Studio air journal final submission (fixed version)

Page 1

ARCHITECTURE DESIGN STUDIO AIR 2013

382808 YINING SHE


CONTENTS PART A. EOI I: CASE FOR INNOVATION

INTRODUCTION...................................01 A.1. ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE...............03 A.2. COMPUTATIONAL ARCHITECTURE................11 A.3. PARAMETRIC MODELLING......................14 A.4. CONCLUSION................................19 A.5. LEARNING OUTCOMES.........................20 A.6. APPENDIX - ALGORITHMIC EXPLORATIONS.......21 NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART A...................23

PART B. EOI II: DESIGN APPROACH

B.1. DESIGN FOCUS..............................26 B.2. CASE STUDY 1.0............................29 B.3. CASE STUDY 2.0............................33 B.4. TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT....................38


B.5. TECHNIQUE: PROTOTYPES.....................47 B.6. TECHNIQUE PROPOSAL........................51 B.7. LEARNING OBJECTIVES AND OUTCOMES..........53 NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART B...................54

PART C. PROJECT PROPOSAL

C.1. GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT...........55 C.2. GATEWAY PROJECT: TECTONIC ELEMENTS........65 C.3. GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL..............67 C.4. LEARNING OBJECTIVES AND OUTCOMES..........83 C.5. APPENDIX - ALGORITHMIC SKETCHES...........84 NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART C...................85


make a multiple designing system

Hi, my name is Yining She, and I am also glad to be called Darren. I’m an oversea student from China, and this is my first semester, third year in architecture major as I entered Melbourne Uni by the mid-year intake. In past designing studios, I have basically done most of my design studio models with hand drawings or some physical techniques under the subject needs. Meanwhile I’ve also done some works by computer, basically with Sketchup & Autocad. Although I did the “lantern” design by Rhino and Fablab fabrication in Virtual Environments at my first year, but that was kind of an introduction and fundamental practice about Rhino, which is actually such a complex and helpful programme, so I’m really looking forward to this Air Studio for its more advanced Rhino designing practice, and different architectural ideas.

01 INTRODUCTION


In Virtual Environments subject at my first year, I started to organize some of my designing ideas in a digital way with Rhino. The initial natural process of this lantern model I looked at was the track drew by the moving arm when the violinist plays the violin. In the view of relationship between the music and the concept of lantern, I was trying to make a multiple designing system that contains both visual and verbal fields. Rhino did help me a lot during the whole digitization. That was the first time I found a designing process could be much more efficient on computers rather than hand drawings.

Digital designing will allow more complex calculations which delimit designers and will allow a diverse range of complex forms to be created with great ease using digital techniques. Digital architecture also plays a vital and significant role in this industry. Using Rhino as an example, it analyses the changing data and parametric factors that can be hardly dealt with any other ways without computing calculations. More accurate details consist of a better design for the calculations brings almost no errors that might take place during hand designing.

INTRODUCTION 02


PART A. EOI I: CASE FOR INNOVATION

A.1. ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE Two brilliant architectural projects located in different countries designed be two great architects that have different cultural backgrounds will be introduced and analysed to explore the significance of architectural ideas and its influence on our lives.

1. 4x4 House by Tadao Ando. 2. Seattle Central Library by Rem Koolhaas and Joshua Prince-Ramus of OMA/LMN.

We live in a time of renaissance... cities are coming back to life, after a long neglect.[1] - Daniel Libeskind

03 ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE


ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE 04


4x4 House Architect: Tadao Ando Year of construction: 2003 Land Area: 117.19 m2 Floor Area: 22.56 m2 Location: Tarumi-ku, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan Materials: Concrete, wood and glass Structure: Reinforced concrete

This project was asked to be built at an extremely small size site, which is approximately 4m x 4m, and Tadao Ando named it so. The site is just close to the beach, having a great view of the sea in front of it. The first house also addresses the necessities of the occupants in height, with a basement, ground floor and three other floors above this. However, the second one nearby has a different vertical access system. Instead of the staircase, the second one has an elevator. Another difference is the first one uses all concrete while the second one replaces some concrete by wood. Every level has its own specific function.

4x4 House should be regarded as a well done example showing how the idea of sustainability and space-organization could be achieved in limited areas. This condition becomes common in nowaday urban planning for the city development. Cilent now has an opportunity to feel a living sapce that has been highly planned and accurately calculated. The construction process could also be seen as an experiment indicates how to keep the aesthetic needs under strict spatial restrictions.

05 ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE


4x4 House is one of the best examples expressing the architect Tadao Ando’s thoughts in modern architecture. Tadao Ando always believes three basic points. Firstly, any building must be designed and built based on reliable materials, such as concrete, and unpainted wood. This is a fundamental statement to guarantee the building provides secure, safe, and solid environment for the people living inside. Secondly, he loves obvious and pure geometric shapes in design. Geometries will give out the strongest security for users, furthermore, this method placed a firm foundation in the designing process, sending messages all about keeping clients safe and comfortable in their private space. When the geometries appears, the boundaries would be quite visible, meanwhile location, orientation, and such properties could be easily seen and determined. The nature and the building interact with each other, the building turns to a huge screen reflecting all the human activities on it, so does the lighting, which will be presented frequently and completely as well.

The third point is the nature. Tadao projects unique spaces, which change constantly, because the sun and wind play in their confines.[2] Besides that, he loves to re-arrange the natural surroundings around the building, to create a unique type of artificial nature, which means an environment after accurately organized and planned. Tadao Ando is a minimalist architect and he has been strongly influenced by the Japanese traditional design and architecture, which which focuses on the simplicity and elegance of the shapes. I think 4x4 House successfully represents Tadao Ando’s idea that how human needs to plan our future, especially the living space. It renews people’s thoughts of seeing and thinking, as well as the designing approaches. This is also referring to the role of digitization in modern architecture. His works are mostly always related to accurate arrangement, which is the best thing could be done with advanced computing techniques.

ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE 06


Seattle Central Library Architect: Rem Koolhaas and Joshua Prince-Ramus of OMA/LMN Open Date: May 23, 2004 Building Area: 34000 m2 Floor number: 11 Location: Downtown Seattle, Washington, America Surface Materials: Glass and Steel

Dutch architect Rem Koohass has described the steel, glass, and aluminum library as “large but not monumental.� Aluminum mesh sandwiched between glass panels reduces heat and glare on the interior, and the glass grid provides seismic stability. The view from the soaring atrium changes with each movement of the sun and clouds. The building garnered a 2005 national AIA Honor Award for Architecture.[3]

07 ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE


ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE 08


The Seattle Public Library’s Central Library is the flagship library of The Seattle Public Library system. The library has a unique, striking appearance, consisting of several discrete “floating platforms” seemingly wrapped in a large steel net around glass skin. In the designing process, Rem Koolhaas and his team put the function on the most important place. Although the library has an uncommon outfit from the outside, the vital concept was to let the building’s required functions dictate what it should look like, rather than imposing a structure and making the functions conform to that.

