XI JIN 2023

B. Arch ‘22 M. S ‘23 Columbia University

2017 - 2023 Selected Works

33 THOMAS ST.

COLUMBIA 2022 Fall Collaborator: Nuofan Xu Tribeca, NEW YORK, NY

Prof. Wonne ICKX

Located in center Tribeca, the AT&T Longline building has been abandoned for years. This window-less tower was overstructured and designed to be a data center; in this studio, we divide this large volume to be 70% affordable housing and 30% social infrastructure.

We argue that structure is the key in understanding adaptive reuse. The proposal redistribute materials from original facade to the proposed addition.

Structure has long been understood as the bone of a building. Typically, we consider programmatic types and then size bays accordingly. When it comes to adaptive reuse, the existing structure is a resource or sometimes an obstacle in design tasks. In adaptive reuse, we invert the two steps: investigating the existing structure, then critically evaluating how spatial needs could be fulfilled.

URBAN STRATEGY

PARK - ETRANCE

The original entrance is on the southwest side (right top). A fenced plaza (right bottom) is transformed into a park as a new entrance that extends into the original structure. In a dense area like Tribeca, the park will function as a new urban-scale public space that is accessible and welcoming.

HEIGHT DIFFERENCE

The ground level of the building and sidewalk has a ~2m difference in height (see section). To accomodate, the park is a gradual slop going half of a floor down to the lobby; street level by west entrance is connected with the loby with stairs. All public programs are accessible for wheelchairs

MATERIAL REUSE

Facade panels from the original building are disassembled and repurposed in the new structure as finishes.

The affordable housing sector is divided into blocks by the social infrastructure attached to them. As illustrated in the exploded axon, connections between housing and public space vary based on programs.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING

Given the single floor height of the existing sturcture, housing units are lofts with a lightweight steel sleeping platform. Recycled CMU blocks from the original facade panel is reused as partition walls for the units. Interior materials are mostly exposed

STUDIO UNIT SINGLE 425 sqft

STUDIO UNIT LARGE 590 sqft

2 BEDROOM UNIT 945 sqft

FLOOR ARRANGEMENT

Each block of housing is anchored by a large-scale social infrastructure and features different connections. Housing scheme varies. The “inbetween” of the old and new structures is not merely a gap, but a series of intermediate spaces.

FRINGE COLLECTIVES

COLUMBIA 2022 Summer

NEW YORK, NY

Collaborators: YI-AN ZHOU, JULIA MAEVSKI

Prof. David Moon

The Speculative City studio investigates New York City through the lens of the 7 train, spanning from hudson yeards to flushing, serving as a section of New York City.

This project propose an incubator on the Belmont Island for discussing social justice of minorities, or “fringe“ of the city. It is an alternative assembly space near the United Nation.

STEINWAY TUNNEL - BELMONT ISLAND, 1960

CASE STUDY

The studio case study is an investigation of the specculative moments along the 7 line subway. This case study of Times Square billboards intend to peal away the layering of commercial-covered facades and to reveal historical identities of architecture through time.

Belmont Island is a manmade island on the East River right above the Steinway Tunnel. Its formation was caused by the excavation of the tunnel.

The Occupy Everything movement is a worldwide socio-political event as a format of protesting for equality and “real democracy“. The premise is to go out on the street and occupy physical spaces in order to be seen. Physical occupation is projected as societal and political occupation.

STEINWAY TUNNEL, 1960

CONTEXT PLAN

The proposed site for minority occupation has existing transportation infrastructures inclusing multiple ferries, and subway and driveway tunnels, including the Steinway Tunnel for the 7 line, Queens-Midtown Tunnels. Two additional docks and a subway station are proposed on site.

The project intend to be a claim, in contrast with the grand top-down existing system of the United Nations.

FUNCTIONS

The Fringe Collectives consists of a series of islands that are made for minority groups to dicuss and mediate pressing social issues.

COMMUNITY KITCHEN

PLATFORM VIEW

SITE PLAN

The layout of the project give it possibilities to further expand. Platform sizes change with waterlevel change through the year.

FINDING DUALITY

PSU 2019 Fall, 6 weeks

Portugal Prof. Laia Celma

A visitor’s center designed for a historical stone dolmen. The design is, as the opposite of the existing, a linear and modularized space.

Divided by a single surface, the side facing the monument is for public use; the other side is for administrative and research uses. This design discusses the co-existing condition of the old and the new, halves and one.

Spatial

Finding

MODEL PHOTOS

Concept model: halves and one Space A&B

the “opposite“

Traffic approaches the site from the north. The building hangs over the main road and divides the view and emphasizes the two halves, left and right, emptiness and fullness.

