Sunday, August 23, 2009

No Mundane Design Allowed!

I just posted on Facebook that I am aware that I will never design a building in my career that will be dependent upon fossil fuels as its main source of energy. It is a fact that any building I draw will have a design life-time that will outlive fossil fuel on this planet. I am amazed by this consideration, and I am wondering how all the old buildings, whose design life-time has not been fully utilized, will be adapted. Surely we cannot continue to discard the resources that have gone into all those existing buildings designed before this awareness arrived (???).

Having read recently that the Sears Tower in Chicago is being retrofitted to meet "new building" energy standards, I am aware that there is a lot of work to be done. Imagine how one might redesign such a monolithic structure so that natural ventilation (convection) and day-lighting are even possible (???). Or consider that it might need to be covered on its South-most facades with active solar photovoltaic panels to acquire enough solar electric to power the building. This is truly a mammoth undertaking.

I have considered that, in five or ten years, the profession of Architecture will not be as we know it today. I am aware that the considerations which will be foremost in our minds will no longer be so focused upon what the building looks like. Blade Runner, one of my movie favorites, was made in 1982 (Ridley Scott, Director) and set in 2016 (just seven years from now). The architecture looks nothing like what we see being built around us in downtown San Diego. I wonder how much things will change; and how prescient Ridley Scott's notion of this nearby future will turn out to be (???).

I had a midterm jury review for my fire station (see Abstract Concepts and Mundane Buildings, below). My presentation was well received. I was praised for my process, and my graphic presentation. I was happy with the critique; and even expected the comment that this building looks a little like an '80's Schoolhouse (read as mundane). I was, however unclear where to go from there.

I took a day off to ponder (actually I took a day off to recover, as the preparations for the jury took more than I anticipated -my first "all-nighter") and came back to my project with a renewed perspective. I am convinced that the creative process comes "from nothing" and that inspiration and innovation are the result of providing the creative mind room to work, with limited distraction. It was as if a new vista had formed over the day I spent catching up on sleep, laundry, housekeeping, grocery shopping and the like.

I sat down to review the comments made by the jurors and was inspired to revise, completely, my design concept. In the process, I have created a new building that does not suffer in the realm 0f the mundane. If anything, it is architecture in a new light. It is like nothing I have ever seen before, and like nothing I could have preconceived. I am jazzed by the new ideas, the new forms and the reinterpretation of function, if not necessarily in that order.

And I have the challenge of learning how to make this building, and every one I design, from here on out, to be as independent as possible when it comes to resources; particularly energy. I have heard that there is a new Dean, Jennifer Wolch, at UC Berkeley in the College of Environmental Design. Her expertise is in the area of Sustainability. I am excited to think that this is one place where the expectations of the future in architecture are being considered, now. I am looking forward to an opportunity to tap into that environment. And I look forward to bringing that same standard of inquiry to my work at NewSchool of Architecture & Design in the meantime.

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Teddy Cruz speaks at NewSchool

This afternoon's studio was interrupted with a presentation from Teddy Cruz of Estudio Teddy Cruz. Mr. Cruz is a former NewSchool faculty member who did his undergraduate work in Architecture at CalPoly in San Luis Obispo, CA and his Master's in Architecture at Harvard's Graduate School of Design. He is an impassioned speaker with a fascinating ability for complex thinking. His speaking was supplemented with fantastic graphics illustrative of his sophisticated conceptual approach (though somewhat unsophisticated in their graphic style).

I was intrigued by his characterizations of architecture as a manipulation of money and process. He created a dichotomy by describing the difference between those projects with "clever money and stupid process, and those with stupid money and clever process." It is a fascinating spectrum I am sure; particularly when one can evaluate from his perspective on a wide(er) range of projects.

The practice of Estudio Teddy Cruz, as presented, is not so much about Architecture (as I have come to know it- having to do with the creation of buildings, place-making and space-making), but rather a complex dialogue in Urban Planning and Environmental Design that is informed by Architecture, and social and economic studies. His work, as presented, certainly takes one away from the ocular-centric (myopic) approach that is the focus of most of my projects at NewSchool of Architecture & Design (thus far; remembering I am in my first quarter).

My recent experience working for global development concern, Emaar, in the Newport Beach, CA offices, was experience working with the kind of "top-down" development approach that Cruz distrusts. His philosophical approach is more grass-roots oriented; dealing with the density of socio-economic transactions per acre rather than the number of salable housing units per acre.

