Inhabit

a

Playing with the idea of technological aspects of architecture, I began by exploring the environmental architectural techniques we learnt from ARCHTECH 106 as to relate back to the reading: Designing in Techno-Social Landscapes. It was to look beyond the notion of function in technology, the green gardens, as merely just 'green' technology but to explore the social aspect of integrating such things. It was about reacting to the building's empty interior atrium space - the almost dead and still space - by adding life into the stairs. 

This project produced the following thoughts: 

Mapping

Trashold Project Final

Following on from the reading on the Medieval Carnival, I was immediately drawn to the purely egaliterian society that the carnival induced, albeit it being temporary. Such events revealed a celebration of equality of all kinds of people and that people are inherently more inclined to laughter and festivity when freed from strict rules and principles. This contrasting sharply to the segregation that existed outside the festival was a model in which I thought design to should follow: like the carnival, architecture should show through design glimpses of the possibility of an equality and its associations, even if the world was different outside. While sounding overly grandiose, and thus, excessively indulging in romanticism for while I was reading I was spell-bound by the literature; and if such things are possible with words, I pondered, why cannot it not with architecture?

Diverging away from the main threshold project a bit, and talking about the team-work process of collectively building a site model I began to realise one very important thing. The political and implicit ideologies of an act that on the surface may possibly be nice, but if it were on a different scale it could lead to disaster is one thing we learnt in team-working. A one person leading team may seem like a logical step at times, however, such acts are not what we in a democratic society practise; that is, even our design processes when working with others should strictly be founded on what we believe is right. While it may have led to well co-ordinated design - it would have meant less thoughts and inputs from each individual member in the class, therefore, not captivating the potential assets we have. This would also not have gone well with  the overall theme of 'classlessness' and fairshare vision that the reading provided. Of course, it does not mean that we should all act as individuals inconsiderate of others but it does mean that we should all be contributing equally in cooperation - one of the very reasons why I believed the site replica of the School of Architecture and Planning building to have been so successful.

Carrying on with the idea of team-work, I decided to work with Kim Hyunh and Patrisha - people I have never worked with. Naturally, the situation was both a challenge and an opportunity. Working togehter enabled an expanded vision of the possibilities and finer details of the project. It made us feel down together when we were constantly questioned, criticised and openly disliked, but it also made us tackle the design problem and when we succeeded it meant our happiness and satisfaction quadrupled. Such experiences are well-worth having and I am glad to have had such great thoughts from Judy to have allowed me to think of the greater political dimensions in the design cooperation process. We all came to share our ideas - the best aspect of working in a group.

One more thing I have learnt from Mark was this: always approach things with justification and sound reasoning. Define the concepts that are critical in the designs, question, observe and restate and reobserve and redefine and requestion. Such rigourous questioning will lead to a greater learning experience of realising with greater clarity the extent of what you have designed. It is also a rational and empirical approach - such philosophical reasoning that demonstrate the highest of critical thinking which all good designs must have. The thoroughness of such reasoning have led me to not only devise a better understanding of 'threshold' (note: devise - it was partly organised, partly created and partly from observation) and also an approach to things I will have on my mind, always.

Threshold?!!

A threshold is spatially designed as a method of giving the impression of what is beyond from either of the two linked spaces. We feel the space of the threshold through the moments of transition when the transitory space can be experienced, thus, indicating that of the newly entered space. For example, castle gates impart a strong sense of boldness and grandiose, the entrance to a security door looks visually guarded, an arch expresses emotions related to nationalism... In short, the threshold is a way of activating the space that is beyond.

The act of passing is relevant in terms of time. It is important to include the factor of time as it gives the real relative perspective of the 'threshold' which is a moment of transition towards permanent spaces where moments are measured through greater quantities of time. We spend small moments in thresholds and greater amounts in rooms.

The threshold's passage is selectively permeable in that it is able to exclude and include things related to its function. This exclusion and inclusion factor also influences the connected spaces because people's occupation is the ultimate influence of a built design - how they use it, how they feel inside it thus must be considered through the threshold. The act of passing, thus, allows a phenomenon or functional transition to occur...

Collecting opinions

"how a treshold point is ranged, either short or long, that implies time and communication. I like the theory of how such boundary expands and eventually becomes one "functional" space. It is the phyical tranformation of moment to period.. For me, it is little bit difficult to understand the "terms" that you have used. Door is a physical and funcational object. And space is dematerialised, and conceptual volume that we experience. Two things cannot be compared directly to each other. My advice is that you use the specific moment of transition, rather than a word, door. It's more like a study on relationships bettwen the temporal (transitory) and permanent spaces.

