Chicago revisited

I finally downloaded the pictures I took in Chicago while we were there for our class trip, and so I figured I would upload some of the more interesting/relevant shots here.

This is a picture I took at the Art Institute of Chicago viewing its newer wing, and I found the different materials and structural techniques to be very interesting in terms of how they allowed light to travel through them or reflect off their surfaces. As we get more in depth into our project, this is definitely something to be considered when we be begin employing various materials.

This picture is taken from our site, viewing the structure directly to the north of our building. There are a few items of interest relating our site and this building we are looking into: first, finding a way to incorporate the indented light well in this structure into our design through some sort of visual connection. Also, another issue we might run into eventually is the few exposed windows on the lower level of this building, because we don't want to build directly over them since we'll already be blocking a significant portion of sunlight.

Here was the big surprise of our trip: the L trains running adjacent to our site. We previously thought the south and east borders of our site were open and exposed to good amounts of daylight. As it turns out, the L tracks not only cast a sizeable shadow over our site, they also create a great deal of noise for the site, which is pretty constant. This realization has made us treat the site differently: Classrooms must be insulated away from the tracks to keep quieter noise levels, and horizontal light sources are at a premium, meaning that much of our light will have to be drawn from directly above.

We saw this southeast corner as the busiest location of the site (intersection of the two main streets, corner of the L), so we became very interested in the view from this spot. We want our building to have a bit more of a human scale near this corner of the sidewalk, and from this location moving towards the northwest corner the building will slope upward following a progression of public programs. I will update this weekend on our project, which will hopefully illustrate these concepts more clearly.

Catching up

So I have failed to keep up with this blog, which has left me with a great deal of information and work that has been unposted here. I will try to overview most of the past month's important work here, and in the future I will be more timely with the blog in order to keep it updated with my most recent work.

Wasting no time:

We began with the Digital Project shadow models, which were helpful in seeing how sunlight affects our site throughout the day and during different times of year. My models essentially look the same as many of my classmates', but I began to examine the idea of how the sun's rays could directly impact the shape of our site or building:

Although it was a very abstract first attempt, using the sun to shape our building has become one of the main objectives this semester.

When we began looking at our building more specifically, I tried observing different precedents in how buildings (and more specifically school buildings) interact with the sun for optimal lighting scenarios.

A classroom making good use of sunlight, without too much resulting glare:

(Image taken from http://www.green-technology.org/green_technology_magazine/chps8.htm)
Versus a gym area with a problematic relationship with the sun, where it seems that glare or too much direct light would become an issue:

(Image taken from http://www.ebnet.org/Hammarskjold/construction_update.htm)

We began to think about forms that could work with our program and our objective of harnessing sunlight where necessary. The model below looked at using a curve along the southern facade in order to maximize sunlight throughout the day.

After working through several variations, we began focusing on an idea that employs a series of light wells and slits in the building facade. One of our final models for our first review focused on the light-well aspect of the building:

Since that review, we have tried a few different approaches to refining the light-well model. One approach looked to incorporate a mix of slits, light wells, and angled surfaces to bring light to the interior:

Another approach looks at the idea of "parascopes" bringing light to the interior. This idea became more prevalent when we saw our site for the first time and realized that the train tracks would not only block additional light, but be a source of loud, distracting noise as well.

We are now looking at reconciling these two ideas. By using the parascopes and light wells to draw light into the withdrawn classrooms, we hope to buffer the classes from the extremely loud exterior while providing as much sunlight and indirect light as possible. Another current focus of our project is looking at the building in plan, in order to configure the classrooms in a way that light wells can maximize the light being channeled to them.

Organizing the layout of our building is a primary concern, and perhaps moving away from the traditional box arrangement of classrooms would be an ideal solution. We are looking at various geometries that could result in a more unique school experience. The description of this proposed school project in Nova Scotia shows an interesting way of distributing a cellular arrangement of classrooms: http://www.misosoupdesign.com/feidad/NewMediaSchool/. Their exact method of determing room sizes and geometries might not be ideal for us, but it is a thought-provoking way of splitting up the monotony of a traditional hallway-classroom relationship, and hopefully we can do something similar with our program.

So, that was way too much for one post, but it is a general sampling of what I've done so far this semester. As I said before, I'll be able to be more specific with our project as we move forward from here, and I'll be sure to keep this blog updated with our progress.