ. North Carolina)

1. Full-scale model constructed as the stage for the studio final review, consisting of 180 orange crates.

2. Participants occupied the spaces naturally, invented their own uses and created clusters of niches.

3. The social space became children's playground and the eating and drinking party after, all unplanned.

4. Lastly, the model is deconstructed and by the cohort of 15 within 10 minutes.

Island, Mihara, Japan