People generally come up with an idea of physically splitting the building in two several pieces, when they face the concept of treshold, boundary, barrier, etc. But I think architecture requires and wants more depth. And the depth comes from how one understands and compose the space: experience. Form is a mere appearance. How can human-beings live without organs." - Ikje Cheon

Threshold?

My current definition of the threshold:
A sharp point of difference spatially between two spaces - that can either be different, opposing or the same - which contains a certain mechanised access or ritual of activation allowing it to be selectively-permeable (i.e. access designed for certain people or designed to exclude certain people) but requiring a physical 'crossing' of the connection to result in a condition, transition or phemenon to occur or simply to 'enter' the second space. The threshold in architectural terms could be significantly 'different' for example the gate into the Taj Mahal, or simply a line dividing two spaces.

Few things that do puzzle me are the reasons why these connections are required i.e. when does a room require a door, what functional roles do they play, are there any alternatives to connecting things, what kind of passage is required... From research:

Doors - is used to control the physical atmosphere within a space by enclosing it; that is, it is a process of screening what is inside the door but also giving the impression of an entrance to it. It allows the differentiation from in to out, controls the conditions (e.g. when the door is opened, light and air enter).

Cells - selectively permeable to allow only certain things in, made from protein, segregation of biological interior to exterior things. It keeps things inside...

Perhaps, the connection is a mutual point between inside and outside which requires some sort of segregation, such that the purpose is to allow limited access... The threshold influences the two spaces by imparting an impression of entrance/exit/passage... E.g. a cell membrane exerts influence onto the inside by allowing only a few things in and a few things out... That boundary kind of influences it, allows us to identify whats in and whats out? A factor of movement between two spaces? A factor of occupation (i.e. it should be used)? 


The doors locked in archi building can be considered as walls because they dont allow passage through it, though, have the potential to.

Secondlife Project: Trash-hold [sic]

Grotesque Poster

"A Grotesque Portrait of the Institute."
Woo-Min Lee 1498365

It may seem as if computers are these days almost religiously worshipped; especially with many innovative software such as Rhino and 3Ds Max and along with it an extensive tool package capable of enhancing architectural projects like never before. However, such advancements in technology imposed by institutions, such as the School of Architecture and Planning and more broadly NICAI, brings about mixed feelings of new 'excitement' and 'fear.' Reflecting both these emotions, the poster tries to elaborate on the 'fear' of both resisting the change towards technological advancement in the concern of architects potentially being replaced either in its entirety or in mentality in terms of a mechanised design process (and how the architect may one day think more like a robot) due to the institution's promotion of technology. That is, it is the fear that computers are becoming a threat to creativity due to the fact that using a fantastically computer-rendered presentation of architectural ideas may deceive clients or others of projects of little architectural merit and thus misleading them.

Trash-Can Project

Illustration 1.

Illustration 2.

Illustration 3.

Illustration 4.

Illustration 5.

Introduction:

The brief required a trashcan to be built in our studio space for the recycling of 'design junk' based on the reading Lila: An Inquiry into Morals by Robert M. Pirsig and the overarching theme of the Medieval Carnival (the design theme for this semester). For my group, the Paper (3D scan) group, we had an additional requirement to relate or draw inspiration from the 3D scans of 10 collected objects. The collected objects were mostly found as rubbish; thus, initiating the irony of 'rubbish' as an inspiration for a 'trashcan.'

The Process: 

With my idea I began with the understanding that our junk must be forgotten to get rid of the bias and the emotional state at that time, both of which inclined towards witnessing the idea in a bad light. Only when we have forgotten about the dark subjectivity attached to the idea, through a process of distancing ourselves from the project, could we begin to rethink, review and re-engage with the 'junk' ideas as a way of inspiring us for new projects in the future. That is, we must first get rid of our negativity that associates the idea as junk to allow for it to be useful later - and that begins, in my opinion, through not seeing the object for a long period of time.

This idea developed further to accomodate a design that allowed for the characteristic of 'randomising'; this would allow the storage of the junk ideas to be rearranged into a place where it would be hard to be found at once, thus hiding the junk until we are able to rid ourselves from negativity. Furthermore, I thought it was necessary to physically demonstrate this aspect of 'hiding' and 'randomising' so that the trashcan was able to be actively engaged with; hence, the physical act would emphasise the desire to 'forget.' From my research, these concepts was most readily related to puzzles.