09 ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE

The impressive surface is not just a skin done by techniques. The whole outlook expresses some new ideas about how to establish a 3D space for public. Rem Koolhaas strongly believes Deconstructivism Architecture. He loves this approach to building design that attempts to view architecture in bits and pieces. Most of their works may seem to have no visual logic, on the other side, they may appear to be made up of unrelated, disharmonious abstract forms. This type of architecture pays more attention on the relationships between different parts in the building as well as the spatial arrangement and surface design.


In Seattle Central Library project, the ideas of architectural critics and the general public has been combined and mixed. Nowadays, many architects start to organize different thoughts from both urban planning and architecture into a co-existing system and make it work for advanced architectural designing. Rem Koolhaas himself is a Deconstructivist architect, therefore a lot of postmodern elements could be easily found in his works, such like fragmentation, manipulating a structure’s surface or skin, and non-rectilinear shapes which appear to distort and dislocate elements of architecture, such as structure and envelope. The finished visual appearance of buildings that exhibit deconstructivist “styles” is characterized by unpredictability and controlled chaos.[5] Deconstructivist architects have been enjoying dealing with complex relationships between different parts, and finally give out a surface or whole style fulfilled with “cells”, which will be the most fundamental unit to make up a complete surface or space design. Deconstructivism is a big step in human history. People start to feel the strong visual messages sent from the works. Users in this Seattle Central Library would be satisfied by the unusual but efficient layout and vertical arrangement.

Architecture is expected to be solid, stable and reassuring – physically, socially and psychologically. Bound to each other, the architectural and the material are considered inseparable. But the immaterial is as important to architecture as the material and has as long a history.[4] -Jonathan Hill

Another key point is that constructivist architecture will be quite easily related to computational, digital, and parametric architectural designing. Digital designing is now an essential tool in most aspects of contemporary architecture. However, the particular nature of deconstructivism makes the use of computers especially pertinent. Though the computer has made the designing of complex shapes much easier and more accruate, and not everything that looks odd is “deconstructivist.”[6]

ARCHITECTURE AS A DISCOURSE 10


A.2. COMPUTATIONAL ARCHITECTURE

11 COMPUTATIONAL ARCHITECTURE


ICD/ITKE

Research

University of ty of Architecture

Pavilion

Stuttgart, and Urban

FaculPlanning.

In November 2012 the Institute for Computational Design (ICD) and the Institute of Building Structures and Structural Design (ITKE) at the University of Stuttgart have completed a research pavilion that is entirely robotically fabricated from carbon and glass fibre composites.[7] This pavilioon basically uses the same material concept as my project in Studio Air. Composite material is a huge range with almost every type of materials in this range. At the core of the project is the development of an innovative robotic fabrication process within the context of the building industry based on filament winding of carbon and glass fibres and the related computational design tools and simulation methods.[8] How to deal with the relationship between different materials will be a key point. COMPUTATIONAL ARCHITECTURE 12


From my works, spiring impact

previous designing experiences and I found it is important and inapplying with different media to on creative design development.

People have been creating designing approaches for centuries. From the earliest time, people use paintings and hand sketches to express their own thoughts. As time goes by, the photos became the most direct way to catch and keep the shapes and appearance of objects, which brought a revolution to designing world. It is much easier to keep ideas and inspirations when people see or feel anything wherever they are, and whenever it is. Photography also shorten the distance between common people to design works. Keeping ideas and expressing thoughts are not that professional than years before. For decades lately, digital designing has become the center role in the creative design stage. Digitization shows highest accuracy compared to hand works meanwhile builds the actual communications with engineering. The concept and production have been associated to each other in a efficient way. As a result, different media will contribute to the development of creative design in a increasing trend, and at the same time, the connections between every single way are going to be established efficiently and helpfully.

Just like what Kalay mentioned, computer, by their nature, are superb analytical engines. If correctly program m ed, they can follow a line of reasoning to its logical conclusion. They will never tire, never make silly arithm etical mistakes, and will gladly search through and correlate facts buried in the endless heaps of inform ation they can store.[9] Most things those digital techniques could help with are calculation and repeating, which seems quite simple and non-creative. However, hum ans that possess both rational and creative abilities, are easily bored, and tend to make mistakes. What programmes could archieve is highly helpful for types of works like calculation and repeating, and additionally, they do it in a high speed that people could save time for creativity. Another important point is that computers would not make any mistakes if we ask them to go for the right direction, which improves accuracy significantly. Kalay also stated that design, accordingly, is a purposeful activity, aimed at achieving some welldefined goals.[10] Therefore, the essential point in designing is to solve problems, and computational tools could largely reduce the chance that unexpected problems appear. Now we are at a stage that architecture industry might be facing revolutions. The processes of constructing a design can be now more direct and more complex because the information can be easily extracted, exchanged, and utilized with far greater facility and speed. The digital information is exactly the construction information with the help of digital techniques.[11]

13 COMPUTATIONAL ARCHITECTURE


A.3. PARAMETRIC MODELLING

We might be passing a period that modernism designing is fading away, and post-modernism and deconstructivism were mere transitional for us currently, and finally, parametricism needs to be discussed for its new way seeing and thinking about designing. Patrik Schumacher has talked about the future of parametricism. He mentioned that many people might be worrying about if The admixture of a post-modernist, deconstructivist or minimalist design can only disrupt the penetrating and far-reaching parametricist continuity, and the reverse does not hold, because there is no equivalent degree of continuity in post-modernist, deconstructivist or minimalist urbanism. However, in fact, parametricism can take up vernacular, classical, modernist, post-modernist, deconstructivist and minimalist urban conditions, and forge a new network of affiliations and continuities between and beyond any number of urban fragments and conditions.[12]

