Portfolio

The Coming Circle

The Coming Full Circle

Community

            In architecture I think of sustainable communities, which are communities that are planned, modified, or built to promote sustainable living. This can pertain to environmental and economic sustainability. These communities are rapidly appearing and gaining interest in the public eye.

Stewardship

            Stewardship has many definitions but pertaining to architecture, I was looking for environmental stewardship. According to the EPA, Environmental stewardship is the responsibility for environmental quality shared by all those whose actions affect the environment. In less words it really means sustainability and to take responsibility when pertaining to the environment. And one structure that I think about locally is the Proximity Hotel, which is the only hotel with Platinum LEED certification in the country.

Authenticity

            To me it means to be original or to make a replica. But in architecture I think of architects like Frank Lloyd Wright, Mies Van der Rohe, and Edward Lowenstein. The reason I think of these architects is because they actually created their own style of architecture and had their own principles pertaining to architecture. They had an original idea and since there ideas were known they have been replicated over the years with some changes thrown in which may have been for the worst leading us away from great design principles over the years.

Innovation

            Innovation is to come up with a new idea or in this case a new design. And I immediately think of Modernism in the 1900s because during this time we actually exercised structural preservation. Such as the Louvre renovations, Boston Public Library Expansion, and the Monticello renovations. We also started a thing called deconstructive design in which the designers wanted their design to differ from many other designs. Such as the Vietnams Veterans Memorial, Wexner Center, and Aronoff Center. In which the buildings looked as if they were falling apart.

Finally

            I felt that these terms were very vast at first but they really do relate in many ways. Stewardship to me is the term that can be applied to all of these; all of these terms require responsibility in some way. Sustainable communities definitely require a great deal of responsibility in the planning process when you consider the entire factors that are involved. 

[Pair] ing Down

[Pair] ing Down

Meditation/ Celebration

            When I think of these to terms I immediately think of our final project for studio and drafting, because our goal is to create a space that is a meditation space as well as a celebration space. Which is actually rather difficult if you sit down and think about it.

Light/ Shadow

            These terms also remind me of our final studio project, because we have to define the two spaces by altering and manipulating the natural light of the room, which I am finding very difficult to do. But light and shadow allow the essence of reality and duality into the image.

Transpose/ Juxtapose

            Transpose means that two things change place in this case to better a design, however juxtapose is when to things are placed closely together to help electrify a vast contrasting visual. Which reminds me of what we have been told all along when pertaining to projects, because you want to make your images pop and not be looked over.

Literal/ Abstract

            These terms are probably some of the hardest concepts to grasp in IARC because when you first get in the program you want to draw inspiration from another work but you don’t really think about it so you just end up taking more than you wanted from someone else’s design. But this reminds me of the window project in studio because we had to manipulate light and as I have learned you never want to be too literal. “Oh you know the building that looks like a piece of furniture (Roth, 584)?”  Phillip Johnson acquired inspiration for this building by a broken pediment. Maybe a bit too literal.

Monologue/ Dialogue

            These two terms are a long-term friend of the IARC student. Monologue is how your project communicates its purpose, if it’s a hammock then it will communicate as being a hammock. Dialogue is when your projects communicate multiple ideas, this is usually achieved after completing many iterations. Dialogue is what everyone wants their project to attain. During the modernistic phase the architecture seemed to have lost it’s ability to connect or speak to people. It was when a man by the name of Mario Botta said that there was “a need for images, for emotion in architecture, a need for architecture to speak once again to people (Roth, 587).”

Finally

            After completing the opus and thus being probably the shortest one that I have ever done, I realized that the words that were chosen this week were to me almost like an overview and left us thinking about probably the most important terms in our career as IARC students.

Road Trip

Road Trip

Roots

            To me roots mean the basic origin of something or its source. In our readings in Roth we learned that in the nineteenth century, pertaining to architectural development, while there were periodic changes in the creation of new building types that benefitted new building materials, historical precedent determined the architectural building forms. He quickly went on the defense by saying that it wasn’t because nineteenth century architects lacked imagination, it was simply because that the detailed and accurate knowledge of architectural past was so new and growing very rapidly. Eventually this led to eclecticism in which the architects would barrow certain building forms and details combining them to make a magnificent structure. We also saw to great examples of this on our trip to Falling water and Monticello. We saw Frank Lloyd Wright’s innovation of opening up space and rejection traditional forms and building methods. We also saw this at Monticello, in the fact that Thomas Jefferson wanted to have a plantation house but on the other hand he wanted it to differ from the traditional plantation. In the two previous examples we saw how both architects knew the traditional style but wanted to throw it out the window and expand their imagination.

Compression/Release

            Compression means to make something denser to simplify it if you will. Release to me means to liberate something or to set free. And in the early steps of modernism the era of machines made architecture slightly easier and done at a more rapid pace. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe said “I see industrialization the central problem of building in our time. If we succeed in carrying out this industrialization, the social, economic, technical, and also artistic problems will be readily solved (Roth, 527).” Louis H. Sullivan discovered that his skyscrapers have twice the amount of vertical piers, thus he can reduce the size of the window planes, which also gave the illusion that the structure was much taller than it actually was.

