ARCHITECTURE PROJECTS

from CHEN_WANYU_PORTFOLIO_Feb_17_2023

by Wendy Chen

LAZY CHAIRS

RE: INVENTION

Biotech Laboratory

2022 SPRING 2GBX Design Studio

Instructor: Elena Manferdini

Partner: Jinxin Xu

Software: Rhino, Zbrush, Unreal Engine

RE: INVENSION biotech focuses on exploring the advanced biotechnology of Anti-aging and decay of human bodies. As a hub of biotechnology, the design redefines the conventional idea of how people approach laboratory spaces by incorporating nature and landscape into the building.

In the future, humanity will overcome most diseases. In return, more people are becoming immobile due to the aging and decay of their bodies. Human society is faced with the question of aging of organs and natural death. The Global Anti-Aging market report and forecast indicate the market's growing size due to consciousness among consumers regarding their physical appearance. Behind this are the advancements in technology and huge investments in research and development activities.

Climate change, health crisis, scarcity or excess of resources, luxury and poverty, technology and inventions, reinforce the idea that humans are part of a relational ecosystem with other beings, biospheres and environments. In our globalized and hyper-connected world, we are increasingly exposed to complex phenomena and an expanded network of representation. To understand them and to deal with them, we need to manage large quantities and qualities of data. This project investigate possible futures stemming from the current ecological and health challenges, and to expand the role of agency in our architectural creative process.

Design Approach: A.I. GAN Training

The initial ideas and concepts of the project came from A.I. GAN training. To align the possible futures that we imagine, jellyfish, prothesis, and tree barks have been chosen to undergo the A.I. GAN training. And the mixture images that have metallic shells with bulbing and glowing volumes were generated. These images of living and nonliving creatures were then used as the inspiration for the building form.

Building Exterior

The mass of the building is generated from A.I. GAN training with images of jellyfish, trees, and prostheses for the inspiration of the organic form of architecture.

The bulbing volumes with metallic and transparent material are generated and replaced several major spaces of the originally rectangular mass of the building. They create specific qualities that varieties of programs require inside the building.

The pipes attached throughout the whole building connect all the spaces in the building. Collecting wastewater from laboratories, they form a water circulation system that purifies water and reuses them. The panels on the surface of bulbing volumes constantly are water purifiers. They change colors according to the status of water purification.

Closeup view: pipes and purifiers

The design is specially composed of Jellyfish and Trees laboratories, theater, two major parliaments, and several circulations which connect them all. Each circulation gives people the freedom to explore the space inside the building. The bulbing volumes with metallic and transparent material

To let the public be involved, the main entrance of the building is located at the southwest corner of the building, which is more accessible to the public. The other one is a down digging space underneath the building, which leads to the forestry at the east that connects to the building. The forestry is part of the tree lab, which serves as the eco landscape. By breeding varieties of trees and vegetation, people can experience a natural forest

Parliament & Biotech

As the heart of the building, the parliaments are used for arranging seminars and summits between scientists and the public. The huge hollow spaces introduce the light into it and other spaces in the building. It is also the intersection of all the public circulation.

The Jellyfish lab locates at the upper levels of the building. Its primary research is to do cell research and genetic research of jellyfish. In addition, there are also studies on the extraction of ingredients from various plants (seaweed, coral, bark) that can be used as health or nutritional supplements. Depending on the research project, the shape of the lab is different. Each laboratory has its breeding tank. Jellyfish with varying cycles of life were cultured in other laboratories and tanks.

Parliament lightwell

Parliament space

Tree Lab Walkway / Jellyfish Lab

The aquaculture water will be collected through the pipeline to the ecological pool outside the laboratory towards the forestry and to the underground to form an eco cycling. Filtered water will be reused for culturing trees and jellyfishes. Depending on the research project, the shape of the lab is different. Each laboratory has its breeding tank. Jellyfish with varying cycles of life were cultured in other laboratories and tanks. The forestry is part of the tree lab, which serves as the eco landscape. By breeding varieties of trees and vegetation, people can experience a natural forest while circulating up to the inside of the building.