Paremetric designing should not be just focusing on creating shapes and curves, or archieving some difficult constructions with a huge number of calculations and experiments. However, instead of classical and modern reliance on rigid geometrical figures – rectangles, cubes, cylinders, pyramids and spheres – the new primitives of parametricism are animate geometrical entities – splines, nurbs and subdivs. [13] From parametricist architects’ eyes, the buildings could be seen as organic bodies. They could be designed from each little cell, to a entire whole. After understanding all those thoughts and ideas, the paramatric designing then makes a lot sense, not just computational analysis and calculation. Schumacher also has his own idea about the whole picture of parametric design. It aims to establish a complex variegated spatial order, using scripting to differentiate and correlate all elements and subsystems of a design. The goal is to intensify the internal interdependencies within an architectural design, as well as the external affiliations and continuities within complex, urban contexts.[14]

PARAMETRIC MODELLING 14


15 COMPUTATIONAL ARCHITECTURE


PARAMETRIC MODELLING 16


Beijing National Aquatics Center Location: Beijing, China Architect(s): PTW Architects, CSCEC, CCDI, and Arup Built Time: 2004 - 2007

17 COMPUTATIONAL ARCHITECTURE


Burnham Pavilions Location: Chicago, Illinois, USA Architect(s): Berkel

Zaha Hadid and Ben van

A temporary pavilion designed and erected in Chicago’s Millennium Park as part of the Burnham Plan celebrations reflecting the Chicago’s long tradition for embracing cutting edge architecture in an in intricate but fluid structure that incorporates hidden traces of Burnham and Bennett’s original 1909 plans to redevelop the city. [15]

Their purpose was to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Daniel Burnham’s Plan of Chicago,[16] and symbolize the city’s continued pursuit of the Plan’s architectural vision with contemporary architecture and planning.[17] The sculptures were privately funded and reside in Millennium Park. The pavilions were designed to be temporary structures.[18] This is a tensioned fabric shell fitted over a curving aluminum framework inside, then decorated outside.

Parametric techniques help us to step onto the next level that imagination becomes the first and the most important element in designing process. Digital tools describe every detail accurately and turn those almost impoossible fabrication parts into reality. Take background into consideration, the Water Cube will be more like a experiment to test how the natural elements and structures works and how much human can manipulate from these reasonable stories given by the nature.

PARAMETRIC MODELLING 18


A.4. CONCLUSION

In conclusion, contemporary digital and computational designing is now in a state of rapid evolution. From the beginning of human race history, architecture was born and kept developing during every historical period. People need to earn a comfortable living environment, private space, the architetcure satisfies those needs and provides artistic works with aesthetic elements. From the earliest time, people use paintings and hand sketches to express their own thoughts. As time goes by, the photos became the most direct way to catch and keep the shapes and appearance of objects, which brought a revolution to designing world. It is much easier to keep ideas and inspirations when people see or feel anything wherever they are, and whenever it is. For decades lately, digital designing has become the center role in the creative design stage. Computers take over all the monotonous work for us. They are able to present the results “in textual reports, tables of numbers, charts, graphical constructions — even in dynamically changing images and sounds“[19]. Therefore the user of computers for the process of design, will be asked to requires both rational and creative abilities. Architects have been learning and using some typical programmes for a long time, such like AutoCAD and Rhinoceros. But the nature of architecture is still and will always be creativity. Ideas could be expressed and operated by digital techiniques, but nothing can be built up without a strong, firm, attractive and impressive foundation, which is exactly, the idea.

19 CONCLUSION


In fact, the amount of things that I have learned in this subject so far already could not be condensed into just these pages. During all those researches when doing this report, I have been thinking not only the major project in Studio Air this semester, but also the nature of architectural designing. From now on, it will be far more sophisticated than using computer instead of drawing board. Once my idea is done, I will need to find a proper way to fit my ideas into some programmes to make them visible for both myself and others. When the transit happens, I follow certain operations which are monotone and repetitive, but through all these, I will get myself a satisfying result. Grasshopper is a graphical algorithm editor tightly integrated with Rhino’s 3-D modeling tools. I had tried once using Grasshopper when I was at Year 1, in the Virtual Environments subject. I was struggling with the fabrication of my unusual model. I have been trying all digital tools to make it easier to control but failed. Then I found Grasshopper, which was really useful for my situation at that time. Grasshopper requires much less knowledge of programming or scripting, but still allows designers to build form generators from the simple to the awe-inspiring. I have also been doing my material selection and testing. Composite material is a more flexible concept but also difficult to define. I am looking forward to the project coming after.

A.5. LEARNING OUTCOMES

LEARNING OUTCOMES 20


A.6. APPENDIX - ALGORITHMIC EXPLORATIONS

21 APPENDIX - ALGORITHMIC EXPLORATIONS


APPENDIX - ALGORITHMIC EXPLORATIONS 22


NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART A Image: 1. http://goodbysanfrancisco.blogspot.com.au/2011/03/arquitectura-4x4-house-tadaoando.html 2. http://addfiuspring2010.blogspot.com.au/2010_03_01_archive.html 3. http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonhefel/6727825259/ 4. http://bevsbitsandbites.blogspot.com.au/2010/09/september-in-seattle.html 5. http://www.archdaily.com/11651/seattle-central-library-oma-lmn/1685363506_spl-facade-detail-rualt/ 6. http://www.archdaily.com/11651/seattle-central-library-oma-lmn/a301-model-1/ 7. http://www.archdaily.com/11651/seattle-central-library-oma-lmn/a304-model-1/ 8. http://www.archdaily.com/11651/seattle-central-library-oma-lmn/a302-model-1/ 9. http://www.archdaily.com/11651/seattle-central-library-oma-lmn/a303-model-1/ 10. http://ad009cdnb.archdaily.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/1364604415_spl-bookspiral-diagram-rex.jpg 11. http://www.archdaily.com/340374/icditke-research-pavilion-university-of-stuttgart-faculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning/5136a9dfb3fc4ba663000235_icd-itkeresearch-pavilion-university-of-stuttgart-faculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning_ icd-itke_rp12_image18-jpg/ 12. http://www.archdaily.com/340374/icditke-research-pavilion-university-of-stuttgart-faculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning/5136a95ab3fc4bf0a800022e_icd-itkeresearch-pavilion-university-of-stuttgart-faculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning_ icd-itke_rp12_image10-jpg/ 13. http://www.archdaily.com/340374/icditke-research-pavilion-university-of-stuttgart-faculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning/5136a894b3fc4b32a4000226_icd-itkeresearch-pavilion-university-of-stuttgart-faculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning_ icd-itke_rp12_image02-jpg/ 14. http://www.archdaily.com/340374/icditke-research-pavilion-university-of-stuttgart-faculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning/5136a9ffb3fc4b32a4000237_icd-itkeresearch-pavilion-university-of-stuttgart-faculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning_ icd-itke_rp12_image20-jpg/ 15. http://onlyhdwallpapers.com/wallpaper/architecture_beijing_water_cube_ desktop_3000x2000_hd-wallpaper-2727.jpg 16. http://blog.chinatravel.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/Steven-Song-Water-SkyCube.jpg 17. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/19/Construction_beijing_2008_water_cube_2.jpg 18. http://www.arup.com/Projects/Chinese_National_Aquatics_Center/WaterCube_overview_1.aspx 19. http://www.zaha-hadid.com/architecture/burnham-pavillion/# 20. http://www.zaha-hadid.com/architecture/burnham-pavillion/# 21. http://www.zaha-hadid.com/architecture/burnham-pavillion/# 22. http://static1.evermotion.org/files/EVRprfolio/ff3a44b44a512c065c37d782b19583604a2cdf05.jpg 23 NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART A


NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART A

Text: 1. http://www.ilikearchitecture.net/2013/06/quote-69-daniel-libeskind/ 2. http://www.minimalisti.com/architecture/01/minimalist-architect-tadao-ando.html 3. http://blog.aia.org/favorites/2007/02/108_seattle_public_library_200.html 4. Hill, Jonathan (2006). ‘Drawing Forth Immaterial Architecture’, Architectural Research Quarterly, 10, 1, pp. 54 5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deconstructivism 6. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deconstructivism 7. http://www.archdaily.com/340374/icditke-research-pavilion-university-of-stuttgartfaculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning/ 8. http://www.archdaily.com/340374/icditke-research-pavilion-university-of-stuttgartfaculty-of-architecture-and-urban-planning/ 9. Yehuda E. Kalay, Architecture’s New Media : Principles, Theories, and Methods of Computer-Aided Design (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2004), pp. 2 10. Yehuda E. Kalay, Architecture’s New Media : Principles, Theories, and Methods of Computer-Aided Design (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2004), pp. 5 11. Kolarevic, Branko, Architecture in the Digital Age: Design and Manufacturing (New York; London: Spon Press, 2003), pp. 7 12. http://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/the-critics/patrik-schumacher-on-parametricism-let-the-style-wars-begin/5217211.article 13. http://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/the-critics/patrik-schumacher-on-parametricism-let-the-style-wars-begin/5217211.article 14. http://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/the-critics/patrik-schumacher-on-parametricism-let-the-style-wars-begin/5217211.article 15. http://www.zaha-hadid.com/architecture/burnham-pavillion/# 16. Cohen, Patricia (2008-06-24). “Footnotes”. The New York Times. The New York Times Company. Retrieved 2008-07-02. 17. Howard, Hilary (2009-07-19). “Comings & Goings; Chicago Celebrates An Urban Dream”. The New York Times. The New York Times Company. Retrieved 2009-07-29. 18. Kamin, Blair (2008-06-22). “2 architects to design Burnham pavilions”. Chicago Tribune. Newsbank. Retrieved 2008-07-25. 19. Yehuda E. Kalay, Architecture’s New Media : Principles, Theories, and Methods of Computer-Aided Design (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2004), pp. 2

NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART A 24


PART

B.

EOI

II:

DESIGN

APPROACH

I make a project and I panic, which is good, it can be a method. First, panic. Second conquer panic by working. Third, find ways to solve your doubts.[20] - Eduardo Souto de Moura

25 DESIGN FOCUS


B.1. DESIGN FOCUS COMPOSITE MATERIAL In the very beginning of this semester, our group has chosen the composite material to be our direction of both designing concept and material selection. In common sense, a composite material should be made from two or more types of materials with significantly different physical or chemical properties, that when combined, produce a material with characteristics different from the individual components before. However, in this design project, our group brought up our own opinion about the composite materials. We would like to use two or more than two types of materials to build up a consistant, unseparated material system as the basic structure of our gateway design. We will be trying to prove this point with a reasonable multiple material combination and a wellworking system by parametric design.

GROUP ARGUMENTS 1. The design should be a multiple material structure with strong connections between these materials, both conceptual and physical. 2. A half-opened construction provides most space with the interaction of design and environment around. 3. The theme of our design will be “a changing world“. 4. Every piece of materials selected should be related and reflected to the composite material direction.

Therefore, to achieve all those targets above, we introduce the “TRANSITION“ and “GEODESICS“ concept that will be explained later in the journal.

DESIGN FOCUS 26


COMPOSITE MATERIAL CONCEPT & EXPERIMENTS

27 DESIGN FOCUS


Our own understading of composite material will be a co-operative closed system consists of two or even more types of materials. They might not have any chemical reactions among the system, or changed properties to fit each other. In other word, It does not need to be a whole new material after combination, what we are trying to achieve is t find interesting effect when the materials put together. In our opinion, the best result will be that each material is interdependent to others, if any is missing, the whole system collapses. As a starting point, we used several different materials to test how they work with each other. We bought some standard A4 office paper and harder cardboards, meanwhile with metal wires and regular hemp cables. As we mentioned before, we would like to see what kind of effect a multiple material system can produce.

We cut out a series of holes on the paper, then let the rope and wire embedding into these holes. The paper became a surface consists of two materials. Looking back to our other arguments before, we would like to produce a “changing project“ for the gateway site, then during the experiments done with this “paper and rope“ material, we found that we could use different bent surface to trace the transition of the material, which is a material system at this stage. So we have done several bending tests to find out how the surface moves and how it changes under the force from outside, by which, our hands here. The way ropes run through holes on the paper is also reflecting the geodesics idea which is about the shortest distance from a point inside of a sphere to any point on the surface outside.

