Toolik Climate Change Research Community: Toolik, AK
Architecture is making the move toward sustainable design as the world carbon emission levels continue to increase, changing climates all around the globe. That rate, says researchers like those studying in Alaska at the Toolik Field Station, is increasing more rapidly due to permafrost melt. There are numerous environmental concerns yet to be discovered and explored as the planet changes and it is these scientists who need the means to do so.
Currently working out of temporary, low quality labs and offices, with seasonal housing, these researchers are struggling to fund projects.
I propose establishing a new community of research spaces and housing off the Dalton Highway north of Fairbanks to increase awareness of climate change and to generate funding with the considerations of material transport and limited construction season. The facilities will demonstrate new carbon neutral and zero-electric technologies and create an inhabitable community [physically and psychologically safe for researchers] in these circum-polar climate conditions on the North Slope of Alaska
—the last frontier.
Currently working out of temporary, low quality labs and offices, with seasonal housing, these researchers are struggling to fund projects.
I propose establishing a new community of research spaces and housing off the Dalton Highway north of Fairbanks to increase awareness of climate change and to generate funding with the considerations of material transport and limited construction season. The facilities will demonstrate new carbon neutral and zero-electric technologies and create an inhabitable community [physically and psychologically safe for researchers] in these circum-polar climate conditions on the North Slope of Alaska
—the last frontier.
Foundation for New Music: Chicago, IL
The Foundation for New Music is a performance center with a concert hall, black box theater, individual and group practice rooms, administrative offices and two condos for visiting composers. The program for the foundation is such that fundraising event space would open up the building for the public sector. Integrating a pulic courtyard off of the residential corridor of North Hermitage, brings guests into the space before entering the main lobby and proceeding into the more intimate programmatic spaces. Acting as a volumetric transition, the main ceremonial staircase is enclosed between a glass diagonal wall and concrete bringing guests to upper levels while engaging in the excitement of the courtyard below. In consideration for sustainability, the project aims to renovate portions of the existing structure and integrate rainwater collection for a graywater plumbing system, as well as drilling wells on the northern side of the site for geothermal energy harvesting.
Aesthetics of Waste. A Community Center for East Garfield Park.
East Garfield Park has been a scattered, abandoned neighborhood in the west of Chicago, IL since the fires after the death of Martin Luther King Jr.
The neighborhood has a young population, primarily under the age of 45. That being said, there is a significant interest in life improvement for those community members who are school age. Local organizations work to provide after school groups and recreation, peer to peer mentoring, and Big Brother/ Big Sister. These efforts only go so far if the environment where these children are growing up is devoid of well-kept, safe and inspired buildings.
The DeReConstruct Project allows for the community to embrace the recycling process while revisiting their industrial roots by exploring donated materials from industrial manufacturers in Chicago.
The first site on Madison Ave. is located across from East Garfield Park, in an empty lot 25 feet wide and 192 feet deep with access by alleyway to the rear side.
The second site on Madison Ave. is located at the intersection of Fifth Ave. between Francisco and California. The Madison site length is 335 feet and is triangular in shape.
DeReConstruct, in its final state, offers community members of East Garfield Park a chance to buy recycled/ reusable materials at low prices, while providing the tools to do exactly that. The facility also provides the opportunities for people to learn building techniques and gives them a place to display their products for sale. In addition to educational opportunity and sales, the facility allows community members a place to work on their projects on their own time in the workshop space and studio rooms.
The clean-up efforts for abandoned storefronts engages the new skills learned in the facility as well as give the people of the neighborhood a pride in the spaces around them. With nice looking buildings available for rent or purchase, small businesses feel more welcome, allowing the community to help itself.
Recycled Materials can become anything that we can imagine them to be. DeReconstruct allows for that process to happen and a knowledge to be spread through a community of people about material reuse.
The neighborhood has a young population, primarily under the age of 45. That being said, there is a significant interest in life improvement for those community members who are school age. Local organizations work to provide after school groups and recreation, peer to peer mentoring, and Big Brother/ Big Sister. These efforts only go so far if the environment where these children are growing up is devoid of well-kept, safe and inspired buildings.
The DeReConstruct Project allows for the community to embrace the recycling process while revisiting their industrial roots by exploring donated materials from industrial manufacturers in Chicago.
The first site on Madison Ave. is located across from East Garfield Park, in an empty lot 25 feet wide and 192 feet deep with access by alleyway to the rear side.
The second site on Madison Ave. is located at the intersection of Fifth Ave. between Francisco and California. The Madison site length is 335 feet and is triangular in shape.
DeReConstruct, in its final state, offers community members of East Garfield Park a chance to buy recycled/ reusable materials at low prices, while providing the tools to do exactly that. The facility also provides the opportunities for people to learn building techniques and gives them a place to display their products for sale. In addition to educational opportunity and sales, the facility allows community members a place to work on their projects on their own time in the workshop space and studio rooms.
The clean-up efforts for abandoned storefronts engages the new skills learned in the facility as well as give the people of the neighborhood a pride in the spaces around them. With nice looking buildings available for rent or purchase, small businesses feel more welcome, allowing the community to help itself.
Recycled Materials can become anything that we can imagine them to be. DeReconstruct allows for that process to happen and a knowledge to be spread through a community of people about material reuse.
Chicago Transit Authority. Blue Line Division Station. A moment to pause.
The Chicago Transit Authority is developing plans for an outer loop to be named the Circle Line and as one component of this proposal, my team of designers have created a new station for the current Blue Line Division stop that integrates the new Circle Line.
The placement in the urban landscape provides the opportunity for a new design. That unique design element that allows my design to stand out is the exploration of pause. Of all the different interpretations of pause, a common dimension is comfort through familiarity. To create a pause, members of the transit community must feel safe and not rushed which can be hard to achieve within a rapid transit station. We bring an atrium from street level down 34' full of light allowing that transition from the neighborhood to the experience below ground.
The placement in the urban landscape provides the opportunity for a new design. That unique design element that allows my design to stand out is the exploration of pause. Of all the different interpretations of pause, a common dimension is comfort through familiarity. To create a pause, members of the transit community must feel safe and not rushed which can be hard to achieve within a rapid transit station. We bring an atrium from street level down 34' full of light allowing that transition from the neighborhood to the experience below ground.
Above, Group Final Presentation with Zach Hoffman, Kenny Nelson, David Augspurger.
Below, Independent Critique Week presentation.
(Below) Nanotech Carbon Skin that reacts to sound in the space, retracting, returning to flat when sound levels are low. This could turn into my thesis project next year, creating it mechanically as well as exploring ways to make it really effect acoustics of a space in a performance space setting--allowing for a responsive architecture for precise acoustical control--callibrated differently for different type of performance. In the CTA project the application is in the platform space to lessen train arrival and gray noise.