Puzzles, such as the rubicks cube, coincided with my intentions of randomising and hiding. Through motion of the rubicks cube, the coloured squares could be rearranged in a way that was random. This process can be illustrated above in Illustration 1. The eventual development towards my design was allowing for movement as a way of randomising things and engagement with the trashcan itself.

In relation to the reading, the trashcan facilitated the random access part and some limited ways of sorting the 'junk' into 2D, 3D and digital design works. That is, the trashcan was readily available and could be used without restriction (except on the availability of junk) and had limited sorting into groups depending on mediums. The reading also inspired the idea of 'systems' and I tried to continuously think of my design as both a physical object but also as a set of possible and positive consequences.

Finally, I chose the 'egg carton' scanned object as a starting point to my design. I quite liked the idea of the egg carton being made to 'fit' the egg, which made it extremely condensed and functional. While playing around with the egg carton scan, by stretching horizontally and vertically, I began to see that the design junk could be like the egg, and so the container might resemble something of an egg carton stretched in different ways dependent on the nature of the media.

The Final Outcome:

The design's final outcome encompasses the ideas of randomising and hiding in three different 'modules' of red (for the digital media), orange (for the three dimensional work) and the blue (for the two dimensional work) which move around so that each module can be 'hidden' amongst the masses of similar modules.

The location of the trashcan was at the Architecture studio, in attempts to bring something 'playful' into the somewhat gloomy place (that is, the architecture studios are somewhat purely functional and there are no 'fun' things anywhere). It was also to encourage the use of the trashcan amongst many people so that we can find not only our own ideas but other design junk from other students; and also to enable others to join in together and discuss.

 The trashcan was displayed on the wall in colourful arrangements to provide a final aesthetic comment.

 Hate/Love:

• I hated how I focused more on the model than the drawings.
• I hate how my drawings were not efficient in conveying the final outcome; this, I felt gave the overall presentation to have inconfidence and uncertainty. These factors made it feel less strong.
• I liked how ideas needed to be tested to properly work and learning that the project's success is its plausibility in real life context.

My learning experience.

I love Second Life - it didn't feel as if I was working. It was fun, like a game, but made me think of all these things architecturally...

And from this, I have pretty much come up with my own defintion of what architecture is. Architecture, in the most vague terms possible, is the art of organisation of space by considering form, mass and materials under a continuously fluctuating light source. It is an art that has to be viewed for a long time (that is, it is temporarl not ephermal - though, ephermal moments do exist), it is a solution to problems (such as those urban problems, of sustainability, of a man-made reaction to a physical environment etc), an art that can be a part of someone's life (e.g. it is their house, it is a landmark that distinguishes a town in which you live, it is a place where you have your first kiss, it is a place where you remember your childhood etc), it is an art that is to be shared, to be public rather than be self-absorbed, it is a high-defintion vision of the architect where the desires of patrons are made more detailed, vivid and real. It is also an art that does not stick to one definition, or rather, one which cannot have a definition that is so short.

This definition may be short and incomplete at the moment... But I have seen this task as a serious investigation which has made me think; thus, was not only a useful discovery but also an enjoyable journey.

Final Attempt @ Office in Second Life

Fourth Attempt @ Office in Second Life

d

The design has five different holes in which the people can jump into the different floors. One really MAJOR problem with this design is that now, Judy says, we can't have sky boxs - that is, we are not allowed to build in the sky. Hence, it seems like I need to reconsider this whole design so that fits in with the spaces (at the moment, it doesn't seem to fit, because the views are more restricted and collides with other buildings).

Third Attempt @ Office in Second Life

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New architecture office takes into account the 'corridor' interiors of the second attempt. It has been designed so that the form divides the building into 'four'. These four divisions are to create the four rooms for the different magazines and various working spaces and meeting rooms. However, after I have created this design, I realised there were two different major problems:

1. The flow from the first floor to the second floor. I decided to use teleportation as a method of going from top floor to the bottom, because I thought it would improve the digital aspect of my design. However, Judy gave me feedback saying that 'teleport' should involve a greater impact of transporting from one space to a totally different one. I agree on this note, I will have to consider other methods.

2. The division is too extreme in that all the spaces are small rooms, and there are no open spaces. I think I will try and make the bottom floor more spacious and keep the top divided.