Studio projects

     Our first project of the semester was to describe in a 3 meter (over 9 feet long) drawing, a map of how we feel traveling to a new place. My idea was to make one line that continues on the page like a time line, but goes through spirals and confusion [representing the body] and another line of leaves flow up and down [representing the mind] and the two eventually meet as the map becomes more clear. Still though only parts of the map are filled and the rest is empty, because these were the only parts I knew at the time. 

mine is the one on top, laura's is on bottom.
[you can click to zoom in]

     My project for studio this semester was an immigration center. We were given a choice of site locations for the project either Plaza de Mayo [city center with tall buildings, picture in the title of my blog is of a collage I made of a test image in this site] or La boca [old italian immigration port, now one touristy road, the rest is really poor, and across the river is even poorer slums]. I chose to work in La Boca. It is a site on the river and their is a historic bridge right next door. The river has a wide pathway that follows around the bend of the edge.

digram of an idea [ rock is the past, being sheltered by a roof]

Idea begins to unfold in a design sketch. 

       The idea is that there is a big gap between the high income population and low income [or no income] population of Buenos Aires. I felt like the La Boca site was somewhere that people were currently in need of help in some way because this is  on of the many places the lower income population is forced to live because of the poor conditions of the area and its location to industrial factories and run down plants. Making an immigration center here allows for an opportunity to help people in the neighborhood. I added program that makes this place a support center as well as a museum, with language classes or financial support, helping them get a job or stills. In other words it brings people in to teach them about the past immigration issues, the present issues and it brings the immigrants in to mix them all together under one umbrella. This is where the roof comes in. It is a unifying structure that relates to the industrial feel of the area, the scale of the bridge, but also shelters the people keeping all that is under it safe and protected. It is unifying. The buildings underneath were spit into the past [gallery] and present [library/classrooms]. The roof creates a 3d public space that wraps the outside of all the buildings and creates a network of outside terraces that are all different experiences in relation to their context and the roof at different levels.

preliminary [1:250 scale] model showing roof over
masses below 

keeping me company while we made our models on our living room floor  all night

Preliminary [1:100 scale] model showing back street of the model
the entrance is compressed through a public passage and is at the back of the site
after the ramp that goes down. 

and then a week before our final ... our glass table broke while I was working at it and Laura was sleeping. 

and tea fell on my computer.
we sat with it on this stand as I could hear its last breaths of life escape from its lips.
it was making funny noises .... and then it was gone.

RIP


[but now its fixed and everything is ok :)]

final model [1:100 scale] process picture 

In order to not waste time I started making my final model first since I didnt have a computer anymore. After a couple of days my teacher helped me borrow my other teachers computer to finish the project. 

These are views of the two gallery spaces, top is the dark permanent gallery, below is the

light open gallery that opens to the outside. The difference between inside and outside is not clear.

my temporary desk :) 

sunrise one morning I looked out and this is what I saw. 

Completely bare before, these trees literally bloomed over night into beautiful purple wonderfulness.  Plus everything to do with nature and sunlight is amazing when you haven't slept for a week. 

taking a break nap on the porch :) so pretty

final model

interlocking gallery space.
This is a view of the entrance of the building, a gallery to the top left and on the right
behind that mass is the library program
and my feets

market/public passageway perspective 

entrance [mass above is the "dark" gallery]

final presentation

A truly amazing discussion after all the presentations with some architects that were left. It was  for about 2 hours about architecture, school, projects, ideas everything. It was really nice .




the end.