SYMBIOSIS

FALL 2017 MIXED-USE |

Oakland, California’s income gap is fractured into two distinct incomes, lower and upper. The goal of this project is to improve the sociological state by integrating all economic incomes on the site; creating a social fabric to grow. The master plan for this project aims to blur the line between the two incomes and have these two independent systems become co-dependent by means of symbiosis.

GROWTH & REPRODUCTION

TRANSDUCTION GENETIC TRANSFER MOLECULAR STRUCTURE

POLYMER

This project replicates spatially the process of symbiosis by analyzing bacterial growth of biosynthesis to derive the overall form of the structure. Biosynthesis is a multi-step, enzyme-catalyzed process where compounds modify, convert into more complex compounds, and join to form macromolecules. As the compounds convert, it allows cells to integrate into select voids or stems into new sections of growth.

Trilateral Composition

This building aims to revitalize the immediate context that is comprised of five public schools (south-southwest), a community college (southeast), and residential towers (north) with essential public facilities. With these three existing developments, they become the three primary nodes that anchor the thresholds of the building to the site. The thresholds placement become the immediate access point for the surrounding context to its corresponding public facility. The mixed-use civic building program comprises a library, a healthcare facility, and public workshops. Each program becomes the framework of the trilateral form, which mediates the discretized context to a single.

Transverse Section Perspective

The overall form mimics the process of biosynthesis, where the bacteria stems from single cells into new sections of growth. Cutting transversely through the building shows that sequence of growth from the core to the ends of the programs on either side. Causing the centermost point to become the densest, whereas the new sections are left open-ended, translating the density into clear and distinct volumes. The central volume extends towards the three nodes while creating a relationship to the immediate program below and engages the central atrium through its overarching form.