Portfolio. AlexandraTrofin
What is architecture?
I think architecture is a field of continuous challenge and responsibility. It is a complex fuse of solutions and responses to forever changing needs and problems. The architect’s mission is to keep himself updated so his work could focus and respond to present society’s needs or even to try to foresee next challenges of the near future. His training and professionalism should guide him to find the way to fulfill his clients’ needs/ demands while representing and respecting the social and built environment, always having a wider vision of the social and urban context he’s operating in.
Alexandra Trofin date of birth: 7th January 1992 nationality: romaniam email: alexandra.trofin.7@gmail.com phone number: +351 924 396 534 (PT) +40 722 972 156 (RO)
EDUCATION 2015- 2016 Architecture Department Coimbra University, Portugal 2014-2015 Intensive Portuguese Culture and Language Course West University, Timisoara, Romania 2011- present Architecture and Urbanism Faculty Polytechnic University, Timisoara, Romania 2007-2011 Traian Lalescu National College, Reșița, Romania major in mathematics & informatics 2008 Alberto Sampaio Superior School, Braga, Portugal visual arts profile 1999-2007 Sabin Păuță Art School, Reșița. Romania musical profile, piano
SOFTWARE KNOWLEDGE graphic instruments: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign. 3D modelling instruments: ArchiCAD, Rhinoceros, Grasshopper, Sketchup. AutoCAD. visualisation instruments: Artlantis, Maxwell (ArhiCAD 18), Vray. LANGUAGES english french portuguese romanian - mother language
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE 2015 and 2017 VitaminArchitects Timișoara, Romania www.vitamina.ro 2016 Lexarq Arquitectura, Braga, Portugal www.lexarq.pt 2017 Q Architects Timișoara, Romania
OTHER ACTIVITIES 2017 portuguese private tutor in Timisoara, Romania 2015-2016 active member of the NU magazine team (Darq UC) 2014-2017 volunteering in the “Brincar à arquitectura” program - teaching children architecture and civic behaviour 2014 A0 Architecture Festival coordinator, Timisoara 2013 Seri(i)le D’arc events coordinator and moderator
PRIZES & EXHIBITIONS 2017 Tichlein Deck Dich - project chosen for Vienna Design Week 2017 A Saudade se traduz - photography exhibition 2016 article “Brincar à arquitectura” in the NU magazine (Darq), “Raiz” publication 2015 BAUMIT honorable mention - Rehabilitation in a social neighbourhood 2015 presentation of the IVA competition entry at the Seri(i)le D’arc event 2013 C|A|S|A finalist - Annual Competition for Architecture Students 2013 university Ideal House Design prize 2013 prize for extracurricular activities 2013 exhibition of the finalist C|A|S|A competition entry in Timișoara and Cluj 2013 model exhibition in Mokum Café Timișoara
WORKSHOPS 2016 2015 2014 2014 2013
Timisoara Architecture Biennial - Yes, but there is a problem Student Fest Conflict - FABRICate creative space Radical Island Blaster - coordinated by Parasite 2.0, during the Timisoara Architecture Annual Sky Hill summer workshop - restoring vernacular houses Workshop Hodoni - building a wooden pavilion - concept, details and constructive process
1. Cultural Centre in Porto 1st Masters year (2015-2016) 5th year - Erasmus Departamento de Arquitectura, FCTUC, Coimbra prof. António Lousa
The beauty of this city, especially of the project site area, stays in the powerful relation between the built enviorement and natural elements, the spactacular views and hights that allow one to explore the city vertically. The site is slightly problematic because of the viaduct spliting the area very agressivly in halves but, on the other hand, it is a huge traffic solver on an urban scale, reason why it remains a presence and I took advantages out of it, proposing an outdoor art gallery beneath it, and also, several covered court yards for the library. In order to respect the identity of this city and to introduce so many different functions, I chose a sort of pavilion like aprouch, layering the possible activities happening in the new cultural centre. LIVING / WORKING / EXPOSING are the three layers. In the residential neighbourhood I proposed to restore an abandoned old house and turn it into temporary artistic housing. Assuming the newly came artists are not locals and that’s why they need acomodation, this solution would let them experience the genuine inhabitation in a traditional housing area of Porto. The working part of my proposal means working studios for artists which are connected to a park and promenade but also, a library and some additional spaces were created for the students of Lusofona Faculty. O Passeio das Fontainhas is kept pedestrian and is the starting point of the exposing layer: the kids’ tower, the galleries, restaurant and the black box. This part of the project is not exposing the work of art only, but its aim is to treat the site, the views and the cliff itself as a piece of art worth exposing.
