Thursday, November 10, 2011

093 Assessment: Presentation Reflection

We had a guest crit during our morning shift presentation, Don Albert, a visiting academic from South Africa.

At the end of my presentation, Don brought up the subject of "bio-mimicry" in relation to my conceptual design process, as I had early in the presentation talked about the leaves of a branch and petals of a flower to be the inspiration as to how I moved forward in my design development. "Bio-mimicry" was never something that came up during the last 7 to 8 weeks of my design process and I felt that it was an interesting perspective to look at my design.

I think if I could do things a little bit differently, I could look deeper into the anatomy of leaves and flowers so that I can incorporate it into my design. There are details within these flora, that Don mentioned, could be inspired into the integration of perhaps, my spatial planning design. Seriously, it's an exciting perspective actually.

Overall, I think I achieved my basic goal of having a presence that incorporates Australia's rich biodiversity - well, in terms of fresh produce food production - into my design. In retrospect, I felt that I could have added more fervour into the detailing of spaces - although I felt that it was unnecessary for this design presentation. I wanted to really bring out the possibility of using Australia's existing public transportation network because I felt that most of the time, these networks are under-utilised as the surrounding developments give no reason for the general public to use. I think this is something Australia's planning system, or a parliamentary function can and should look into further if they want to mobilise the citizens even more through a public network system. And with Australia's urgent attention to food, I think mobilising and utilising the existing rail network for example, is definitely a window of opportunity for these agricultural communities living and working on the farmlands on the urban fringes, and rural areas.

~ Hana

092 Assessment: Presentation Process

 During the slideshow presentation...

The summary board presentation...

~ Hana

Tuesday, November 08, 2011

091 Assessment: Project 2 Presentation Slide

This is the slideshow which was presented to Jane on Tuesday. It is 29 pages and I've uploaded through an external platform - Slideshare. If you can't see the presentation here, please try viewing it here - http://www.slideshare.net/hananordin/project-2-final-presentation-slide?from=ss_embed.

~ Hana

090 Assessment: Project 2 Summary Poster


~ Hana

Saturday, November 05, 2011

089 Development: Presentation Ideas (Abandoned)

Initially, I had planned on showing a stage-by-stage levels of my building in 3D with the following images, because I think it's a simple way of showing some form of understanding. However, I have decided to do it in a different method... which means, for archiving and development purposes, these images will remain in this blog.

Ground Floor

Second Floor

Third Floor

Third Floor / Roof
~ Hana

088 Development: pre-Final Video Render


I did a TEST video render aka fly-through of the A.C.A.E., but I will not be presenting it during the presentation on Tuesday afternoon. This render will not compliment the theme of my presentation on Tuesday, but as this blog will be a major point of reference during the marking, if tutors and Yasu needs to see a 3D fly-through, this would be it.

~ Hana

087 Development: User Experience

I found some useful photos online, mostly on Flickr, that I will be using to express the relevance of user experience to my design, during the presentation tomorrow. All references for the images can be found on the final PDF/PPT, which will be up shortly on this blog.





~ Hana

086 Development: pre-Final Renders

I have done a few renders which has been photoshopped into a "desired" context but there are a few that will not be "making" itself into my presentation layouts on Tuesday. The following are just some of the MANY pre-Final TEST renders that I have for my architectural pavilion for A.C.A.E.

Front View aka Main Entrance Foyer

Angled View of Main Entrance Foyer

another Angled View of Main Entrance Foyer

Test Shot of West Elevation

Top View of Roof System of the Hydroponic Farm in the Sky
Test Interior Shot of the Hydroponic Farm 
Test Shot of the Roof Garden Level
~ Hana

085 Development: DRAFT A1 Panel

This is still a work in progress as I'm trying to combine the important aspects of my presentation into the required A1 Panel... I still can't quite get it right.


~ Hana

Thursday, November 03, 2011

084 Development: Presentation Strategy

I am progressing well into my presentation slides, simultaneously rendering and photoshopping to get an overall desired outcome - comic style, montage style - which is really a further advancement and development to the way Project 1 was presented. I also wanted to do a stage-by-stage presentation demonstrating my design from conception to outcome using a simplified first-person scenario. I am liking this method of presentation, because I believe it works and will work towards allowing my audience to attendance my design from 

Infrastructure Strategy & Logistics, to
Tectonic Resolution of Purpose & Function, Circulation & Accessibilit and Structural Integrity, to
finally the Poetic Resolution  of Presence & Identity demonstrating User Experience

all to achieve the goal of communicating an aesthetic rigor of

Detail to the Local Issue presented.