SOUTH ELEVATION

FLOOR PLANS

building model north side

TREE HOUSE

2020 Summer, 5 weeks

Château de Vibrac, France

Team Member: Natalie Walter (Renderings), Jonathan Wong (3D Model), Xi Jin (Illustration & diagramming)

A tree house design that meditates on living inside and outside. The design aims to challenge the traditional tree house trope, one of isolation and solitude, by introducing elements of growth. These elements provide the potential for a single tree house module to aggregate, transform, and connect to form an entire network and community around the ruin castel.

PAINTERLY ARCHITECTONICS

Columbia Fall 2022

Design Seminar

Prof. Steven Holl & Dimitra Tsachrelia

This project seek for bridges between Russian constructivist architecture by Iakov Chernikhov and Cubo-futurism paintings by Lyubov Popova. Seminar explores the interconnecting relationship between Arts and Architecture in history.

Lyubov Popova had a short but prolific life. Her early stage paintings reveal how her artistic ideology was formed from studying the human body and the conjunction of the parts. In her sketch of figures, she analyzed the human body with multiple three-dimensional axes. Her composition features very angular shapes, emphasizing edges and the intersection of volumes. In this sense, she constructed figures with edges, starting from a joint, and developing bones and muscles. This style carried on to her later practice, and she coined the term “Painterly Architectonics”, pointing out that to paint is to construct.

Popova’s painterly architectonics and Chernikhov’s architecture on paper share very similar methodologies: intersecting planes and volumes, and extreme abstraction. If we look into the details, both were particularly interested in the joints. For Popova, it’s embedded in the parts of figures and joints; and for Chernikhov, it started with pure geometric forms. His geometric compositions experiment with orthogonal and dynamic intersections. Architectural Fantasies included his constructivist architectural imagination, but intersecting volumes is still a motive.

Female Model, Lyubov Popova, 1914

Study of a Model, Lyubov Popova, 1913

Having found this connection, given all these moments of structural intersection, I merged the two worlds together and reinterpreted Popova’s Seated Figure (1916) with architectonics. Architectonics gives the painting spatiality and connects volumes directly to architectural elements. The very angular and machine-like interpretation aims to explore spatial indications of the original painting. It also ties to her later works on both textile design and her societal engagements: the human body being seen as machine, strength, and resource.

Seated Figure, Lyubov Popova, 1914 Oil on canvas, 115.2 x 85 cm.

Architectonics of Seated Figure Conté Crayon, 24 x 32 in.

101 Architectural Fantasies Iakov Chernikhov, 1930 - 31

NEW MEDIA CITY

PSU 2019 Fall - 2020 Spring

Comprehensive Studio

Harlem, NY

Prof. Eric Sutherland

Locating in a neighborhood with rich theatrical culture in Harlem, it is a space in which various of art mediums can be exhibited and collaborated.

The main challenges are: 1) to fit many programs with a wide range of sizes into a very limited site; and 2) to create rich spatial experience on a boxy corner site.

DESIGN LANGUAGE:

In my interpretation, media or medium is the boundary between people, and it forms how we communicate. Experiences and implications with different layers and boundaries can be organized as diagrams.

FLEXIBLE LAB F4

What is “new media”? What is “media“? If the media is the extension of us, how can the everchanging extension influence our interaction?

In this project, I try to explore this relationship by building in flexibility and stability. It allows the building to evolve with the changing of media.

FLEXIBLE INFILL INSTANCES

The facades are to respond the rhythm of the adjacent buildings in the block. 125TH ST. ELEVATION

SITE PLAN

The basic grid is inherited from the historic street pattern, and the pattern is dissolved by programs and circulation. Communication and activities between people are the flexibility that breaks through the rigidity of the grid.

Flexible Performance space, in plan, is a invisible box in which artists can collaborate, communicate, and draw attentions from the passing audience.

STRUCTURAL DIAGRAM:

The spatial strategy used is separating required programs as fixed and flexible. Programs, HVAC, and structure are all organized in one scheme.

The four major fixed / most technically demanding programs are volumes embedded in the structural grid. Flexible spaces, programs such as Artist Studios, Labs, and other supporting spaces, are to happen based on needs among the 5ft flexible grid.

VIEW IN FLEX. PERFORMANCE SPACE

Flexible Performance Space and its balcony feature the visual connection on F2 and F3. Various sizes of space provide a wide range of working atmosphere for the collaborators.

ACOUSTIC DESIGN

The Performance Theater is a traditional theater for theatrical, instrumental performances, and film. As one of the four fixed spaces, the interior finish of the theater, lighting, and structure complies with the basic grain of the building, running East-West.

Mechanical system of the performance theater and surrounding spaces are zoned as one, supplied by an AHU in the basement.