temporary residences area library, workshops and neighbourhood fair pavilion blackbox, galleries and restaurant, student tower
As the second semester is gently getting to its end, the black box is finally taking shape and soon, details as well. It is now more than just an auditorium, but an urban connector that links the riverside level to the upper old city and the rest of the project. All the vertical circulation was inserted into sides bottom-up tunnels, one that has stairs only and the other elevators instead. This object offers now accessability to the cliff that turned up to be a vertical park with various levels of platforms and activities.
elevadores
entrada principal
escadas
Passeio das Fontainhas
esplanada das galerĂas
accesso elevador panorĂĄmico
parcurso pedestro
acceso auto
The black box itself is made out of three boxes connected by two structural and technical levels which also work as terraces, and kept together by the sides tubes of vertical circulation. The first box is the main entry from the pedestrian Passeio das Fontainhas, and it is the distribution level, also connected to the galleries. The main space is a highly flexible auditorium organised on a hydraulic system (vertically) and in between the rock and the view to Douro river (in questions of horizontal configuration). Under another structural level there are the changing rooms for artists and administrative area.
access level plan
gallery access plan
terrace and technical area plan
visitor gallery plan
actor cabins plan
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P3'
40
48
P3'
5 7.20
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3.00 1.20
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9 11
Altura interior= 4 m A: 19.55 m2 PAV: soalho macheado PAR: reboco branco TET: reboco branco
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Corredor
8 12 7 13
1.20
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40
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1.755
15 4
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10.50
16 3 17 2 18
1.795
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2.175
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75 15
U2
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U2
H int= 2.70 A:
52.37 m2 soalho madeira betão a vista reboco branco
PAV: PAR: TET:
3
15
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2.25 2.10
2.55
2.70
25.00
Corredor-backstage
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Corredor U3 3.70
H int= 2.7m A: 17.31 m2 PAV: soalho madeira PAR: reboco branco TET: reboco branco
P4
U1
1.50 2.10
U1
1.50 2.10
6.00
P4
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P3
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20
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18 2
2.00
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H int variável 3-10m A: 297.23 m 2 soalho madeira sportiva PAV: PAR: betão a vista técnico TET:
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3.60
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1.55
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BlackBox 2.40
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18 x 17 = 3.10
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P5
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3.40
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3.52
2.80
13.60
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P2
1.15
12.88
56
3.40
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3.80
4.52 20.92
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technical plan of the main space
+5.30
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- pavimento - calçada portuguesa - gravilha - 2x telas bituminosasas hidroisolamento - difusão - primer - betão inclinado - isolamento termico 80 mm - barreira de vápores - laje betão 310 mm - sistema linear de insuflação HVAC - montantes de piso técnico tipo Knauf pedra calcária lioz solancis model Saint Raphael D´ore 30x250x9 60mm
2.10
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2.70
- seixos Esmaroz cinzento - gravilha - betão leve 30 mm - isolamento termico 80 mm - 2x telas bituminosas hidroisolamento - difusão - primer - betão inclinado - laje bubbledeck 310 mm - sistema linear de insuflação HVAC - teto suspenso, grelha metálica 30 mm
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90 2.70
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-6.86
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- pedra calcária lioz solancis model Saint Raphael D´ore 30x250x9 60mm - argamassa flexível - betão leve 30 mm - isolamento térmico esferovite extrudado 80 mm - 2x telas bituminosas hidroisolamento - difusão - primer - betão inclinado - laje bubbledeck 310 mm