Wednesday, November 02, 2011

083 Development: Roof Form


The development of the roof system has pretty much been an ongoing process since I first blogged about the draft in entry 063 and entry 064. It hasn't evolved much from the initial stage because I was pretty firm on the basic idea of the roof and I basically continued in trying to model it up using Sketchup. It wasn't an easy process using Sketchup but it wasn't that hard either.

Although, I must say that at the initial stage, during exploration... I did not actually rule out the possibility of trying to form a roof over my whole built form (image below). I think you can quite figure out how I eventually came up with my almost-final roof system.


On a sidenote, I wish I knew how to use Revit or Max or even Catia properly to be able to do a more "fluid-like" roofing system. But I might test it out further after the end of this unit at my own time.

~ H

082 Development: Materiality

Obviously by the time I tried a few more other materials, and colours, I have almost firmed up my form. Below is still not the final form yet as it's still a work in progress. Notice the slight changes made to the core and the roof-deck since the last few renders as I've blogged previously.


~ H

081 Week 13 Tutorial & Development: Materiality

Jane wanted to see the "materiality" of my final form coming together and I've endeavored to try blog about it in this entry, as well as the next.

After having gone through a mildly failed attempt at context exploration in entry 068 Development: Context Exploration (failed because the conceptual materiality of the then built form didn't "blend" into the proposed context), I reminded myself again of some of the exemplars that were helping me with the type of materials that my built form should endeavor towards... which will be the Australian Centre of Contemporary Art (below left) and the Registry Office of St Vicente by Duarte Caldeira (below right).


Then I recalled once again the dry textures of Australia during the roadtrip Lara, Alice & myself did a few weeks ago as part of our site research for this design unit (image below).


So I came up with a quick test of materials on my built form.


It's not quite working yet, but I've got a few more render tests to upload.

~ H

080 Development: Spatial Program


I defined the spaces sectionally, level-by-level, after sketching and cadding it out on plan last week as to which spaces will be accommodated, and at which level.

~ H

079 Development: Recap of Form Development


These renders have been blogged about (separately) previously, but I think putting it together helps me understand as to how and why my final form eventually turn out the way it is looking right now.

~ H

078 Development: Mobilising my Thoughts

The last tutorial of my architectural bachelor was bittersweet. I found myself realising that my best works tend to be from the design studios which are not strictly themed nor set-in-stone sort of brief, and it's always been Yasu's studios. Not saying the other design studios are not up to par. Just a personal preference and realisation after looking through my past 5 semester of design studios.

Why do I say this?

I am 70% on completion of my design panels and the design itself, and I suddenly found myself in an awkward position of not being able to connect with it emotionally. Perhaps I should have Jane and Yasu know that I'm in the middle of packing my life in Brisbane away (literally) while trying to finish up the semester - I will be flying out of Brisbane 4 days after the presentation on 12 November 2011. So I'm not sure if my awkward sense of feelings towards my design is because I'm nervous about leaving Brisbane, or actually presenting my final work.

Then I found this video Claire put up on her blog, which was actually the quote that Yasu had flashed in our first and last lecture of the semester. It will be one of my take-away from this design unit, as well as one that will inspire me to finish up the last few days with a little bit more rigour and, by the time I am ready to present next Tuesday, (hopefully) I will feel more "connected" to my design. Don't get me wrong. I still have the passion and the commitment, and I do think my work is kinda-awesome (not amazing, but not a failure either. ok maybe moderate is the word) but I'm pretty sure there's some "magic" missing from my design that's conjuring this feeling of "disconnectedness". But I'll figure it out.


Ira Glass on Storytelling from David Shiyang Liu on Vimeo.

~ H

Thursday, October 27, 2011

077 Exemplar: BMW Guggenheim Lab


A mobile piece of architecture that will be moving through 9 different cities and rebuild for an exhibition in New York City by the end of its cycle. It is currently set up in New York on a corner of Houston St. I think this is a really simple design, and like most architectural presence, aims to engage the everyday people to participate in building what they want of the city they live in.

The interesting component about this project, was the fact that it was a collaboration of various disciplines.

~ H

076 Development: A.C.A.E.

Before I get lost (again) in the grand scheme of designing my architectural entity, here are summaries of my brief, taken from all the previous entries that I have written in the last few weeks.

