My 1:100 Site

This is my site, choosen because of the neighbouring architecture (think Vector Arena and the Train Station), the view such a site would offer, and also the road alongside. As can be seen on my site plan, the designated site overlaps a road. This is intentional. I want a space that has a sense of movement, and is unobtrusive to the roads already present. Something that, like a tunnel, might weave it's way through obstacles, rather than divulge itself upon them.

Gathering Brief - Inspiration for my Design

So it's the day before mid semester crit, and I'm about to get stuck into some serious drawing. But before I do, I thought I'd stop in with some ideas for my design :D We had a quick briefing today to just clarify a few points, which helped me a lot in terms of my propostition.
I've decided on my four colleagues for my Architectural Firm! Introductions?

• First, there's the Engineer. This is the guy who brought that building from the matrix with him... I guess he's going to need his own office, and after googling "what does an engineer need?" (original, I know), a lot of sites said that they need their own work room, to test out theories and gadgets and other ground-breaking, awesome stuff. So i guess my engineer dude is going to need that as well!
• Secondly, there's the Graphic Designer. A person to do all the cool CAD work and who knows a thing or two about all of the architectural software. They will also work closely with the Marketer, because thye put a visual face to a project that can be used in the marketing for the business. She's the one with a thing for doors, and demands this exciting and original threshold. As always, she'll need an office. What else might she need? Apparently a studio is a necessesity, to test out design ideas.
• There's a builder involved in the project, and he demands that there be a map with all the needed services mapped out so that everything is easily accessible to him, in terms of materials and other services. Once again, he'll get an office.... and i guess he's going to need a workshop as well, for all DIY needs.
• Lastly there is the Marketer, responsible for all the advertising and publicising of the firm. They can handle some of the finances for the business as well. They get their own office, with a room for meetings with the other colleagues to discuss business oppurtunites and also organise advertising campaigns.
• Then there's me, I guess. The Architect, designing this whole building where all of this is going to happen! What do I need? Well right now it's definately some inspiration. The tutors told me to have a look at some designs from the Japanese Metabolist era (so 1950s-60s), because when i discussed my design ideas with them they thought I had some similarities to that kind or Architecture! I googled round and did a bit of research. Here's what i found:

Courtesy of Wiki:
"In the late 1950s a small group of young Japanese architects and designers joined forces under the title of "Metabolism". Their visions for cities of the future inhabited by a mass society were characterized by large scale, flexible, and expandable structures that evoked the processes of organic growth. In their view, the traditional laws of fixed form and function were obsolete. Metabolism arose in post-World War II Japan, and so much of the work produced by the movement is primarily concerned with housing issues.
The group's work is often called technocratic and their designs are described as avant-garde with a rhetorical character. The work of the Metabolists has often been compared to the unbuilt designs of Archigram"

Need some pictures to get a better idea!






These are pretty inspirational designs, and surprisingly I hadn't ever seen them before, nor heard of the term 'Japanese Metabolists'. But it's definately given me some inspiration.... so I guess I can go start my drawings now!

What is this 'Startup Business' you speak of?

So yesterday we obtained this sheet, and it said that we need to imagine we are setting up our first 'startup business'. Hm. Initially I thought, oh right, starting up a business, righto. Then I payed more attention to that word 'startup'. Hm. Yea. I wasn't quite sure what it all meant! So I googled around as you do, and managed to work out (at least I hope!) what a 'startup business' is.
Courtesy of the ever-increasing intellect of wikipedia.org :D
"A startup company or startup is a company with a limited operating history. These companies, generally newly created, are in a phase of development and research for markets."
All fair and well, right? Wrong. I am so uninformed on all things business. Need. More. Clarification.
"Startup companies can come in all forms, but the phrase "startup company" is often associated with high growth, technology oriented companies"
"A critical task in setting up a business is to conduct research in order to validate, assess and develop the ideas or business concepts in addition to opportunities to establish further and deeper understanding on the ideas or business concepts as well as their commercial potential."
And THEN they mention the internet, and it finally clicked. All this talk of technology and here I am using something started by one of these startup businesses. Well. I'm off to start thinking up some 'gathering' ideas!

Peer Reviews, Week 6

Ok, so time for the next set of peer crits! This week i reviewed Taylor Chan & Glen Yuan's work. For some reason i had Taylor down twice to review, so I just went and reviewed another person - I had a look at Tessa's work simply because it took my fancy and I'd struck up a conversation with her. Group four had done stop motion this week, and I really enjoyed this work! It was nice learning about how to go about doing it and the appropriate programmes to use.

TAYLOR'S CRIT

First i started with Taylor. Taylor had created this set of work which was bigger than most, because he had too many ideas! He had designed this building which can best be described by his own words: "A building that doesn't seperate interior from exterior". I thought that was a pretty great idea, and once he mentioned that I thought, wow, he's right... it really doesn't! He had drawn inspiration from this idea of the double helix, and the way the two strands intertwine. I could see that same movement in his building. And his stop motion really impressed me too because he had synced this music with it that fitted just perfectly. It made it a whole lot more dynamic. Really nice project, and clearly a lot of effort had gone into it.

GLEN'S CRIT

I then took a look at Glen Yuan's work. His use of colour and overall drawing technique struck me instantly. His work was vibrantly presented and attractive, and his idea was pretty awesome too! He had this idea of a building specialising in environmental conservation. Inside, plants would grow, utilising a site around the railroad tracks that was currently unused.

 He took the inspiration for the shape, and eventual overall purpose, from a leaf, and the structure offered by the stem and veins. It was cool to see how far he had come, because he had started off with this idea of sushi and other food (sustenance), but through his processes had finally come to rest on this fairly different idea. Overall, great project!

MORE PICTURES!!

I took almost 100 photots of my laser cut model, and today i thought, why not put them up? I realise my tutors have already checked out my blog, but I felt like my obsessive photography could do with some publicising. So here a whole heap of photos of my model!

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Final Project- Laser cut: From procedures to presentation

Finding a fluid form for my stall was important - i wanted those who walked inside to be engulfed and surrounded by an array of aromas and sights, and to visually capture how these scents rotate and move around and across the space. I used a small model at first to explore shape, in which I cut the previous model into strips and arranged them in different sized circles, slightly overlapping one another. i joined them together to create a very circular shape (retained from the first form) and from here eventually decided on a similar form to that of my final design,  shown below.

Here are the end results, after using illustrator to generate the pattern, the laser cut, and the addition of cellophane.

What it might look like to step into the stall...

The exit/ entry ... though preferrably the exit, because it offers the open side to attract customers, while thos who have travelled down the path can leave in a much less hectic atmosphere.

 The Outer skin layer

 Light effects as the light catches all of the layers

Sense of mixture and unpredictability - two key qualities in my initial design.

I felt like the model and photos generally achieved what i wanted in terms of ideas and visualisation.

Experimentation: Looking for Form