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- pedra calcária lioz solancis model Saint Raphael D´ore 30x250x9 60mm - argamassa flexível - betão leve 30 mm - laje bubbledeck 310 mm - isolamento térmico esferovite expandado 80 mm fixação mecánica - pedra calcária lioz solancis model Saint Raphael D´ore 30x250x9 60mm
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- soalho macheado sportivo em madeira maciça trés camadas Kahrs Activity 30x200x2423 mm, Oak Mocha - 2 paineis OSB 50 mm - sistema montagem 50 mm - suporto plataforma hidraúlica SPIRALIFT HD9
36 2.67
2.70 31
51 2.70
3.00
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-22.42
15
- pedra calcária lioz solancis model Saint Raphael D´ore 30x250x9 60mm - argamassa flexível - betão leve 30 mm - isolamento térmico esferovite extrudado 80 mm - 2x telas bituminosas hidroisolamento - difusão - primer - laje betão 150 mm - reboco branco 20 mm
-19.30
90
- betão leve 30 mm - laje bubbledeck 310 mm - isolamento térmico esferovite expandado 80 mm fixação mecanica - pedra calcária lioz solancis model Saint Raphael D´ore 30x250x9 60mm
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-15.75
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-27.75 -28.30
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- soalho macheado em madeira 7mm - cola 5 mm - betão leve 50 mm - tela de separação - laje 400 mm - telas hidroisolamento - isolamento termico esforovite extrudado 120 mm - drenagem 20 mm - geotêxtil - gravilha - escarpa - pedra natural
2.60
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26
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- soalho macheado em madeira 7mm - cola 5 mm - betão leve 50 mm - tela de separação - isolamento fónico 30 mm - laje 150 mm - reboco 20 mm
2.80
- soalho macheado sportivo em madeira maciça trés camadas Kahrs Activity 30x200x2423 mm, Oak Mocha - betão de egalização 20 mm - laje bubbledeck 310 mm
3.60
6.00
2.70
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- piatră calcaroasă lioz - mortar flexibil - șapă suport 2cm - geotextil - pietriș - pământ natural, rocă
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2. A story of Møllendal: the reclaiming process Europan 13 competition entry Bergen, Norway 4th year (2015) Timisoara Architecture and Urbanism Faculty
The 13th session of Europan have searched for developing strategies with the aim of kick-starting urban culture based on opening up for creative initiatives, new processes for involvement and models of co-existing in private and public spheres. Møllendal’s story awaits to be written. It has an infinity of possible endings. This is not one of them. This is an attempt at reconciliating all the forces that act upon the newly open neighbourhood, in time. What if Møllendal stops being an ambiguity and opens itself up, with its shape marked clearly, to the people of Bergen? The project creates a plan of reclaiming Møllendal, this ever inaccessible site, by planning a process in which people gradually meet this newly open identity, then finally settle on it. The process begins by marking the site and activating it through bathing areas, a park and the waterfront promenade and lighting up ‘the Sun’ - the old Belsen building - which represents the community’s core, the meeting place and the lighting device for Bergen’s dark winter days. After getting familiar with it, the people are invited to participate in the configuration of the housing project: a structure containing various typologies of shared spaces appears, and, through meeting and negotiating with each other, they fill the structure so that everybody has an ideal setting. An online application also allows them to personalise their apartments and to propose and visualise future scenarios for this adaptable structure, capable to resist even dramatic changes. The entire process goes on and on, it has no end, but the beauty of it is that Møllendal is reclaimed by the people and it’s now fully up to them to make this project grow in time in their own way.
1916: view of east Møllendal, with the project site not yet existent. People enjoying Store Lungegårdsvannet
1960s: the new west Møllendal, a permanently enclosed area. Notice the lack of boats around its shore
2010s: still inaccesible and estranged from the rest of the neighbourhood
2015+: fully open to people, inviting them to get acquainted with the park, bathing area and to reinvent Møllendal’s identity
The Sun - the old Belsen building
Since the average norwegian apartment has around 60-70 sq.m, requires as much natural light as possible, has a prevalent affinity towards a two-story configuration, but should still be adaptable to any type of inhabitant, we propose a rather unusual element: a 6x6x6 meter cubicle - a spatial entity - which, through repetition, creates a structure which awaits to be filled in with apartments.
