The Nocturnal Grocery Store

In my aimless hunger, I have formulated a new building type: the sleepless grocery store, open from midnight to six in the morning. Seven-eleven neon lights, fresh vegetables down to your meats. Pancake batter, no problem!

At least 24 hours. Please, city, pop one of these open. I bet I am not the only one that wants to cook in the middle of the night, then fails to notice the lack of groceries. Never lacking creativity! Just material!

Yes, it has been a long hiatus. This blog seems no longer mine. I have ignored it like a damned, annoying puppy. It is now my senior year of undergraduate architecture school. I feel completely different, but very much enlightened. Maybe I will tell you my dreams and nightmares as this semester unfolds.

More and More

"Almost without realizing it, we have absorbed into our lives the first generation of expendables... foodbags, paper tissues, polythene wrappers, ballpens, E.P.s...so many things about which we don't have to think. We throw them away almost as soon as we acquire them.

Also with us are the items that are bigger and last longer, but are nevertheless planned for obsolescence...the motor car,...and its unit-built garage.

Now the second generation is upon us-- paper furniture is a reality in the Sates, paper sheets are a reality in British hospital beds, the Greater London Council is putting up limited-life-span houses."

-Peter Cook, Archigram 3

I want to look like SANAA...

Yes, I haven't written in a long while. So far, partnered project has developed so much! It amazes me how little arguments we have. And when we do, it actually makes the project better than before, simply because arguments only clarify the purpose, the concept, and the idea.

Our professor was in our last review, and before Michael and I even spoke, he laughed. "Gosh, I gotta know why you two are working together."

After the presentation, which went well, we approached him and asked him about his snickering. He declared (after some pushing on our part) that both Michael and I work so differently, that it was confusing why we worked so well. Michael, he says, starts with one, fat graphic idea, and I start with the pieces, and put them together. Doug spoke so much truth, and it only teaches me how we are all in close observance. Perhaps because its only 25 of us, but even then, without a doubt, he knows us after one semester, like the back of his hand.

So for our final review, I joked to Michael that we should look sharp, yet hip, like SANAA. He shakes his head, despite his admiration for SANAA, and says it would be obnoxious, to dress up so 'professionally.'

Well. It's still a thought.

Truth?

Someone posts on a blog, in response to a parade of exterior shots of a new housing development somewhere in Madrid:

"October 9th, 2008 at 11:32 am
horrible!
architecture because of architecture, not because of living…
bad bad bad"

How right this person is.

And I bet, there's so many buildings out there that are architecture for the sake of architecture.

Buildings without people are nothing, but pieces of concrete and joints, or steel and bolts. But. That's. It.

Make it work.

House : H stands for (in)Habitable

"It's raining in the hall, it's raining in the ramp, and the wall of the garage is absolutely soaked. What is more, it is still raining in my bathroom, which floors every time it rains. After numerous demands, you have finally accepted that this house is uninhabitable." Says Madame Savoye to Le Corbusier.

Lesson: don't let your ideologies blind/block you from realizing that this house will need to hold humans comfortably within it!

The 2,000 SF House

"Oh, he seems like a nice guy, very chill; but no, he tricks you. He's strict as hell."
"So he tricked you?"
"He tricked all of us."

That was about one of my professors, Sean Lally, coupled with Michael Robinson, during one of my classes, the class above us scaring us with their woes.

I've picked a partner, for our next project: a 2,000 square foot house, with minimal programming-- what this project emphasizes is the design process, and how one visually represents that process. A readable line, be it linear or looped.

"Form is not architecture until you adopt the social dimension," says Robinson.

Chicken scratches on notebook, whatever wisdom they pass forward. Even when I dive into a spectrum of books, it's easy to lose track of everything.

A clear idea of this social dimension, of what a house will be used for, for whom the house is, what activities goes on in there.

"The only times you will be working alone is in architecture school," says Lally.