DOC. RE: INVENTION

Instructor: Herwig Baumgartner, Zach Burns / Consultant: Matthew Melnyk, 2022 FALL Design Development Integrated Design Project

Sophie Pennetier, Jamey Lyzun

Teamleader: Wan-Yu Chen, Jinxin Xu

Partner: Arjun Bharat, Diba Ghazia, Qingyang Zong, Xiao Jin, Alejandro Aguilera

This project investigates issues related to the implementation of design: technology, the use of materials, systems integration, and the archetypal analytical strategies of force, order and character. The project includes a review of basic and advanced construction methods, analysis of building codes, the design of Structural and Mechanical systems, Environmental systems, Buildings service systems, the development of building materials and the integration of building components and systems. The intent of this project is to develop a cohesive understanding of how architects communicate complex building systems for the built environment and to demonstrate the ability to document a comprehensive architectural project and Stewardship of the Environment based on the previous design project "RE: INVENTION" .

A series of built case studies will be presented by the instructors along with visiting professionals in the field who are exploring new project delivery methods. These case studies will be shown in-depth with construction photographs, 3D renderings, and technical drawings and details.

Whole Structure Model Axo 1

INTRINSICAL-NESS

Diamond Ranch Elementary School

2021 FALL 2GAX Design Studio

Instructor: Marcelyn Gow

Partner: Hao Wang, Suyue Jin

Software: Rhino, Cinema 4D, Maya, Redshift

Diamond Ranch High School was established in 1997-1999 to inject more vitality into the community and recruit more students. The studio centers on public education, especially elementary learning. And the project will be Diamond Ranch Arts and Sciences Elementary school. The notion of scalar change focuses on our design from small items at the scale of chairs to large-scale work on the context and site in the surrounding environment.

The reference of this method of close up and zoom out is the movie ‘The Powers of Ten’ created by Charles and Ray Eames in 1977. The intention is to work through scalar changes to navigate the project in all scales, understanding that interiority and exteriority are intermingled into a single narrative.

The pedagogical position of this project is to create small learning environments in the school where students reflect on the relationship between people and nature. From a functional point of view, holes of different sizes and walls of varying shape also introduce natural light into the rooms and allow for natural ventilation, which cools down the perennially hot building. The project reflects a belief that architecture should create a connection rather than a separation between people and nature.

Chairs & Classroom

The architectural shape of the classromm is designed and developed from the form and concept of the chair. It unified and clear architectural language can enhance people’s first impression of this school and improve the integrity and harmony of the design.

The design of chairs came from the the iteration of Thonet chair. The chairs are curved and intrinsic with different pipe widths and deformed into various models, beginning from simple line work. Since chairs are for the elementary schools, more vitality is considered to be brought into the site. The chair design exaggerates some features derived from the Thonet chair and transforms the color palette.

With the meandering wall forms and the textures applied to them, the birch bark material creates natural terrain and plant growth qualities. The classroom is the landscape, which blurs the boundary between architecture and nature, allowing natural elements to be introduced into the indoor spaces. This creates the possibility for sunlight, air, and plants in the natural environment to enter the indoor spaces.

Campus

Our site and building are quietly located between the land and the mountains, and the campus has a strong sculptural quality. The free and organic form also shapes the adaptable indoor space comprised of walls, floors, ceilings, flexible interiors, and the landscape of the campus. The design language of meandering, which is driven from the lines, creates an escalating landscape and zoning along with the existing site. These forms allow teachers and students to roam, experience nature, and look at the sky and mountains at any time. They blur the boundary between architecture and nature. The community center locates at the end of the main road of the existing middle school site for public people to access this site. As the building mainly serves students and faculty in the school, the art center and sports stadium locate the inner part of the site, which nears the sports field. On top of this, the circulation from one building to another was placed created for people to circulate inside the site.

Ensphere

West 2nd Street Art Museum

2022 FALL 3GAX Vertical Studio

Instructor: Jenny Wu

Partner: Yiyu Zhou

Software: Rhino, Cinema 4D, Redshift

Geometric primitives are the basic shapes we all know and recognize. They are simple three-dimensional forms such as cubes, spheres, cylinders, and cones. One of the fundamental powers of the primitive is the way our brain instantly recognizes its geometric character, even when the form is not perfectly defined.

In addition to its formal qualities, we have also been interested in articulating methods of assembly, specifically the operations necessary in connecting and attaching parts in place. We like to imagine that building elements, while sliding, rotating, clicking into place, may leave traces of its assembly onto the architecture itself.

The studio will begin by using Midjourney as an early exercise to test potential configurations and spatial consequences for a geometric primitive made with interlocking parts. The second half of the semester will situate the primitive in relation to the ground.