I started my design with wanting to create a centre of education for communities within a radius of the urban fringe. It was an idea spurred by the knowledge of Australia's increasing loss of agricultural land to urbanisation. As my architectural presence falls within the broad banner of Mobile Architecture, I wanted to marry the technology that we have today with the Australian agricultural community, and hence, the idea of Australia Centre for Agricultural Education (A.C.A.E.) was born. As has been blogged about before, the context was in response to:-


Ministry - "Department of Regional Australia"
An architectural presence to support the initiative of Regional Development Australia http://www.rda.gov.au.

Goal - "Reaching out to Australia's Isolated Communities"
A central structure of  architectural presence + mobility curated for Australians and curated by Australians.


Progressing from our Project 1 presentation, I wanted to also create a presence that spurs the movement and mobility of the people using the spaces. It is not just about creating a form to satisfy a brief but one that satisfies the community enough for them to use it more often. A form that educates the local about parliamentary functions (in this case something that's related to agricultural), and the responsibilities of the government to provide an initiative for the locals.

We have a few centres in Australia that are initiatives or agencies by the Australian state and territory governments, representing the various characteristics of Australia. These are various entities responding to the various functions of the parliament of Australia. A few examples are:-
  • Australia Centre for Photography by the NSW Government supported by Australian Government of Visual Arts and Craft Strategy
  • Australian Centre for Contemporary Art by the VICTORIA Government, also supported by the Australian Government of Visual Arts and Craft Strategy
  • Geoscience Australia, a prescribed agency within the Resources, Energy and Tourism portfolio, and our Minister is The Hon Martin Ferguson AM MP - a world leader in providing first class geoscientific information and knowledge
  • There are two centres within The University of Sydney;

So with the creation of my Australia Centre for Agricultural Education (A.C.A.E.), it will be an Australian Government initiative of Regional Department of Australia, administered by the Department of Regional Australia, Regional Development and Local Government, under the parliamentary leadership of Hon Simon Crean MP.

~ H

Monday, October 24, 2011

075 Development: Spatial Planning


I quickly cad out my sketches and tried to incorporate the context that it is built for - along existing rail or road network. The above is in context of an "existing" rail network. This spatial planning is still in work in progress. But the site constraint, area (footprint) and spaces are almost "there"...

~ H

074 Development: Spatial Planning

After drafting out a 2nd planning program, previously, I continued to further develop on the form, making estimates as to where the spaces will fit into. But it was much easier when sketched out really quickly and I get to see where the real spaces will have to go. What you see below is the outcome... and I must reiterate a point, that the "flower"-looking plan which I think my entity is developinig towards, is totally, purely and absolutely unintentional.


~ H

Saturday, October 22, 2011

073 Exemplar: Presentation


I was flipping through BIG's archicomic book and felt that some of the methods of presenting their firm's design approach made sense, no matter how complicated their design appears to be. This particular page of the book (page 90), is an example of how I can adopt the idea process behind my design. It's just an example that I quite like because the "stage-by-stage" approach is very easy to "read", which is something I'd like Jane & the other tutors to feel when they look at my presentation later.

~ H

Friday, October 21, 2011

072 Development: Roofing Integrity


The basis idea of transformable canopy in my Architectural Form. This was part of the idea process for my roofing development, and may or may not be adopted in the final design.

~ H

071 Week 12 Tutorial & Development: Form


Architectural Form
This is the development of the form when integrated with the roofing form which will eventually be adopted into the final design. The form is a continuous result from the previous form ideas blogged in entry 57, entry 58 & entry 59. It is also a further thought process of the spaces within will eventually be finalised, keeping in mind the early development of spatial idea in entry 60.

This was a development from the tutorial based on the following sketch.




~ H

070 Development: Planning Program


After a few conceptual developments, I have re-drafted the planning program of my architectural entity by making it greatly smaller than before [see previous draft here].

~ H

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

069 Exemplar: "Zombie Safe House Competition"

One of the Competition Entry for 2011 Zombie Safe House Competition
http://zombiesafehouse.wordpress.com/z1538/

I found an article on Inhabitat about a competition to design Safe Houses for the civilisation to prepare against the possibility of a Zombie Apocalyse [a bit far-fetched coz I don't believe in these things but I'm all for creativity] and I found this competition entry of a particular interest - Zombie Ranch.

I am more interested in the form of this entity. I have been trying to form different levels of activities with a central core and with the emergence of this design entry online, it is obviously a coincidence that what I'm trying to create is almost similar. Of course the context & environment that between this design and mine is totally different. A fun, interesting competition nonetheless!

