Systems

A lot of thought today is linear when it should be more encompassing of reality.  The minimalist breakdown of essential parts is a logical one, but only because we have to determine just what correlates to what and in what manner.  Causation has been a hard thing to prove in its own right.

Through this course, I’ve seen that it’s important to see the world (and the smaller, [possibly] more contained systems within it) as always affected by some means by something else.  It’s a little on the side of Chaos Theory, but as with everything else, we put our own (perhaps somewhat arbitrary) limits on the system and its effects.

And, arguably, it’s that arbitrary aspect in addition to the inability to assuredly pinpoint causality (in some cases) that makes systems thinking really interesting.

As with everything else with architecture (though systems are certainly not contained only to architecture), not everything has a clear answer.  It, and life, seems to be about finding solutions as we go.

Through the Bay Game earlier this semester, we’ve seen how simple moves can disrupt, improve, or cause an equilibrium in the Chesapeake Bay’s health.

A single plan implemented over a twenty year period (the length of our Bay Game), is not necessarily the answer.  Twenty revised plans as time progresses, adapting to issues regarding the bay’s health might come closer.  It also might not – given that a plan a year might not take into consideration the resilience of the system that had been in play the year before, acting too quickly to change things that might resolve themselves.

Finding answers, right and wrong, will be an experience that takes careful consideration, and I look forward to it each step of the way.

Sustainable Design + Biophilia

Ken Yeang is an architect whose sustainable design ideals are visible throughout his designs.  His work, is often referred to as ecoarchitecture, and is known for pushing the limits between the “natural environment” and the built one.

He has recently been pushing his designs even further, generating “total living systems” by means of creating new habitats within his architecture.  His buildings are able to integrate the natural environment with the built environment with such efficiency that they reduce, sometimes even to zero, the dependency on non-renewable sources of energy.

This biointegration is something that is a constant within Ken Yeang’s designs, which make intelligent use of much more than just sun exposure and ventilation.

I’ll admit that a lot of it looks strange and surrealistic at best, but it’s an interesting take on the concept of biophilia.

Biophilia is a concept that we, as humans, are drawn to nature because, for the majority of our existence, it’s what we’ve been around and what we’ve appreciated.  Only recently in the span of human time have we been able to exist in some respects removed from nature.  Just think why sea-side apartments or housing surrounding Central Park are so highly valued.

It’s beautiful, and at some level, it’s basic.  Could Ken Yeang be building towards the ideal that we are hesitant to grasp and experience because it’s beyond what we’re used to?

I’ve recently been given the great opportunity to work as an extern at William McDonough + Partners, the principal being the familiar name associated with Cradle to Cradle, which has been an inspiration to me in terms of sustainable ideas.

Besides being full of critiques regarding the poor engineering and design embedded in everyday things, the book itself is a statement.

You won’t notice at first, and maybe you don’t notice it at all.  Until the writing within the book tells you what exactly it is.

The book isn’t made of paper.  It’s a synthetic of plastic resins and inorganic fillers designed to be just like paper.  Except the waterproof part.  That’s just a plus.  Easily recyclable, the book itself (as a physical object) has nothing to do with trees – which despite the trees being a renewable resource, it might be best not to buy into the overconsumption of tree-based products that reduce ecosystems.

The entire book is a critique of “cradle to grave” mentality and substitutes that way of thinking with… well, that’s sort of obvious, isn’t it?

While emphasizing a philosophy of Reduce; Reuse; and Recycle, words well-spread in society (I would think), William McDonough and Michael Braungart look also to new ways of designing for a sustainable way of life.

The book (as a physical object), with its design that stands apart from tree consumption and is more readily recyclable, isn’t even claimed to be anywhere near the sustainable ideal.  The first few pages talk about a material for books that allows ink to be readily washed away and reapplied (by methods that you wouldn’t normally come across by normal usage, of course), allowing texts to be readily reprinted on material without breaking down the material to put it back together again.

The Big Dig [House]

Paul Pedini, a civil engineer who worked on the Big Dig Project, asked to take some of the refuse from the construction.  When he responded to the question as to what he was going to do with the materials, he said that he’d be making a house.

A bold statement.

One that got him laughed at.

Most of the house that Paul made, along with the designers of Single Speed Design, was made from free materials that Paul recovered, resulting in a house that is $150 per square foot.  It’s constructed with over 600,000 lbs. of recycled materials, re purposing these materials in innovative and unconventional ways to no longer be just a highway but a house.

The reviewers, being neighbors of the Big Dig House, were slow to comment, but as the house came together and became something elegant out of something unrefined, they eventually asked for similar designs for their houses.

That’s quite a shift from being made a laughing-stock.

If we could repurpose more things, or even better yet, design things to be able to be remade into other things (perhaps on the side of material science and engineering), we could manage a more sustainable future by simply reducing wasted materials.

Charrette + Redundancy: A Recap

Now that Charrette’s behind me, I observed a few systems at work during an arguably quasi-delusional state of mind.

For one, I found out that sleep is good.  It recharges the brain.  It lets you continue doing the stuff you’re too nervous and frantic about doing to go to sleep.

Go ahead.  Read that line again. It’s the first paradox of Charrette.

A bloody Christmas miracle.

For me, the idea of sleeping during that wonderful death-tempting time of forced production flips between incredibly appealing and the equivalent of suicide.  I admit, that yes, sleep is smart for keeping my rate of efficiency at its maximum, but wasting time getting to sleep because all I can think about is stressing over how much I need to do is… less than ideal.

In short, we have a nice setup for a system.

Focusing more on the importance of redundancy in Charrette, however, is the need for fail-safes.  For instance, planning ahead that the plotters will probably jam/break/shut down/delete your file/not print in time.  Printing ahead, even if at smaller scales, is smart.  Emphasizing certain very important parts of your building design is another part of redundancy in the system that is Charrette that proves to never be against you.  Showing a space or sequence in plan, section, perspective, and various other diagrams is a good way to make sure that pesky reviewer is not like, “Well, you’re telling me an incredible narrative, but… I don’t see it happening anywhere.”

It’s right there.  And there.
That, was, of course, what you’re saying in your mind.  Because, in reality, you don’t have to say it.  Because of redundancy.

Ahhhhhh.

Rough Stuff: Building Design in the Systems Scope

It’s begun.

We are now in the throes of forced production.

This post is a glimpse of the systems thinking embedded into my building design for a rehabilitation center for wounded veterans.

The building form is inspired by pattern analysis and exploration that I’ve conducted earlier in the semester and have found a rather interesting configuration of apartment units for the rehabilitation center.  The configuration  has been shaped and constrained by the obstruction that the programs of the building should begin to move towards a cohesion of residence and program (in that they are adjacent in some fashion to one another).  Each accumulation of the apartment units allows for easy access to public areas, where community can contribute to the process of rehabilitation.

As noted in a previous blog post, the vertical nature of the buildings in New York City create distinct microclimates, with this project stressing the element of light.  The tall buildings cast shadows and change spaces throughout the day, and this effect is only amplified in the winter time, where the shadows stretch dramatically.

Experimenting with Autodesk Ecotect, I compiled a few animations that show the changing shadows throughout the day on the summer solstice and winter solstice:

The thermal mass of the building, largely concrete, also lends itself to stay cooler longer during the summer and staying warmer during the winter.