Curiously, the whole time I was working for Emaar, I was fascinated by the global marketing of the SoCal suburban design approach practiced by Emaar. What has not worked so well here in Southern California (based upon the approaching demise of sustainability of suburbia caused by depletion of essential fossil fuel resources) seems highly desirable in the face of the challenging conditions existing in suburban Cairo. And while it may be that our SoCal suburban dream is more desirable than the existing options in Cairo, one wonders if the projects we were working on at Emaar Design Studio will ever be built as planned; and if the density of units will continue to be one of their defining factors.

What is compelling about this lecture was the depiction of a larger opportunity for design. Not unlike the evolution of a species, the design of the built environment is evolving to survive in conditions which threaten its continuation. Our ever present awareness of the depletion of fossil fuel resources means that structures designed today cannot be built with any expectation of dependence upon fossil fuel. The lifetime of buildings on the drawing boards today will see the depletion of those resources on this planet. So to co-op a phrase from process planning today, we must design with our "best-practices" in mind while at the same time fulfilling the role of the seer; looking into the future in a way we have not dared before.

The feel-good moment in the lecture was realizing that we (as architecture students, prospective architects, environmental designers, etc...) have the opportunity to insert the learnings of our failed policies and practices into the opportunities of developing cultures. Complex thinking indeed.

Thursday, August 6, 2009

Abstract Concepts and Mundane Buildings

After a greuling session of formal critiques by studio mates, instructors and TA's, I am spent. Yesterday's pin-up of progress drawings was an amazing learning experience. I was fascinated by the variety of solutions to what appeared to be a simple program with some narrowly defined parameters (not the least of which is a too-small site crammed up against a freeway that is more than ten feet higher than the average elevation of the site).

The most fascinating thing was the abstraction(s) of process by some of my classmates. Perhaps I have been in the world of work for too long... or not in the world of education for so long... My in-progress drawings are solidly in the realm of construction documents. Admittedly, there are flaws, unknowns, details which have yet to be created, structural elements that are possbily the wrong size, or the wrong visual weight. And all of that can be resolved in the next five weeks.

I believe my building is actually build-able without too-terribly much stretching of the current technology. It looks a little mundane (in elevation views, all the sculptural richness is flattened out) and that troubles me. So what's the problem??? I am guessing that my mind is grounded in a way that the other students are not. I have no abstract reasoning that is too difficult to graphically communicate. I have no abstract concepts that have never before been built. I have no abstract reasoning that I do not have words to adequately express. And I feel bad about this. (???)

Still, the building will address a standard of sustainability that is far beyond anything attempted in most municipal construction projects. The facility will depend heavily on natural daylighting, stored solar thermal, and solar electric that is grid connected for net-zero (design goal) night-lighting and AC, recycled "gray" water for site landscaping, natural ventilation / convection in the public spaces, and sustainable materials use wherever possible. The firefighters will be treated to spaces that are created with spiritually restorative qualities meant to manage the stress of life as a firefighter/medical "first responder."

What am I missing?

Sunday, August 2, 2009

3D Thinking

After developing a new set of muscles, due to holding pressure on the railroad board and the steel rule while cutting with an Xacto knife, and developing a callous on my index finger from driving the Xacto blade through the various other modelling materials, I am finally seeing some light. I always thought I had excellent 3D modelling in my head. Having thought so means that I was skeptical that model making had much purpose; save for developing "brains in my finger tips." I became even more skeptical as the callous on my index finger over-took the growth of the "brains."

This past week, upon revising (and revising again) my concept models for the fire station I am working on (designed to replace station house #3 in San Diego with a modern, up-to-date facility suitable for a larger crew), I saw the light. I realised that there were some things I could learn from the modelling process that I couldn't grasp any other way. And there is the reason for this exercise.

Currently in production of drawings to support my design concept, I am moving back into the documentation phase having sculpted a concept for a building about which I and my instructors are satisfied. It doesn't look anything like my initial concept. And it doesn't look anything like what I saw in my mind's eye. I guess this is progress as, in fact, it looks better.

I am reveling in my sense of being suited to the work I am undertaking. I have no question in my mind that this is the place and time for me to be doing this. I am clear, however, that I am in a process of credentialing a good deal of design process knowledge which I already possess. Still, there are the new things which I can learn. Much of this is technological rather than theoretical knowledge (Obama's "retooling"). I need to update my technological skills to support my design processing.

I am beginning by updating my 3D thinking. While the idea of "brains in my fingertips" is still to gel, I am certain that there is a way in which I have created some new muscles that are not related to the physical craft of modelling. And I am certain that more 3D modelling (digitally speaking) will be coming soon.