~ H

068 Development: Context Exploration

I decided that in the process of my conceptualising my design, I needed to try placing my entity into a context that it is built for. One of the key components of having this entity regularly used and recognised is to have it within or near existing lines of public transport, one of them being the rail tracks. Therefore, as can be seen in the JPG above, this is what I quickly tried doing. The selection of context and site is based on the theme of mobility and my (our group) initial interpretation of "mobile architecture". Mobile Architecture is a catalyst that triggers movement not only within the entity but a presence that spurs the movement and mobility of the people using the spaces within and around it [link to a previous entry on this].

The form is still in a development process, and the context is still open to interpretation:-
rail tracks, motorway, roads & streets and whichever mode of accessible public transportation.

~ H

Sunday, October 16, 2011

067 Reading: [Personal] Transformation in Architecture

My work has centered on a fundamental idea that a designed object can transform in the way a natural organism does. The design of such transforming objects is based on several key principles - a transforming object:
  • is made of many parts that act as an integral whole
  • has a dual nature - half structure, half mechanism
  • is made up of linkages having unique properties - i call these kinetic blocks
  • has behavior based on its underlying geometry
(Hoberman 2005, 71)

The exploration of kinetic blocks, structure and mechanism in the process of transformation in an architectural entity is something that I am trying to apply in the mobile elements of my permanent architectural pavilion. This reading is very relevant in helping me understand the basic principles that lies behind the notion of "transformable" architecture, if I am pursuing the application of this theory.

~ H

Hoberman, Chuck. 2005. "Transformation in Architecture" in Transportable Environments 3 edited by Robert Kronenburg, 70-79. Taylor & Francies, Hoboken.

066 Exemplar: Hoberman Transformable Canopy


This transformable canopy by Hoberman Associates was a preliminary design commissioned by SHoP Architects. It was... "for an innovative canopy that extends to cover an open plaza, and then retracts, nesting into a large architectural column. The canopy is developed from a unique spiral geometry, constructed of structural panels and supported by a series of tension rods." I think the idea behind this is exactly what I am trying to do for my roof design of A.C.A.E. - the retracting roof concept -, as has been blogged about in the last 3 entries. Although, what I'm trying to do is a bit more straightforward, in the sense that the roof retracts left to right and into the central column core, instead of in an anti-clockwise/circular motion the way Hoberman have explored. There is a 13-sec clip on their website worth watching for you to have a feel of how it works. Check it out here - Transformable Canopy.

~ H

Saturday, October 15, 2011

065 Development: Textures & Mood


Textures & Mood, possibly inspiring the context of my A.C.A.E. as well as the materials that will take form. [Images taken during the road-trip in September]

~ H

064 Development: Roofing


This is the development of the roofing system applied to my architectural entity.

Mobile Element(s)
 I think the next stage of development will have to show how this kinetic roof will be applied in terms of its mobility. This program that this roof will be "housing" is intended for the roof deck level of aquaponics system that will be integrated into the pavilion. I am trying to create a system that allows the roof to be mechanically-operated to be opened and closed as and when it's necessary for this "farming" to happen. It is supposed to be one of the imperative factors making this pavilion a significant presence within my A.C.A.E. center. If you've forgotten what the abbreviation stands for, it is Australian Centre for Agricultural Education which I have decided in Week 8 upon consultation with my tutor, and discussion with my group mates.

Architectural Form
The overall form that you are slowly seeing is a result of a developmental process, exploring the variation of my concept inspired by the natural landscape found in the rural areas of Australia - hay, plants, flora and fauna, windmill-thingamajig. It is also a progression of the initial form done in in Week 9.

~ H

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

063 Development: Roofing


This was a study of roof forms, and lightweight structures. More on how this idea was derived, as well as further development on the formation will be blogged about sometime this week.

~ H

Monday, October 10, 2011

062 - Development: Planning Program


Based on a calculation of 1.5 to 2sqm provided per person, the above is an estimated draft planning program required for the pavilion of Australian Centre of Agricultural Education (A.C.A.E.). The overall estimated 1800sqm, is typically about 1/4 of the size of a football/soccer pitch.

~ H

061 Development: Listening Closely & Staying Focus

As the design of this architectural form is currently underway, may I just remind myself that I am creating a a presence that spurs the movement and mobility of the people using the spaces within. It is not just about creating a form to satisfy a brief but one that satisfies the community enough for them to use it more often. A form that educates the local about parliamentary functions, and the responsibilities of the government to provide an initiative for the locals.


A reminder from Week 4 tutorial session on "Investigating Issues".

"there is a strong need for recognising the relationship between the PARLIAMENT and the POPULATION"

~ H