The negotiation comes when people are provided with a map of different types of shared spaces - large kitchens, saunas, gyms, common living rooms, children’s play area, gardens etc. - which are placed within the structure. They have to choose their favourite shared space and link their apartment to it, while keeping in mind the neighbouring apartments’ positions. After minding the relationship with the neighbours, one may focus on personalising their own cubicle(s), which must also be filled in: future inhabitants have a large pallette of modules they can choose from and through the online application, place them to suit their own needs and create their own personalised apartment.
The essence is the process before the construction of the apartments: future neighbours get acquainted, they have to discuss, to imagine the filled-up structure together, to share, so that, in time, even before being built, the housing in Møllendal becomes a place that takes so much space in thought, that everyone starts seeing it.
Inhabitants can change, climate can change, functions can change, economy can change. All things come and go. Yet the structure and water remain simple, present, timeless.
3. Light as structure International Velux Award competition entry 3rd year (2014) Timisoara Architecture and Urbanism Faculty
“ Light, light, the visible reminder of the Invisible Light “ (T.S. Eliot) Everything lives through light. Based on this principle, we propose a pavilion which thrives on natural daylight and quietly retires for the rest of the day, framing its context, underlining its beauty. It consists of two lightweight opaque aluminium slabs supported by numerous transparent acrylic columns, directly connected to the top of the upper slab. As natural light penetrates the columns, they become more present and the light acts like a structure for the slabs. But when the columns remain unlit, they reflect the surrounding lights, and the pavilion’s structure responds to its context, softly concealing itself in favour of the newly framed image. The proposed pavilion is a space of contemplation. Bearing such powerfull significance, it requires direct interaction with the people inside, both physically and spiritually. The pavilion invites at creating a connection with the sky by offering the possibility of raising a candle towards it. By simply placing the candle on a plate corresponding to each column, a heat sensor based mechanism allows natural light to enter the column. By offering light, you receive light, and the pavilion’s structure reveals itself. Our pavilion introduces a second motion, a more personal one - the gesture of lighting the candle - as a step towards receiveing the zenithal light through the column. Time also plays a key role in the diverse manifestations of the pavilion. At a larger scale, its role is present in the cyclic duality of the construction as a framing device for the context (at nighttime, dusk and dawn) and as an object using light to define its own structure. At a smaller scale, even the time it takes the mechanism to pull up the candle, gradually lighting the column offers the person having lit the candle a little breathing space, a moment of rest. Rather than being just a cold sculptural object, the pavilion, under the effects of time, varying density of columns, light and direct interaction with people, becomes a full sensorial experience and a world of life*. *C.N. Schulz - Architecture: Presence, Language, Place
4. C | A | S | A finalist project at the Annual Architecture Students Competition 2nd year (2013) Timisoara Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism tutors: Oana Simionescu and Bogdan Demetrescu
During the spring semester of the 2nd year, somehow, all the architecture schools in Romania have the same project assesment - collective housing. Years ago, someone came with this great idea to make of this semester a national competition for the 2nd year students. When I was in my 2nd year we were supposed to design a four apartments house in the city of Târgu Mureș, Romania. We’ve been confronted with a corner site delimited by two blind walls and some strange circumstances of scale. The site inspired me to treat the building as a thick wall that will work as solid to dig in for apartments and, on the other hand, it creates a private courtyard in between the walls. All the circulation and atmosphere in the courtyard is highly generated by the bakery’s chimney that offerz a strong identity to this house.
5. Tischlein deck dich - a social experiment winning project for Vienna Design Week Stadtarbeit 2017 www.viennadesignweek.at 2017 - collaboration with VitaminArchitects
This years’ Vienna Design Week brief asked for an urban scaled social design proposal. Since food has such a powerful social significance in various cultures, for this edition our proposal uses this subject to coagulate people around it, testing the interactions that they can have with our designed object - the created routes, the implications, participation and availabilities. The inherent multicultural values of gastronomy pushed us to creat this simple device that offers opportunities to express cultural differences. The object We propose two movable boxes that can be opened and transformed into a long table, storage and workspace, both created from simple panels and metalic structures. When doubled, the table can also work as a cart that can easily transport the chairs. During the festival For the Vienna Design Week opening, our team will prepare romanian food for the passers-by. We will inform people that they are at all times free to use the pavilion and to move it wherever necessary, while we discreetly analyse their locations of choice. During the rest of the festival days, we will invite active members of the Street Food Vienna group to participate and animate the object. On one hand, one of the main objectives of this pavilion is to work as an instrument of integration and multicultural meetings, therefore we will invite refugees from local shelters to express their culinary culture and to appropriate our object, to join the locals and participate in the festival. The countertop provides a donation box, where anybody can help support the refugee camps, where the object will be sent after the festival.