I had a clear idea of who I wanted to work with or not work with. It's hard to match up your work ethic to people absent during the summer, or absent when you are struggling with your own mind, not a collaborative design. It always appears to be easier, with two minds, split the work, etc. But I know it's not that easy, there's almost some overbearing, pseudointellectual wanting monopoly of the project's concepts and designs.

Miscommunication is the downfall of humanity. Trying to remedy that is impossible; but trying the impossible can always function as some sort of remedy.

Diagramming starts today.

...what exactly decides, politics or efficiency?

"The two bridges taking the Inner Ring Road across the Huanpu--- especially the great coiled access ramp for the Nanpu Bride in Puxi-- also required the removal of hundreds of families. The decision to go with bridges for the symbolic first linkage to Pudong is itself revealing. Feasibility studies had actually shown that a tunnel would be less expensive to build and more efficient, requiring minimal condemnation and demolition. But tunnels are not photogenic; they strike no heroic silhouette against the sky, despite whatever ingenious engineering might have gone into their construction. A bridge, on the other hand, is a proud and soaring thing that makes for great publicity shots and tourists brochures. It is a rare mayor or city official who can such down such eye candy, especially when competing for the good will and fiscal blessings of Beijing officialdom."

- excerpt from The Concrete Dragon: China's Urban Revolution and What it Means for the World by Thomas J. Campanella

...so I wonder, what's the ratio? How many political decisions are based on actual need, and how many are based on merely producing "eye-candy"? I don't disagree with the need of city markers: not only are they visually stimulating, but it definitely adds character to the city-- a persona that many of us city-dwellers definitely need, consciously or unconsciously. However, there should be a limit to pride, shouldn't there?

Then again, it's only 'natural' we feel an irrational need to subdue mountains, and make our own monsters.

As one classmate put it, when we were sitting in front of the Grande Arch in La Defense, watching the sunset wash the tall steel giants: "Man, it's a monster showdown."

Buildings cry out to each other, like all miserable humans: "I am smarter, more handsome, richer, more colorful, more popular than you!!!"

045: Photography, textures, quick thoughts

Photography:

Photography by :Sannah Kvist

Her photography I've particularly loved since I added her on flickr-- she had this account, then deleted all her pictures, then started again, with a fresh, non-frustrated attitude.

I picked this picture in particular to post in my blog because: What makes this picture interesting is its texture: bark, a building's bark, gravel, grass, person.

To think: When we are designing a building, people will find the art in the building int heir photographs: in how light touches on part of it, how it varies throughout the day, the many angles, the different companions they take, etc. etc.

So what if we are just designers? So what if it's "just an art" we are doing?: think of the photographers that will use these spaces to frame their thoughts, their subjects, their lovers, their family, their expressions-- or just their daily life.

Just a small thing. But I'm just pointing out: how the texture / wood slating / austere landscaping / the tree, and its tones at that moment-- that makes this picture gorgeous (in my opinion, of course.)

Umbrellas and temporary structures:

Kengo Kuma designs an umbrella house. Very creative :)

040: Riken Yamamoto & Field Workshop, melting plastic/shaping chipboard/ process

The day, in particles:

[Thinking While Creating/Creating by Writing]Riken Yamamoto & Field Workshop

Their thoughts on process:

Process プロセス

What we call 'process' cannot be illustrated by, for example, arranging a series of study models, side by side. Such an arrangement might demonstrate how the design changed from one model tot he next, but there is more to a 'process' than that. A 'process' is not something that can be broken down into clearcut stages. Many different things influence the design in an organic way between one study model and the next, for example, discussions with the client, local character,systems and ideas that Yamamoto and the staff come up with. Indeed, a workshop is held to investigate this very process.

We try to see things in a broader perspective from the point of view of agents such as local residents, users, and administrators. Architecture is an important part of that process bu not the end objective. In the case of an art museum, architecture is merely one of a number of elements or agents (such as the works in the collection, the administrative program and the social role and history of the museum) that interact and undergo change. The series of changes binds together the overall vision, but within the process the vision itself undergoes continual change. When architecture is not regarded as the end objective, that has an effect on everything: the boundaries between various agents are blurred.