Congruence

            Congruence to me means to be in agreement or harmony with someone or something. In our reading in Massey we learned that the Art Deco style was characterized by geometric motifs. We also learned about Orphism in which Sonia and Robert Delaunay decorated their apartment with square armchairs covered in geometric textiles and matching rugs, and walls hung with beige patterned linen. The designers thought all of the aspects of the interior should come together to create a complete work of art.

Materiality

            When I hear materiality I think of two words: quality and character. The Art Deco style also applies to this term as well in the fact that most of the designers used only the rarest materials, giving their work a very high quality. The Art Deco style almost never incorporated paintings in the design, as the decorations were more than enough, although the one exception to this was the use of the mural painting, which formed a luxurious interior for the Art Deco Style.

Concept

            Concept means an abstract idea or a general notion. One concept that seems vaguely familiar from our reading is that of the Modern Movement architects believed in a universal style for all interiors, public or private. The Art Deco designers greatly disapproved of the Modern Movement because it neglected individuality. Ludwig Mies Van der Rohe invented ahistorical modernism in which he rejected past references.

Summary

            I believe that these opus words were truly meaningful and related to the reading very well and I think all of these terms are very well related and can be intertwined within one another. Because anything can be simplified by simply looking back at where you came from. And congruence is very simplistic because it has been used by many civilizations over the years. All of the materials in your design should go together and create harmony. Lastly concept shows a great deal of character or materiality.

Macro:Micro

Macro: Micro 

Porch: Court: Hearth

The Egyptians and the Greeks shaped powerfully evocative buildings, but seldom were these buildings meant to contain groups of people; public life was conducted in the out-of-doors, among these sculpted architectural objects, and the buildings’ constricted interiors were the domain of a priestly and social elite (Roth, 247). These three terms are some of the basic fundamentals of a structure. They allowed us to evolve from the interior being private to designing the interior for public use. Porch to me means the entryway to a home or something that you go through, such as a portal. Court to me means a place to gather or a public place, such as a living room or dinning room. Hearth to me means the part that is not seen but is still very important to the structure, such as a bedroom or a private study, thus derived from the hearth of a fireplace, which to me means the heart or core of the structure. And I’ve shown this by providing a floor plan that I found that demonstrates the idea well.

http://www.anahita.mu/images/plans/floorPlans2bed.gif

Composition

            When I think of composition I think of music, but it can also mean parts of a whole, which kind of still relates to the composition of music, smaller parts coming together as one. One reason why the Romans attached great importance to public architecture, both enclosed spaces and public spaces, was from the beginning, Roman civilization focused the city as its basic constituent element (Roth, 247). Meaning that they focused on the bigger picture at hand. When I think of this term I can’t help but to think of the Found in translation project in studio, because we are now combining four different ideas and redefining those ideas into one structure. There are many parts to this project because the beginning of the project all started with a single story, and since the essence of the stories were captured, they have since been constantly abstracted throughout the process of the project.

Diagram

            Roman engineers built a network of roads linking all parts of the empire, from the Portuguese coast to the ends of Turkey and Syria; if a stony mountain outcrop loomed in the way, they simply cut through it (Roth, 250). Diagram to me means a series of small images combined with text to unite, creating a clear idea or central theme. And while my team was working on the portal project we ran into some bumps in the road, such as composing the portal, how the portal would connect with the wall, and another detail that would be added to the portal. So upon discovering these dreadful problems I composed a simple diagram illustrating our problems and how we were going to fix those problems. I linked parts of the project together and when something got in my way I worked through it.

Impression

            Impression to me means the feeling that one gets when entering or experiencing a space or a structure. When we were doing our studio project of creating a passageway, they told us to imagine that we were passing through or approaching the structure, to make sure that we captured the essence of not only our assigned word but of our structure entirely.

Details

            Details are perfections of the human senses, meaning that usually details can appeal to all of the senses. We could smell, touch, see, or even taste some details, as odd as it may seem. Usually when we see a structure we automatically see the essence or the basic shape of the structure, but when we get closer to the structure we begin to notice that there is even more to the structure. We notice what the structure is made of, the texture of those materials, and even the scent that they give off. For my detail I chose a detailed drawing that we did in Suzanne’s class, and my detailed drawing is of the EUC. It is only a 3” by 3” drawing and it is of the windows that run along the front of the structure.

  It all starts with the basic fundamentals, then leading into smaller parts that contribute to the whole, thus taking us to the part where refining and analysis come into play, and our last stop is the perfection process where we define our idea to appeal to the senses. Finally all of these terms come together the further advance our world of architecture. To make it even better, placing the unimaginable above us, but not out of reach.