DESIGN FOCUS 28


B.2. CASE STUDY 1.0 Montreal Biosphère Architect: Richard Buckminster Fuller Established: 1967 Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada Type: Environment Museum

Montreal Biosphère was built to be the pavilion of the United States for the 1967 World Fair. It stood 61m-high and had a spherical diameter of 76m. It was constructed as a frame of steel pipes enclosing some 1,900 molded acrylic panels. The building is almost completely transparent, and it used an elaborate system of retractable shading screens to control the heat inside the dome, and a computer adjusted the screens in accordance with the direction of the sunlighting.[21] However, the former dome was burnt by the fire during structural renovations in 1976. The fire burned away the building’s transparent acrylic external surface, but the basic steel structure remained.[22] Until 1990, Environment Canada bought the closed site for $17.5 million to turn it into an interactive museum showcasing and exploring the water ecosystems of the Great Lakes-Saint Lawrence River regions.[23]

29 CASE STUDY 1.0


DOING

MORE

WITH

LESS

Fuller was already known for his domes but Montreal Biosphère was, by far, his most elaborate and complicated work.[24] The geodesic dome, in Fuller’s opinion, will be the best example to carry his understandings of the relationships between material and space. The sphere uses the “doing more with less” principle in that it encloses the largest volume of interior space with the least amount of surface area thus saving on materials and cost.[25] Fuller found it successful that the dome resulted in a satisfying outcome both in sustainablity and aesthetic point. This type of structure requires less building materials due to the spherical surface area. Meanwhile the circulation of lighting and air is also efficient. The interior atmospheres for human dwellings because air and energy are allowed

to

circulate

without

obstruction.

Lots of these advantages are simply because of the sphere structure itself. What we are really intereted in is the idea behind, which is “doing more with less“. This concept works in the dome as the principle to build steel truss and acrylic cells, to result in an enclosed structure finally. However, people will not feel rejected from outside, instead of that, visitors will be invited from it. Fuller uses fewer materials than other huge buildings, and created a interactive space with pipes and panels. In this design, he showed us that environment is the best background, and the nature is the best outer surface. This is inspiring to us and helps us think about how to create infinite space with limited materials.

CASE STUDY 1.0 30


PARAMETRIC

STAGGERED QUAD PANELS 1

DIAMOND TRIANGUAL PANELS 1

TRIANGULAR

PANELS

A

1

STAGGERED QUAD PANELS 2

DIAMOND TRIANGUAL PANELS 2

TRIANGULAR

PANELS

A

2

RANDOM

GRASSHOPPER PROCESS USING THE RANDOM QUAD PANELS FUNCTION AS AN EXAMPLE

QUAD

31 CASE STUDY 1.0

PANELS


EXPERIMENTS

TRIANGULAR

PANELS

B

1

TRIANGULAR

PANELS

C

1

QUAD

PANELS

1

TRIANGULAR

PANELS

B

2

TRIANGULAR

PANELS

C

2

QUAD

PANELS

2

We are interested in the grids and lattice field to improve our initial proposal, and to reflect the case study 1.0 project. However there is no any definition or further information about grids and lattice in the material system list on LMS, so we paid our attention to the lunchbox plug-in to see how we can make any changes onto the surface of this sphere. During the process of trying different lunchbox functions, we found that it could be much easier to develop a basic sphere and bring it into next level. This method can also be easily found in a lot of modern architectural design, including Fuller’s Montreal Biosphère. By applying with these techniques, a simple geometry could be developed into many different outcomes, meanwhile they are providing obvious advantages in structral needs, circulation, and visual impression. In another hand, the lunchbox has its own restriction in expressing our concept and ideas. Panels and cells are not perfectly drawing a smooth or continuous external surface, which is needed in our proposal due to that we were trying to combine the idea of “doing more with less“ and another idea of building a composite material system. Therefore we put this aside at this stage, and continued looking for a better approach. Highlighted

four

are

more

successful

and

realistic

than

the

others

in

fabrication.

CASE STUDY 1.0 32


B.3. CASE STUDY 2.0

33 CASE STUDY 2.0


Canton Tower Architect: Mark Hemel & Barbara Kuit (IBA) Structural engineer: Arup Established: 2010 Location: Haizhu District, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China

Type: Restaurant, Observation, Telecommunications (Mixed use) Height: 600 m (1,969 ft) Roof: 488 m (1,601 ft) Lifts & elevators: 9

Canton Tower is a 600 meter high multi-purpose Chinese observation tower in the Haizhu District of Guangzhou, Guangdong, China. Before the Tokyo Skytree has completed in 2011, Canton Tower was the tallest tower in the world, replacing the CN Tower in Toronto, Canada.[26] The design of Canton Tower is a combination with parametric design methods, and applied a simple structural concept of three elements: columns, rings and braces, to this more complex geometry.[27] Parametric technique plays an important this building, especially in the furface

role in setting.

CASE STUDY 2.0 34


PARAMETRIC EXPERIMENTS

D I A M O N D TRIANGUAL P A N E L S

STAGGERED QUAD PANELS

35 CASE STUDY 2.0

TRIANGUAL PANELS C

QUAD PANELS

S K E W E D P A N E L S

TRIANGUAL PANELS A

TRIANGUAL PANELS B

RANDOM QUAD P A N E L S


At this stage we tried the curveloft method in Rhino and Grasshopper.

FIRST VERSION

GRASSHOPPER EXPLORING ING DIAMOND PANELS

1. We started the model with three curves and made a loft by connecting them together. 2. Then by using lunch box plug-in, the loft surface could be resolved into a grid structure. 3. We tried a couple of panel types by the lunchbox plug-in, and through that we found the closet one to the Canton Tower, which is made by Triangular Panels A.

PROCESS AS AN

BY USEXAMPLE

4. Due to the huge structure of Canton Tower, it has more than 1100 nodes in it. We tested some different numbers in the U & V divisions to imitate the original real tower. 5. However, we also would like to use this case study to look back to our proposal, which is about the “paper-rope“ model, so we did our second attampt in building the Canton Tower by a more complex way.

CASE STUDY 2.0 36


SECOND VERSION

After previous attempt, we looked at the model from another angle. This time we used a “surface blending“ method to bring up the whole structure of Canton Tower, and we also believed that we could find inspiration from this model to fit our proposal of the gateway site. We created one start surface, then copied it, and manipulated the copy to use as the other start surface. Then we divided these surfaces into sets of points, to be the levels in between. This method acutually did not end up like the real Canton Tower, insteads that, it was even less efficient than the first version. However, we found this method was more useful to create what we were aiming at. The half opened structure fits the “doing more with less“ idea; the surfaces could be developed towards the “paper and rope“ model; most importantly, this structure provides a reliable system built by two different types of materials that supports each other. 37 CASE STUDY 2.0


B.4. TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT Continuing with our case study 2.0 techniques, we attempted to use some different plug-in tools to develop our model to some different fields. Because there is no any definitions on the LMS about our concept, we choosed some plug-in tools from the Internet and other precedents.

1. WEAVER BIRD

Firstly, I created a mass of mesh boxes, then kept only boundary faces of the mass, and joined duplicate mesh vertices, then assigned each vertice a random vector. Finally I just adjust the distortion amount.