Architecture is a catalyst accelerating change in agents. That is because the process of creating a tangible object called a building provides opportunities to do things such as solving problems of administrative programming and thinking about local society....

This blog was originally supposed to show my progress in all semester's projects: of course, because of other classes + studio time spent on the project itself, my updates are not immediate. I find this firm interesting not only because of their work, but some of their philosophy as well. They are very youthful, holding true to their mantra, "the process itself is architecture." I'm sure many would argue against it, for it, half-agree to it....Even I, myself, half-agree to it.

I checked out the book mainly for their work on the Saitama Prefectural University.

Melting Plastic/Shaping Chipboard

I continue the search for the convenient topographic solution. Give me another day.

Paris,France: Sophomore Trip

I can't wait for the catacombs, I can't wait for Peripherique's Atrium Building, I can't wait for La Defense, for the Louvre, for the cheap wine. I can't wait for Le Corbusier, the museums.

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038: Oh, hiatus, but "work" remains constant during the semester...

Oh, Wheeler Station. The image of a grand transfer station on this piece of land!

The Assignment

Assignment 4. Building Design Program (2.5 weeks)

DUE: Wednesday, February 27

Wheeler Station Building Design Program

In Problem 2 (Design and Program Analysis) you established the parameters on which the program requirements for the final design stage of the project are based. The following list of requirements is based on your analysis. In addition we have added several small program elements not addressed in the analysis.

A. Metro Program Elements
1. Elevated University Line Station (alignment, size, and height as described in analysis)
2. Local Bus Stops (10 total, this includes 6 existing plus 4 new)
3. Information and Security office: 2000 SF (Information and Reception Desk, Security office,
Employee Rest Room, First Aid Room, Administrative Office)
4. Bicycle Storage Facility: 2000 SF (Bicycle Storage Area, Individual Restrooms with showers (4)
5. Public Restrooms: Women’s and Men’s (Total of 6 fixtures per sex, single or multiple sites)

B. Intercity Bus Program: Provide six spaces to be leased to intercity bus companies as
described in the analysis problem. No indoor waiting required; tickets provided by vending machines.

C. Commercial Program: 25,000 SF Gross as per analysis. Please note that 50 parking spaces should
be allocated to serve commercial (no permanent parking in these spaces)

D. Parking Program: 500- 550 Spaces (Includes 50 spaces dedicated to commercial)

F. Storm Water Detention: Provide .5 Acre Feet of Storm Water detention on Site as indicated in the
analysis

G. Urban Event Space: In keeping with Metro’s plan to develop functional urban landscape elements
wherever possible, develop a major public exterior space capable of supporting a weekend produce
market, public meeting, or performance.

H. Miscellaneous Requirements: Provide a protected or pull off waiting space for
6 vehicles (Taxicabs and auto drop off)

Adjacency requirements:

-Direct, accessible pedestrian movement must be accommodated between major metro movement systems (Metro Lines, Local Bus Lines). This would include ramps, stairs, or escalators and elevator(s). All stairs and ramps should be sized for a population of 150 persons (44” + 2 x 22”=88”).
- Information office should be centrally located for ease of use and efficient surveillance.

Additional Requirements:

-All bus and train stops should be provided with overhead covering so that it is possible to move between all modes of transportation (and major program elements) without getting wet.
-Retail space should be located to take advantage of movement between major program elements.

Schedule:

Documentation for this exercise will be due Wednesday, February 27 at 1 PM.
-Site Model: 1”=100’ (Concept Type Model similar to Assignment No. 3)
-Site/ Floor Plan(s): TBD
-Site Sections: TBD
-Digital Model: Ground level views, Major Interior/ Exterior Space

Topographic Interpretation:

Before this assignment, however, we were to vaguely assemble the program under one unifying topic: I picked Topography. Although my project was very literal, I feel that there is logic behind a literal topography, in which that slopes can equate themselves to ramps, making a more fluid traffic flow.

Thinking, thinking....

