ARCHITECT ARTIST + ATHLETE

I just had my last session with my studio critic. Best advice yet! Now it’s time to crank out final production material. Lots of work to do, but really excited to implement all the new suggestions. Nothing makes me happier than when my design starts to make sense. 

• Line to Curve
• Marble to Travertine
• Column to Pier
• 1/2 Column to Pilaster

• 13.2 mile run with three brothers and dad (crazy tradition)
• epsom salt bath (my tradition)
• waffle house (family tradition)
• nap on the porch (tradition?)
• dad’s office for a little edumacation on the crow… (new tradition)
• now, we are all gathered around the garden pavilion smoking a turkey! (awesome tradition)

THOUGHTS SO FAR

One thing about the Tobacco Warehouse is that when you approach it from the street, the Brooklyn Bridge towers over you, providing a visual canopy that I felt is central to the integrity of the site. And I do not want to put anything on the site to obstruct the power and elegant dominance the bridge has over the site. Another aspect I want to emphasize are the axial relationships that the windows and door openings have to each other. They allow someone from the street to see through the interior of the site (it is currently empty) and be informed about what is beyond, on the other side of the site. I feel that maintaining these axial perspectives is key to the warehouse’s location along the East River and that they should be preserved. I also want to create a sense of destination. My design scheme includes a glass block loggia which will create an ethereal quality that a passerby is attracted to, provoking a sense of final destination. I feel this elevated space captures what I’d like my project to do: sit on the wall, under the bridge, and inform the beyond. Final production images coming later.

PHOTOGRAPHIC ESSAYS

The goal of our first project is to investigate tectonic, as a exterior surface that informs the interior, and vice versa. The tectonic of my project was inspired by two things - the pulp of oranges, lemons and limes as well as the fingerprint. Using the pouch form of the juice sacs, and the pattern of the fingerprint resulted in a tectonic that was mailable in some instances and rigid in others. I discovered that the form is determined by the grains of the striations. For example, striations that ran perpendicular to boarders provided more rigid instances, seen in the circulation path. Whereas, striations which ran along the curve of theboarder provided much more organic looking shapes. Both resulting in different enclosure spaces. One thing that I was pleased with in this project were the uncomfortable spaces that these apertures facilitate. The ground floor is disturbed, and the transition space would require careful consideration. I like the idea that someone could be enveloped in these ethereal spaces, yet have to work hard (manipulate their body) to get there. I think the surface also encourages an amount of play. Since the transition space and the angled walls do not vary in degree of difficulty, I can imagine people climbing on the walls of these spaces and finding ways to enjoy not just the enclosures but the unrealized exterior surfaces. That would seem fun to me.

SKETCH MODELS

FINAL MODEL

“Precedent is everywhere, and if you don’t know architectural precedents then everything is new. But, if you are able to recall from where these precedents derive, then you are already aware of their possibilities.” 

- Peter Eisenman, in class October 14th, 2010

“The happiest people don’t need to buy unnecessary things to impress people that they never liked.”

- Deepak Chopra