folded
unfolded - long table
folded - cart like
6. The Smithsons - from theory to built project* 1st Masters year - Darq, FCTUC academic paper in portuguese for the Architecture Theory course tutors: prof. Mário Krüger and Carolina Coelho
The housing boom of the 60s, following the United Kingdom’s economic recovery after the Second World War, left behind a vast inheritance of brutalist buildings, most of them in questionable conditions. Glass towers and grand business districts developped afterwards, altering the image of the brutalist constructions in the eyes of the present-day londoners, who regard these as monstruosities of a long gone era. There are examples, such as the Balfron Tower and the Barbican, that managed to be saved as monument listings by the English Heritage organization. Their maintenace has been carefully sought after and they ended up being accepted by the larger public. The Robin Hood Gardens did not enter the protected monuments list, in spite of their notable theoretic base and regeneration efforts made by architects and supporters. In 2008, the English Heritage association refuses to list the ensamble, dividing the public opinion: the majority of the population insists on the demolition of the buildings, while a smaller group, generally consisting of architects, demands the listing and restoration of the Robin Hood Gardens. This was the starting point of a long polemic on the objective value of the ensamble and whether it was the buildings’ architects that failed to design a quality product or the economic, politic and social circumstances that played the central role in the gradual distruction of the Robin Hood Gardens - this research paper tries to take into account all the perspectives and to provide a possible answer on the topic.
*https://issuu.com/alexandratrofin/docs/the_smithsons_-_robin_hood_gardens
8. De-a arhitectura - Let’s Play Architecture volunteering 2014-2017 Timișoara de-a-arhitectura.ro
The aim of this beautiful program is to develop and promote architecture education in schools. Throghout a year, children are being taught about complex items like comunity, scale, sustentability and so much others, that they’ll have the opportunity to aply on their final work - building the model of the perfect city they imagine.
9. FABRICate creative space workshop 2015 Blue Park Timișoara transformatori.net/en/parcul-albastro-blue-park/
The Blue Park is an open urban space for educational and recreational activities for the Roma community in Fabric district, Timișoara The project was developed during StudentFest Conflict Timisoara 2015 in collaboration with the local NGO, In Comunitate.
10. Radical Island - public space reactivation workshop 2014 led by Parasite 2.0 Luca Marullo, Stefano Colombo, Eugenio Cosentino Timișoara, RO anualadearhitectura.ro/en/workshop-2 http://radicalislandtimisoara.tumblr.com/ http://www.parasiteparasite.com/
In 1996 Lacaton & Vassal astonished the entire European architectural scenario thanks to a requalification project of a public space, using their radical proposal of the Palais de Tokyo, which simply asked to leave the space as it was, yet considered full of possibilities. The workshop starts from the construction of a low cost nomadic device with the purpose of reactivate possible radical islands within the Timisoara post-soviet landscape. Using it in order to reformulate the public space drawing process and starting by building a debate place where questioning on what they can be and become in order to activate a process and not to find a definitive solution. The workshop square will be transformed into an active laboratory for and on the Timisoara public space, as the squares of the 2011 movements were be transformed into places for the elaboration of a new form of democracy. “Dreaming the islands, no matter whether with anguish or joy, it means dreaming of separating, of being alreadyseparated, far from continents, of being alone and lost, or rather starting again and recreating. There are derivedislands, but island is even that to which it’s drifting, and there are original islands but island is also origin, the radicaland absolute origin.” G. Deleuze, Causes and Reasons of Desert Islands
Alexandra Trofin, September 2017