...and my thoughts ended up looking like a magnetic field: all pedestrians orbiting around the intersection of both lines. Of course, this isn't at all realistic (pedestrians will be thinking about their destinations.) Really, the 'magnetism' is behind the circulatory connection between three different zones: parking (cars), light rail (waiting, retail) and buses (inter/intracity) with transfers in between.

Thinking along the lines of form: I'm more of a functionalist, or, circulatorist (let's make up terms shall we?) but I have been thinking of form.

1. Topography + lamination + carve (light)= what my concept model looks at the moment.


2. Interpreting velocity with form, like the speed of cars, of pedestrians, of waiting pedestrians, of Greyhound buses, of METRO buses, of the light rail. Vehicles of different types, functions, and allowed speed.


3. Interpreting 'magnetic lines' with form: follow the line.

The Architecture of Parking by Simon Henley

There are the lines! Lines!



And this....

The above picture is not just for "inspiration," but I found it appealing (not only because it's a Japanese architect) because my professor previously mentioned that parking could indeed be seen as a form of topography. This takes that literally, of course, and I couldn't help but like the idea.

So far, what my project is looking like is like a repeating curve, a curve that was stolen from the flow of parking garages.

Houston is indeed a car city. Commuter haven. (or Hell.)

Wheeler Station does not call for a gargantuan structure. Drive by the site and you hear it call for what it already looks like. A megastructure would just be like a distraction from the city's core.

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037: Glasarchitektur

As method of organizing my thoughts on this excerpt manifesto (from Ulrich Conrad's Programs and Manifestoes on 20th-Century Architecture), I will quote some interesting things from this passage:

1. "We live for the most part within enclosed spaces. These form the environment from which our culture grows. Our culture is in a a sense a product of architecture."


2. "It was the railway station that produced the brick metropolis culture of today from which we all suffer. Glass architecture will come only when the metropolis in our sense of the word has been done away with."

(1): It's a strange thought, that culture is a product of man-made, unnatural things, that instead of culture shaping the architecture, it is the architecture (the environment) that shapes the culture. I would guess it makes sense after some x amount of years....maybe its in cycles: At first, culture creates the architecture, x years pass by, then the architecture-environment modifies the culture. Then new modified culture creates new architecture, etc.
(2): But then if we only build steel, glass structures, wouldn't we suffer from the glass metropolis in the future, when another form or material is introduced to replace steel, concrete and glass?

Paul Scheerbert's poetic obsession over glass.
He completely ignores the rules of the real environment: heat gain = a very, very hot, and energy inefficient metropolis.

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036: Green beams

Not related to my research at all, but I just love the idea of non-structural vegetation beams. As you can read in the short article (it was the issue of AR of "Emergent Architecture"), the architect meant it not to be practical, nor just aesthetic, but unnaturally filling up the void of urban space.

Fake nature. In this world, what do we appreciate more? The man-made landscape, or, the wilderness as terrific (_{old sense of the word}) and vast as it is...?

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029: Mid-review and the few days after...

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Overall: all the comments were positive. The critic Dallas (works in HOK) made many comparisons in ideas, not in what is made.

I presented (sloppily) my design as having two main focuses. The first being circulation, and the second opacity, (while, of course, safely and practically functioning as a movie theatre, without letting the design interrupt its function.)

Circulation has two distinct and independent systems: The exterior is a "filtering device," filtering those arriving at the parking lot and the pedestrians walking down Dallas St into the courtyard--- or, the filtering of those entering through the plaza, all which meet in the nexus-- the cafe, administration, ticket sales, social interactions, some good coffee. Inside, one travels through large escalators, taking one to the theatres starting on the first floor.

This circulation is shown with glass/material opacity. The escalators will be very clear glass- maybe waterwhite glass, known for its clarity-- while the circulation loops around the theaters will be opaque-- in which light shines through. The threaters will be exposed and will be solid-- heavy. The escalators will be a sort of connection to the city (they face the downtown lights) while the opaque glass circulation loop is a separation-- look for your movie showing! Don't stare at the lights!



The first thing they mentioned was: This is an excellent diagram.

They mentioned many architects after this...