ACOUSTIC PANELS PANEL DIRECTION

CITY COLLAGE

PSU 2021 Fall, 12 weeks

Research Studio / Prof. Yasmine Abbas Paris, France

Based on ideas from surrealist artworks, the situationists, and literature, I meditated on what I found as the most interesting part of architecture: people and their lives.

What if two pieces of urban fabrics are swapped? What if two neighborhoods that are used to be away from each other are now next to each other? What would people do?...

This is a project of anti-boredom; it is to say that Paris should be a playground of imagination, mingling, and encounters.

Two half-courtyards are joined together as one; activity and events happen upon the intervention.

URBAN GRAIN REPRESENTATION

This model conceptualizes how different urban analysis (by region, by area, ) change our vision; from different filters, we can get different sizes of grain in an urban context.

REALITY LAYERS OF GRAINS

left: VIEW FINDER

Use the shapes of the original Situationist map to cut and mismatch pieces of urban fabric.

below: MISMATCH OF FORMS

Abstracted urban fabrics with pieces cut out and mismatched. This set of models discusses different formal joints that can appear after cutting and swapping.

Research & Analysis

early surrealist and situationist practices

Marcel Mariën, 1939 “In Search of a Native City”

Georges Perec, 1978 “Life: A User’s Manual”

Marcel Mariën, 1940 “Peace During Wartime”

Guy Debord, 1957 “The Naked City”

Early map collage

In 1939, Avant-garde Belgian artist Marcel Marien had put thoughts into mapping in a surrealist way. He collaged a fragment of the Swiss Alps on a map of Europe. The next year, 1940, in the mist of WWII, he collaged a peaceful countryside view with women and kids on a piece of German topographic map - “Peace During Wartime“. The collaged maps feature their visual discontinuity - the contrast between different cartographic textures; while, the fact that they appear in one image makes completely different experiences connected.

Guy Debord Situationist map

In 1957, Guy Debord created a series of psycho-geographic maps. “The Naked City“ was one of them. He cut pieces of Paris map based on his psychological perception and connected them with arrows that symbolize crossroads and psycho-geographical slopes. Through mapping, the reality is distorted. The map discarded what is geographically correct and fully shows the role of the map creator in the city: a meaderer. It emphasizes the finest grain in the city: individual experiences. The Situationist movement in the 1960s cut everyday life into modern spectacularity. Human perception and images are the components of this modernity.

Bits and Pieces of Life

French novelist Georges Perec, in his books, “an attempt at exhausting a place in Paris” and “Life: A User’s Manual“, depicted a world full of negligible details in life. He sat down and described everything he saw as detailed as possible: colors, smells, numbers of people, what they did, where they were going...This collection of details became his way of telling a story, which demonstrates his sensitivity as an observer.

Project Method and Intention

In this project, I chose to collage pieces of Paris. This operation brings people who used to be far away from each other together.

To find the stories, I zoomed in and looked at the seams/connections of the cut. Different spatial conditions apprear, and their configurations have corresponding interventions to let impossible encounters happen: Carousel, aquarium, movie screening, jogging track... And the story can be surreal, funny, awkward...in this what-if scenario, these are all interesting stories to tell.

It is a comment on the existing condition: if social interaction happens among the counterparts, what if they are mismatched and different from normal?

Marcel Mariën

Georges Perec

Introducing New Boundaries

Outline of The Naked City (1957) Collage with Contemporary Urban Fabric

Cutting Pieces

New Boundaries and Intersections

For each condition, I looked into the program of each building around the sites and imagined how would people meet and interact. Then I composed a little story of a particular person living in the space. The interventions, such as carousel, aquarium, jogging track..., are to facilitate a new way of interacting

These moments, feelings, colors, thoughts to ourselves...are happening in the city everyday. They are the finest grain of the city and what make up an urban story.

URBAN STORY Island

Courtyard Pocket

THE WALL SCENARIO Models and site plan

This specific wall condition is the conjunction of Rue Crillon, Blvd Morland, Rule Saint-Nicholas, and Rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine. Black and white respectively show the two sides of neighborhood.

The original building in the middle was cut and left only a facade. Two sides of people occupies and making connections through the left-over facade. The intervention also expands into the interior space and influences the way of living.

Stitching through the Third Space

SITE

CONNECTION MODEL: possible connections

WALL SITE MODEL: looking from two ends of the wall

Wall

Number 15 on Rue Saint-Nicholas, is a mystery to Victoire. Her new neighbor on the other side of the wall. Windows shut, doors closed. But there are lots of plants on the balcony, so there must be people living.

She wishes that it is a gift store. She likes shopping for artist-made potteries, For her own little collection on her bookshelf, or for holiday seasons.

Or it would be nice to have a Cantonese restaurant, For a cup of hot noodle soup in deep autumn.

URBAN MISMATCH: STAMPS & POSTCARDS (1:15000)

Traveling with pieces of Paris: the original Naked City (1957) map pieces. Postcards of other cities: Vienna, Lagos, Washington D.C...