Midjourney / DALL.E 2 v.s. 3D Primitive Puzzle

In recent years, with the increasing development of AI computing power, AI's ability to process images has also improved. When a man's drawing created with Midjourney AI won an award at the Fine Arts Exhibition held at the Colorado State Fair, it caused an uproar not only in the art world, but also among the general public. It is undeniable that the use of AI will gradually become part of people's lives and affect the way creators create their work. AI can produce a series of solutions in a short period of time by interpreting textual narratives and deconstructing and sewing together material from databases. However, if we imagine a 3D spatial relationship based on the 2D images generated by AI, there is an ambiguity in the results generated by AI. This allow people to read the space and the 3D relationship in different ways. This ambiguity is why we should consider AI as a powerful aid to our design and exploration of volumes.

Our design uses two pictures obtained from midjourney and DALL.E 2 as the front and back hemispheres of the sphere puzzle. Using 3D modeling, we explore the relationship between the surface of the spheres and the volumes inside, such as how they connect and pull themselves together to form a sphere. In both midjourney and DALL.E 2 images, the depth and width of the gaps become the basis for cutting the spheres. We imagine the internal relationship of this sphere puzzle by disassembling the puzzle.

We use sequential disassembly to emphasize the narrative of a disassembly process and the spatial relationship between the connected parts of the different pieces. We imagine that this sphere is assembled by 9 pieces of different sizes, and in the process of disassembly, we can find that each piece overlaps and wraps around the previous parts that have not yet been disassembled. At the end of the disassembly, the core part is a key-like block that locks itself to the next piece. In terms of material selection for the physical model, we used clear resin as the core key material, and plated copper, nickel, and zinc for the other pieces.

Midjourney and DALL.E 2 generated result

Two pictures obtained from midjourney and DALL.E 2 are used as the reference for the front and back hemispheres of the sphere puzzle

9 pieces that construct the sphere and the base

Based on the primitive puzzle that we have already developed, we want to discover the possibility of how the primitive puzzle can be the starting point for a building. By de-assembling the primitive into a new posture on a site, the spatial relationship within the sphere puzzle fundamentally disrupts the fit of the parts to its whole and opens up opportunities for the primitive to become architectural - addressing program, structure, spatial sequence and materiality.

The site of the building is located in the heart of downtown LA, in a nearby open space of The Broad. The site is on a slope with a huge height difference which is a continuous slope all the way up to The Broad. This open space is now used as a parking lot.

As an art museum, we imagine the building and the surrounding landscape are not only an extension of the original museum space of The Broad but also a space that bridges and interlocks the space, people, and the neighborhood and allows them to flow inside. The sphere puzzle was de-assembled by a few moves, such as pulling out and adding pieces, scaling, and rotating before placing it on the site.

Circulation

The building volumes are mainly divided into two halves placed on the base, they come from the process of decomposition and transformation of the sphere puzzle. The keys in the original plan still function as keys to the two large spatial assemblages in the architectural space. The two keys in the building are the main spaces for changing the flow of people. We tried to preserve the spatial relationship between the different blocks of the original plan in the process of transforming the plan into a building. The transformed building volumes are combined with the newly designed topography to create a gap for people to enter.

Physical section Model

Layer Upon Layer

Solar Carve + The King Fahad National Library

2021 FALL Advanced Materials and Tectonics

Instructor: Randy Jefferson, Dwayne Oyler

Partner: Sizhe Lu, Yiyu Zhou, Arjun Bharat

Software: Rhino

Precedent Research: Solar Carve - Studio Gang

Satus: Built 2019

Industries: Commercial Property

Location:New York, NY

Floor: 12-Story

Area: 117,530 SF

Client: Aurora Capital Associates

Architect: Studio Gang

Structural Engineer: ARUP

MEPS: Glickman Engineering Associates (GEA)

The overall tectonics of this building consists of a fully overlapped double-glazed glass façade. The North and the south edges have been deformed into a pixelated geometrical form. This geometry consists of a repeating module that consists of a folded five glass panel geometry. This module has a height of 16 feet that flushes over the entire span of a floor, and it is prefabricated and assembled on site. This geometry primarily consists of a central diamond-shaped panel supported by four smaller triangular panels and is angled in a manner that produces a sharply recessed façade, which is nestled into punctured floor slabs. The glass panels are supported with the help of internally recessed mulleins.