First, massing. He said the spaces created are made out of "Loosian plastic solids and voids" while subtle, powerful moments are made in how these plastic spaces come together. Ever heard of Siza? he asks me, in which I shake my head. Look him up.

I slur, that the minimalism comes from my penchant for Japanese architecture.

He continues this slur; mentions Tadao Ando. There are similar moments in my design, only that mine is not an object, as Tadao makes his buildings.

Continuity is desired, don't break these moves!

They applaud- keep working at it, refine it. Keep thinking in terms of connection to city/separation from city. Think as the parking lot as a texture, reset the horizon to those entering.

027: Process means cold hands, coffee, endless cp, tr, ex, and erase.

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I am in the computer lab.

After a good weekend working on this scheme, a few suggestions from Doug:

1. Medium theatres should be narrower instead of 42 x 39.5'. I've edited them to 32'x 48' instead, and rearranged method of entry/arrangement of seats inside.


2. Escalators: I used some strange template that made them 21.9 degrees rather than 30. Like Jessy said, his Ching mantra, "1.732 times rise!" Instead, I used trigonometry and well, got the same. This changes a lot in my scheme, doubling the work.


3. Less elevators, one more emergency stair.

Main worries:

1. Cohesiveness of the scheme: will it stay intact after these changes? The escalators will change a lot of the plan, since initially, floors were planned according to the 21.9 degree template....


2. Materials: what exactly, and how? What size panels? What do I want to show?


3. And, combining the previous two: Will the experience I planned-- experiencing the city as one floats up the escalators-- be present in the product? Can there be a harmony between harmony and aesthetic intent?


4. Emergency stairs-- I might need more.

Least of my worries/Minor worries:

1. Parking spaces, need at least 5-10 more.


2. Open spaces that serve no particular function-- I should embrace this, no?

Materials:

Transparency: Escalators--> circulation completely clear, connection to city. Hallways--> opaque, separation from city, city lights blur, separation from vertical circulation. Restaurant--> moments of clarity (views), moments of walls (private). Lobby--> daylighting, facing north, no need for shading.

Links:

CAD BLOCK EXCHANGE

BLOCK CREATOR

CAD CORNER



I shall post pictures tomorrow, diagrams, depending on how much I have done.

026: Quick section...

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This is a maybe. Really, I'm thinking along the lines of just entering...instead of making mayhem of aisles, why not enter on flat ground, as it uniformly slopes downward? It'll just mean a much higher ceiling on ground level, but, I wouldn't be too worried about seats right?

025: Recycle, destroy, revamp, redo, edit, edit...

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That's what it has been. A stream of editing, frustration, wanting to destoy papers, then finding somewhat a solution, then fixing, fixing.

What happened was....dimensions were clogging up the entrance. It became a tight spot, lossing its defination as rectangular-prism foyer.

So, I inverted the circulation. Instead of making an inner-loop pattern to get to the theaters, I converted it to an outer-loop, creating an even larger couryard space, larger plaza, openning up the first-floor lobby to overloop three total sides: Austin St., Dallas St., and directly over the parking lot.





The front side, you can see how the front parking lot filters into the plaza, whch filters people through the foyer where the mouth of the escalators are......



The parking lot....circulation overlooks this, plus the outdoor theatre. One major change was height, which increased to +22'. I hope height isn't a fear, nor a problem. It only competes with what's around it?

The restaurant would be over on the left mass, which I left out at the moment because I refining what I already have.

024: Excerpt, a look at FOA's Yokohama Port Terminal....

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"Our proposal for the project start by declaring the site as an open public space and proposes to have the roof of the building as an open plaza, continuous with the surface of Yamashita Park as well as Akaranega Park.
The project is then generated from a circulation diagram that aspires to eliminate the linear structure characteristic of piers, and the directionality of the circulation."

"We wanted to make a pier where you can walk in on a certain path and walk out on a different path. We developed this looped diagram, in which we were chaining all the parts of the program. Then we assigned to every line of the diagram a surface. We were interested in playing with the ground."