It is a statement that claims that, if our minds allow us, we can go to anywhere and have any fantasy encounters.

SENTINEL LANDS

Design Research directed by Prof. Laia Celma & Pep Aviles

Exhibition co-curator & photographer: Cynthia White

The ongoing underground mine fire all over the world are having a huge impact on not only the local people, but the lands, and the atmosphere, releasing a great amount of heat and Green House Gases but having been neglected for decades. This project draws attention to this “invisible“ issue and the “vertical” impacts to the environment in multiple scales, from micro-biology, geography, to the atmosphere.

The key design is an artifact placed on a borehole at Centralia, PA (left photo). It visualizes the atmospheric data from recent decades and symbolizes the breathes of the earth.

I joined the design team in the summer of 2020 and worked on drawings, models, and exhibition design & fabrication. The exhibition is open from Janurary to March, 2022, at Penn State Rouse Gallery.

Installation Mock-up 2021 Fall

Photo Credit: Cynthia White

Centralia Plan Mine fire estimation and borehole locations

Centralia Plan Underground Mining tunnels and topography

Mine Tunnel Model Mock-up 3D model and fabrication: Xi Jin & Daniel Lopatka 2021 Summer

The coal mines at center Centralia has 7 different veins with more sub-veins.

To follow the theme of the research, we decided to cut a cylindrical section of the veins. This sectional exploded mine tunnel model helps visualize the geological structure at Centralia. Photos below show the process of drawing, 3D modeling, connection design, fabrication, and assembly

Challenges are to 1) deal with old drawings and find proper information, 2) work with an unfamiliar modeling material and fabrication tool, and 3) design connections for hanging this heavy model.

Process

Second Geological Survey, J.P.Lesley, 1884

Testing the hanging details with Daniel

Model of all veins installed in gallery

The team designed and fabricated the interior of the exhibition space, including the wooden frame structure, stools, tables, model stands, and lables.

Daniel and I were in charge of the design and fabrication of all furnitures.

Column Mock-up

model fabrication and connection

design: Xi Jin

2021 Fall

COMPOSING SPACE

PSU 2022 Spring

Thesis / Prof. Yasmine Abbas Antelope Island, Utah

This thesis is an atempt to bridge music and architecture. As a sound installation, the project engages natural and manmade sounds, composing spatial experience with the guidance of sound.

Full thesis book see a separate document.

Detailing

1. Tunnel features various sound effects for different acoustic condition and materials.

2. Megaphone is an interactive structure that is able to reflect sound directionally.

3. Rain Room amplifies sound of rain drops.

Rain Room

Metal roof and exterior panels amplifies the sound of rain. Low window requires visitors to sit down and listen to the rain and look out of the window. The rain room function as a resting point for meditation or sound bath.

DESIGN WITH SOUND

Given the natural and primitive condition of the site, soundscape was considered as an important part of the experience design.

The following details shows the consideration of materials and their interaction with natural elements.

Bird Garden

Based on the walking speed 200ft/min, the radius of the installation is 32ft, which makes walking around the circle take about 1 minute. The wall with various sizes of openings creates rhythmic experience.

Bird species like Sage Thrasher are attracted by local shrubs. Wind and birds brings in natural sound to the installation.

Architectural Music Score

Below is an example of a full sheet of Score. On top of architectural plans and sections, vertically, layers of diagramming translates distance to time, given a constant walking speed.

As the sections are unfolded, using the same graphic scale, distance can be marked in steps, and steps indicate time.

The score is arranged in an orchestral matter. Conventionally, each horizontal line of score is attributed to one instrument. Whereas, instruments here are a combination of people/movements, natural sound, and architectural information.

Intro to Elements I

A linear experience of elevation change: slop and stairs going down along walls with different materials Tunnel amplifies the sound of stepping on the flooring.

Score can be played/ interpreted

Diagrams materials, roof line, rhythm...

Anchors

pitches of bells

Sections

Plans

Time signature/

Scale translate spatial and temporal info

Megaphone & Bridge

Two funnel-shaped atriums have one bell in each. an interactive sound experience for people on Following the Megaphone, the path extends metal mesh bridge. Walking on and under form

each. It is to provide on different floors. out and becomes a form a duet.

Rain Room

Metal roof and exterior panels amplifies the sound of rain. Low window requires visitors to sit down and listen to the rain and look out of the window. The rain room function as a resting point for meditation or sound bath.

Bird Garden

Based on the walking speed 200ft/min, the radius of the installation is 32ft, which makes walking around the circle take about 1 minute. The wall with various sizes of openings creates rhythmic experience.

Bird species like Sage Thrasher are attracted by local shrubs. Wind and birds brings in natural sound.