This tool will work with any mass made of planar faced mesh objects. Instead of calling out boundary faces we can use mesh union but this will make the process much longer. TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT 38


2. EXOSKELETON

Exoskeleton is a plug-in grasshopp into solid. It brings simple wire

This experiment itself is not direct found it interesting that network of id, which is helping us understand th

This method can be used in o el has a frame structure, b use this because it did no

39 TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT


per that can turns network of lines eframe thickening to grasshopper.

tly leading us to the result, but we lines could be manipulated into solhe process of wireframe thickening.

our but ot

proposal at the fit our

because our modend we did not other arguments.

TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT 40


3. MINIMAL SURFACE

According to our design model was inspired by the “paper and rope“ material experiments, the forces onto the material system is one of those essential factors in our process.

41 TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT


This time we tried the kangroo plug-in to test how some physical actions could affect with the shape and layout of the model, and this could be used for the starting step in our design, which is the forming of a bending surface, then we could explore the furtherideas such as the transition of it and make it to be the structure of our design.

TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT 42


DIGITAL MODEL

Point of view 1

Point of view 2

Point of view 4

Point of view 5

43 TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT


We created two surfaces as the top and the bottom, the basis.

By this step two tal surfaces brings bending surfaces in

fundamenout two between.

The surfaces were divided into a series of points, and those points will be the locations of the pipes.

For fabrication we changed the smooth surfaces into fold ones with panels. TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT 44


DESIGNING MATRIX

45 TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT


TECHNIQUE: DEVELOPMENT 46


B.5. TECHNIQUE: PROTOTYPES

47 TECHNIQUE: PROTOTYPES


The ideal model of our design would be three smoothly flowing surfaces being bend, but in order to fabricate it in reality, we used paneling tools to divide those three surfaces into many small panels. We of

printed panels out in every piece of strips

strips with extra for sticking them

edges on together

the by

side glue.

About the pipe part, in real life, we thought about using steel to be the material, and the whole structure will be made by steel, supporting the panels and themselves. However, in the physical modelling, we met a lot of problems. The surfaces were just really difficult to be tied up to the plastic sticks, both with or without the help of strong glue. Finally we used a lot of pieces of small rounds with ter as an attached part to connect the plastic sticks

a hole in the cenand the cardborads.

TECHNIQUE: PROTOTYPES 48


Besides that, the bottom of this model was not very stable as well. In order to avoid collapse during the fabrication, we cut a piece of square as the base of this structure, and every plastic stick could be stabilized onto the base under the help of pins. When we were fabricating it, we found some places that not match well as what we could control in Rhino and Grasshopper. The surfaces changed the shapes because of the cardboards were printed out and glued and then stuck together, many details had been already changed in the former steps. This fabrication process was a huge challenge to us because every plastic stick was affected by the surfaces, and the way of these surfaces bent affected with the supporting stick system backwards. This is actually what we were looking build by hand. A system contains two with both of them, every piece of this

49 TECHNIQUE: PROTOTYPES

for although it was hard to different materials, and works system could not be separated.


B.5. TECHNIQUE: PROTOTYPES

TECHNIQUE: PROTOTYPES 50


B.6. TECHNIQUE PROPOSAL

From the very beginning, we decided to focus on three things: the transition, a material co-work system, and an idea of “doing more with less“. Now at this stage we organized what we thought before, and what we actually have now, looked at the progress so far, we believe that there are three reasons why our designing proposal should be fitting the Wyndham City Gateway site best.

1. The Transition There is a designed project called “Seeds of Change”, which is a 10 meter high structure located near the highway, to welcome residents, and attract visitors, to the City of Wyndham. The design encompasses modern materials such as galvanised steel fabricated to the interesting shape. It features a series of open leaf shape frames, which descend in height.[28] The “Seeds of Change” project was conpleted 10 years ago. With our project bulit aside, we can send a message about how things changed and what things remained. The design is encouraging visitors to rethink of what they have gained and lost as time goes by. We changed the environment, what fade away and what came along? By showing the structure with three twisting layers, our “transition“ concept is behind and let people image how things change and flow near them. 51 TECHNIQUE PROPOSAL


2. Material System The site is quite open to public, we are planning putting the design within the red zone due to its a intersection and people might easily use the building by going there. Like our case study 1.0, although the Montreal Sphere is an enclosed building, but people feel welcomed by just standing in front of it. This is why we are using the same concept about interaction with the nature (by light, sound, view and air circulation). The most efficient way is to build a half opened structure, communicating with the nature. Like our proposal. Visitors are going to feel covered and protected from the surfaces, also enjoy thier time by sitting under the layers.

3. Doing more with less This is also related back two the second point describing how visitors could feel themselves in the nature. Geodesics helps us to start thinking the relationship between the line and the surface. So now we would like to try to use limited materials to create an infinite space.

TECHNIQUE PROPOSAL 52


B.7. LEARNING OBJECTIVES AND OUTCOMES After entering the second stage of parametric designing in the Gateway in City of Wyndham, our group started to take everything into consideration and come up with some ideas that could largely help us to think and deal with this project in a big picture. On one side, we are getting familiar with these Rhino, Grasshopper and a series of plug-in tools during the designing work. We now decide the direciton and the field that we feel interested in. This is the first thing for us whenever we want to take a step in a project designing process. The composite material has a large area behind. Therefore, on the other side, the difficulty of even giving out an own definition of composite materials is greater than we thought before. We now think the “composite material” is just an expression, a conceptual idea of our built-up system. We were not just choosing two or three different materials and tie them together, instead of that, we saw the potential that an assembled multiple material structure has. From those experiments and explorations of the

“paper and rope“ experimental model, we saw a transition process when we twisted or bent it, then what we saw became what we really wanted to archieve. The challenge came when we started to fabricate the physical model in reality. Due to the non-physical nature of digital modelling programmes, our model also met the problem. The model seems alright on the screen, but when we tried to assemble those pieces together, the surfaces just did not bend exactly ilke they did in Rhino, meanwhile the connections of surfaces and structural elements have been missed out of our consideration. At the end, we have to use a lot of paper rounds to stick on the surfaces, tying two components together in quite a unrealistic way. Besides the fabrication, given the feedback from the mid-semester presentation, we might head to a wrong

53 LEARNING OBJECTIVES AND OUTCOMES

way in expressing a “co-working“ material system. Our model might not be convincing enough because it is not every piece of materials in the model is unseparated. In the next three weeks, we need to find a way that building up a much strongly convincing model telling about how the whole system works with the existing of every single piece of the materials we choose, which was also an unclear case. Taking a step backwards might be a good solution now for our designing. In order to understand what is missing indeed, more approaches and precedents we should look at and draw our own sketches.


NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART B Image:

23. http://www.evolo.us/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/parametric-architecture-3.jpg 24. http://www.tsplines.com/grasshopper.html 25. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/03/Montreal_Biosphere.JPG 26. http://www.flickr.com/photos/manuelasiener/2560314054/in/photostream/lightbox/ 27. http://www.flickr.com/photos/manuelasiener/2560313810/in/photostream/lightbox/ 28. http://ww1.prweb.com/prfiles/2010/12/15/4901234/2_CantonCropRelease.jpg 29. http://www.amazingpicturesplace.com/canton-tower-in-guangzhou/ 30. http://wordlesstech.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/canton-tower-guangdong.jpg 31. http://www.panoramio.com/photo_explorer#view=photo&position=30&with_photo_ id=83405680&order=date_desc&user=161381 32. http://www.flickr.com/photos/87791108@N00/2249885238/lightbox/

Text:

20. http://www.ilikearchitecture.net/2013/08/quote-78-eduardo-souto-de-moura/ 21. http://www.aviewoncities.com/montreal/biosphere.htm 22. Bolton, KC (2009-01-31). “Photo du jour - Biosphere Burning”. Spacing Montreal. Retrieved 2009-01-31. 23. Environment Canada (2006-01-24). “A Short History of the Biosphère”. The Sphere. Retrieved 2007-06-07. 24. http://www.aviewoncities.com/montreal/biosphere.htm 25. http://www.bfi.org/?q=node/106 26. “List of tallest towers in the world”. Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH). 2011. Retrieved 27 July 2011. 27. “Canton Tower official website”. Cantontower.com. Retrieved 2013-01-01. 28. http://www.experiencewyndham.com.au/artsculture/public_art/seedsofchange

NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART B 54


55 GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT


PART C. PROJECT PROPOSAL

It is not right to take one building out of the whole work of a man because even the faults show the changes in his work. They show the humanity of the man that did it.[29] - ENRICO PERESSUTTI

GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT 56


C.1. GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT

From two stages before in this semester, our group basically expressed our intention and interest in forming a structure carrying with a transition idea, showing a smoothly flowing process. We also sought some connections of our model and the nature, the features on site, and the its meaning to people might see or use our construction. However, after the mid-semester presentation, we really started to realize the importance of just focusing on one or two center ideas, then explored them, tested them, and really understood them. Only in this way can we be able to calm down and find what we are really interested in, and what will be the best solution to the unique site.

We changed our mind both in conceptual ideas and model designing. Although the Studio Air is leading us to focus on a seires of softwares, such like Rhino and Grasshopper, but we decided to use them just as technical supporting tools that help us to make the design more accurate and easier to control. The major part, which is form designing, will be achieved by our hand working. As what we were researching was the compostie material, consequently we really wanted not to just using two or three separated materials tied up together. It will be much more valuable if we could use various materials to create a new kind of material, which means that these components are not just sticking to each other, instead of that, they change the properties they have before individually. This process could be combined with our intention to finish our final model by hand, but there were still some main problems in material selection, designing approach and hand-making techniques, hence we had the discussion with our tutors.

57 GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT


CONCEPT 1:

TRY TO CREATE A NEW MATERIAL

We were lucky to have Finn’s opinion to change our direction of designing this potential landmark. We gave up the initial idea of building a vertical-layer-transiting shelter, and then designed a machine to test a new way to create a composite material. Finn’s original suggestion was to assemble a box that carry be placed a piece of cloth or some other covering in the middle, and put two rolling handler on each side of the box(top and bottom). Two wires could be tied on the handler and the other side would be stuck on two different points on the piece of cloth. When someone started to roll the handler into a specific degree, the wires running through piece of cloth would drug that cloth to a specific shape. Various degree would result in different outcomes, then we just put resin into the shape, using the shape as a mould. Finally when resin completely dried out, every resin-product could be a part of our final model, and a continuous layers would make the final building. This one fit our “transition“ idea perfectly.

GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT 58


Development and future could be seen as two key words to describing the City of Wyndham. The highways running by the service center are like vessels leading people to the heart of Wyndham City. People see changes, see development, see what is disappearing and what is transformating.

CONCEPT 2:

Transition is still the theme of our design because on one side we believe that this is what Wyndham city has been going through and will experience in the future as well, on the other side we would like to give a feel that the whole builing is flowing and transformating by driving and walking by.

TRANSITION

I think physical shape-change is able to send this message as well as visual shock. For the shape-change, the effect from force applied will be a strong and convincing one, and for the flowing, we decided to add some rotation on it. The use of composite material relief our design from frame and structure. The scope of possibly is enlarged as composite material allows us to create seamless freeform surface. Therefore we were able to create a more innovative design.

59 GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT


WORKFOLW OF THE DESIGN DEIFINITION

FORCE APPLIED ONTO ONE SURFACE ROTATION APPLIED ONTO ONE LAYER SCALE INCREASING ONTO ONE LAYER

ONE SURFACE SHAPED BY A LEAF

RECURSION (14 TIMES)

A SEIRES OF SURFACES (15 PIECES)

GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT 60


ROTATION FACTOR 0.1 - 0.6 (0.1 SELEVTED)

61 GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT


SCALE FACTOR 0.95 - 0.90 (0.90 SELEVTED)

GATEWAY PROJECT: DESIGN CONCEPT 62


ROTATION EFFECT (FROM HORIZONTAL VIEW)

PERSPECTIVE VIEW

63 GATEWAY PROJECT: TECTONIC ELEMENTS


FORCE SIMULATION

One surface was set at first. Then the model was established by Grasshopper definition, esapecially by the recursion step. Those surfaces were arranged one by one with a factor=0.1 rotation, and a factor=0.9 increasing scaling.

We use the leaf shape as the starting point. This is because as we thought, plant is one of the best example to show the process of growth, also, we would like to response to the previous project - seed of change.

The key part is the forcing. Two opposite forces were acting on the surfaces with increasing factors in magnitude for both of them. at the largest surface, one of the forces is 3000 N while the other is 0.