"We started with certain principles and later combined and changed them. The changes are never visual or aesthetic; they are always technical or practical. We do not believe in the origin or in the end of a project. We believe in the medium of the process. We are totally opportunistic. The end is determined only by external forces, like deadlines of the contractors or the client."
FOA

So, outside...




Inside..

The program.

I'm amazed by this building as I read about it....the quoted paragraphs, I think, relates to the project we are doing now...pedestrians and the urban environment are essential driving forces here. The art of picking up people from the street, sending them through another path, returning them through another, presenting the city differently, then spiting them out through the front door to mingle with the city lights....

One of the focuses of FOA's Yokohama Port Terminal is allowing the locals to walk out onto the extremities of the pier and to "look back at their city." (I read this in Architectural Review, while doing homework.)

...It's one thing I want to achieve with my movie theatre...as movie-goers ride the escalators to their destinations, I want them to look outside and see the city lights passing them by...

"A poor man's New York..." as Doug says, our professor, when commenting on Houston's night-time skyline...

023: Somethings in the way...

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That which is: how do I encase this with glass?

I want to make a sort of glass cave, a rectangular instead of triangular federation square:



Or maybe, just bring in the triangles from my previous project?

Who knows at this stage...

022: Edit, Edit!

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Of course, this is among the million edits a project must go through.

Last Wednesday, I talked to Blair for five minutes, and refocused my lobby on the second floor, where both rectangular prisms of theatres meet.

Today, I talked to Doug, whom agrees with this shift.

Then I realized I completely misinterpreted his interpretation of my original conceptual rendering. He said "open," not exterior, not "open to the sky!"

I proposed a shading device. A translucent, triangular shade which blocks the sun by day, and "becomes the sun" at night...becoming this glowing light above the giant space my building creates.



Although it is probably highly unlikely I will use this idea, I still like it. Not only does it have a resemblance to my earlier project (Project 2, the concession stand), but it has two (or three-- if decoration counts) functions: shade, artificial light.

Either way, the next step is to understand further the circulation of the theatre, and enclose it in glass.

Doug also suggested it could be a sorts of Guggenheim museum narrative: starting from the top to circulate back down. I don't like the idea at all, nor am I going to purpue it. I feel a movie theatre should be easy to read and not a nuissance. For godsakes, people just want to go to the movies, not manuever through an entire building! That's not the feature!

...even though the idea sounds romantic, flowing through a large, 70' space radiating, glowing with light. Romantic, but not entirely practical.

021: Excerpts & images from Colours...

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Progress has been slow, somewhat thoughtful. And now, I am getting ahead of myself, needing to research many things:

1. Open spaces, public spaces. How does an architect handle a roofless, open space yet still have proper shading + a overall "closed" look from the outside?


2. Lighting & colour-- What is appropriate for a movie theatre? What type of lighting is available to use and exploit? What surfaces reflect the most light?


3. Circulation and convenience-- in other words, does the circulation effect the placement of objects, or does the placement affect the circulation? How do people want to move in a movie theatre?


4. Lastly, what's in the code? What can't I design, what are the measured limits embedded in a theatre?

I will partially address #2 with images:

The first, addressed colour and light directly-- how do you attract the attention from the outside to the inside?



^ Kunsthal (museum), Rotterdam/Netherlands, 1992 >> OMA

Then, the idea of threshold, through colour-- colour-coding the differences of spaces:



^ Second Stage Theatre, NY, 1999 >> OMA



^ Centre for the Visual Arts, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK >> Norman Foster

Lastly, there is art in covering the sun:



^ Third London Airport, Stansted, UK >> Norman Foster

Norman Foster describes this airport as through he is looking through a shoji screen!:

"...a radical reinvention of the terminal as a building type, which has since become the model for future airports world-wide. One consequence is the opportunity to harness the benefits of natural light- both spiritually and technically. There are an infinite number of greys to choose from- and infinite variations on each one according to changes of light- both natural and artificial."

These pictures are mainly for inspiration, for vague direction, for thinking in matter of lighting, colour for threshold, greys for shading.