GATEWAY PROJECT: TECTONIC ELEMENTS 64


C.2. GATEWAY PROJECT: TECTONIC ELEMENTS

Unlike other repeating detail structure, our design so far did not carry too many co-operative connecting components. Therefore, the most loadbearing unit in this sculpturelike gateway design will be the connections between each surface and its supporting column. Due to the overall layout, which is quite simple and neat visually, we would likedesign the connecting units as simple as we can, but firm and stable.

In our ty, the

This type of assembly part is quite simple structurally. Surfaces will be attached to free standing steel columns which would then be connected to the mass concrete to against the normal wind load, meanwhile to support the weight of whole structure itself.

model, the columns wind load is a huge

65 GATEWAY PROJECT: TECTONIC ELEMENTS

work well, but challenge to the

in realistability.


The initial designed base of those columns were quite simple, but really not stable both in model fabrication and in software testing. If we want to use this assembly pattern in reality, the base needs to be highly consolidated, such as adding a reinforced concrete system at the bottom of it. Concrete itself has strong property to resist compression, which is what we need it to do, but in tension, concrete will easily crack and even collapse. Therefore, the steel columnstructure will be needed to be placed in the middle of those concrete to improve the performance in tension as well as increasing the bending resistance. In our final design, both tension and compression will be highly applied on the columns and transferred to the base. We took it into consideration, and then designed a reinforced concrete base underneath. However, this is quite ideal while in reality we have to deal with the wind blowing in high speed towards every piece of surface. When loads come from horizontal direction, this kind of base still might not solve the problem. GATEWAY PROJECT: TECTONIC ELEMENTS 66


67 GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL


GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL 68


C.3. GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL As we mentioned before, the part we were most inerested in is the process we made those resin-cloth surfaces. This also helped us understand how different the result could be after combining two materials together.

69 GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL


FINAL MODEL: FIRST ATTEMPT In the very beginning, we designed a series of cardboard boxes with gaps in the middle to place pieces of tensile cloth, and used them to be the frames of our machines.

Secondly we put a piece of tensile material into the middle of a box, placed it to fit the gaps, used some tapes to stablized it.

The trick part was to use wires to drag the piece of colth until it reached the need that we made due to different factors in Grasshopper. Hand made material inspired us to create unique shape, and the softwares let us to control and visualize our imagined model. Unfortunately, during the first attempt, becasuse of some technical issues, we did not take meny photos for the most creative and imeresting part. But the result was quite good to us. The material combined both advantages of resin and tensile cloth.

GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL 70


RESIN COATING & WAITING FOR DRYING OUT

71 GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL


We used cutting machine to cut out 15 pieces of same shape but with different sizes. After tracing the shapes to the cloth, we started to drag the wires. After aproximately 2-day waiting, we cut the cloth out, and then fixed some details, put them aside to be assembled.

1;300 MODEL FRICATIONG PROCESS

In the 1:300 model, we did not do the same thing as what we did to 1:50 model because it was to difficult to control the resin when target was very small. The 1:300 model shows the location and orientation, the relationships of our design and people, vehicles, and highways.

GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL 72


73 GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL


GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL 74


75 GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL


GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL 76


FINAL MODEL: SECOND ATTEMPT

As we were not very satisfied with the result at Week 12, we did the whole process again, and replaced the blackboard underneath with two ones to emphasis the focus, which should always be the surfaces.

77 GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL


GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL 78


79 GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL


GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL 80


FINAL MODEL: 1:300 MODEL

Each layer is 5m aways from another, so the entire proposal would occupied 70m in length. It is quite massive comparing to the surrounding context because we tried to deliver a strong visual impact to the drivers. They would know that they will arrive Wyndham shortly when they saw this design.

81 GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL


CONCLUSION

Finally, when we get 15 pieces of “new material“, we found that this was exactly what we have been looking for in composite material field. The new material is solid for sure, after all these waiting. It is slightly transparent when we looked through it under the sun, or any lighting. It is very light and thin, successfully sends a smoothly flowing feel to people who see this design. However, as we have been concerned before, using this type of material in real life would be very difficult now. Thickness and areas of every surface could bring problems that might fail the whole structure. Therefore, in conclusion, the procesee of making it was really helping us explore the world of material and designing. In another hand, to finish our work and to put it into reality, there still a long trip to go, now this is just a beginning.

GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL 82


C.4. LEARNING OBJECTIVES AND OUTCOMES

Part C is the major part in this semester, our design has been experiencing a tough progress that in some degree we basically started over from the conceptual ideas and material experiments. After we gave up the previous design, which was the “blooming“ structure from part B, we realized that for an architectural design, the first thing need to be comfirmed should be a exploring process that designers themselves get highly interested in. To use ourselves as an example, when Finn inspired us with that resin-mould machine, we felt that it would be a complete new field for us to give a try. Before that, we never thought we might use any of those resin or cloth, which we can barely use before in an architectural studio. When we started to test Finn’s idea, we found our own way to express our ideas. If we continued using resin to fill the moulds and layered them, the final model will be made of only resin. At that point, we were seeking an opportunity to form a kind of material that works as a closed system. We were not just satisfied with resin only. Then in the tests we found once resin and tensile cloth met together, we would get somehing new and interesting.

Tensile material could be easily shaped but those shapes were hard to record. Resin helped us to achieve that. After a series of experiments, we chose the type of cloth, the resin kind, and coating thickness. During this studio, I have been thinking about how architecture could be introduced to common people. Technique like parametric tools, as I think, complete human’s dream of having those buildings might not be even described. People must be dreaming of all kinds of buildings for ages, but techniques bounded us inside. Those dreamers would be disappointed because constructing techniques could not satisfy their eager for amazing plans and forms. However, now we are on the way to solve every technical problem in architecture. We can start build whatever we have in mind, because parametric could help us to visualize them, explore them and even test them with real gravity and loading bearing. From our final model, it can be easily seen that we now believe building could be more like sculptures. They stand there and send out messages about thoughts, ideas and stories. People surely will use them, live in them, but most importantly, people would love to read them and then understand them.

83 LEARNING OBJECTIVES AND OUTCOMES


C.5. APPENDIX - ALGORITHMIC SKETCHES

APPENDIX - ALGORITHMIC SKETCHES 84


NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART C Image:

33. http://www.jbermanglass.com/glass/images/berman_resin-thick_arrigado.jpg 34. http://www.houserepairtalk.com/f17/preparing-footing-surface-steel-column-12468/

Text:

29. http://www.ilikearchitecture.net/2013/07/quote-73-enrico-peressutti/

85 NOTES & REFERENCE FOR PART C

GATEWAY PROJECT: FINAL MODEL 76


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