My cohousing complex composes the northwest side of my new plaza.  It is to be a truly urban cohousing- an apartment complex with shared community spaces that could be open to the greater public.  By extending the use of certain spaces beyond the housing community, you at once engage the larger urban context as well as give the community a means by which to support itself, therefore keeping the community affordable.

Cohousing is a European concept, but it has existed in the US since the late 1970’s.  Almost all cohousing in America is suburban in its character, mimicking the popular cul-de-sac neighborhoods in its layout and service offerings. In the past few years, many more urban initiatives have gotten underway in the USA, but for now all examples of this style of cohousing exist only in northern Europe.  Typically those complexes consist of a ground floor of community spaces with apartments above, and look no different than any other apartment complex in their neighborhood.

I decided early that I wanted my complex to be more of a beacon for the neighborhood; therefore the community spaces needed to reveal themselves rather than bury underneath I created a glass tower separate from the apartments directly upon the public square. This tower at once announces the difference between this type of housing and typical apartment living.  All community activities have a direct visual conversation with the public plaza with only a layer of glass as separation.  The private apartments then cluster themselves around a courtyard behind this tower, thus creating a gradient of privacy and separation back from the plaza. The courtyard and all other community spaces align themselves to a shifted grid that engages the center of the plaza more, and consist of similar light materials such as glass.  The type of glass and its’ translucency will vary depending upon the amount of publicity each community space’s program specifies.

The original, regular grid remains to comprise the more privatized spaces of the program, in particular the apartment themselves.  These spaces are characterized by much more solid materials such as concrete.

The play between the two grids and the way they intersect and interlock has been of utmost importance in the articulation of the spaces.  For the most part, the public grid has taken precedence over the private, thus carving away at its spaces, a philosophical gesture to the basic function of cohousing- the reversal of the helplessness and loneliness of isolation.  I am currently working on refining this play both within the plan and elevations (the exteriors of the building), and eventually I will speak more upon these.  In the meantime, here is the basic floor plan diagram for my building (north is up, as in the site diagram I placed above):

Midthesis.

That is the major qualification to my life right now.  I have spent one term in school designing thus far, and now I will spend another refining.  To spend 20 weeks on a project that culminates your learning for the past 5.5 years of school is a very daunting task.  I constantly feel as though my design decisions should be faster, simpler, better- and perhaps they are compared to even two years ago, but they are still simply slow in my mind.  As a result I have definitely been losing myself in this project in an attempt to end my school years on a high note.

The project is one I would have not expected myself to choose, but at the same time it fits the slant of my scholastic career thus far.  My studio professor was concerned with the redevelopment plans for an extension to his neighborhood here in Portland, and led my studio for the first four weeks to develop a lower density alternative (sort of a Brooklyn versus Manhattan scenario).  After working for eight months in an urban design firm, I was looking forward to this part of the project, and I felt the design I created was fairly well done.  I wanted to be far-reaching  in my focus, and as a result I concentrated heavily on reorganizing the transportation hierarchy in order to grow this small neighborhood into a cohesive piece of northwest Portland.  I was fairly heavy-handed with the street grid, restoring it whenever possible, moving freeway off-ramps to better connect with arterial routes that had transformed since the freeway’s construction in the 1960’s, and giving over much more space to the pedestrian and bike.  I believe it is these elements that encourage neighborhoods over any other-the neighborhood will automatically thrive if it is walkable and bikable.  This element is particularly important in Portland, where many such neighborhoods already exist and must compete with one another for residents in order to continue to thrive.  Afer establishing my vision for the tranportation grid of the neighborhood, my designation of services and block development was much less forceful.  Here I favored allowing the neighborhood to grow itself organically over time rather than in a rigid, prescribed fashion.  I did designate some streets as retail (an extension of what has already developed in this area), and these streets are also treated differently within the transportation hierarchy compared to nieghborhood streets. I also created a central plaza along this retail extension that interrupts the restored street grid and establishes a center to the neighborhood between two major parks and aerterial routes with some major retail and community activities to occur around it.

Other than these strong moves, I only suggested small pocket activities that could be scattered throughout the neighborhood and therefore  easily accessible to all.  These pockets of activities included small parks, community gardens, and community services such as libraries, schools and rec centers.  One of my reviewers called this strategy shockingly “laissez faire,” but I think it would be an interesting plan to implement, particularly for a neighborhood that has a history of good organic growth.  In fact, it is potentially more unwise to try to overdirect growth in such circumstances, a move that could interrupt the good growth patterns the neighborhood has already established.

After spending four to five weeks on this element, we switched into designing buildings for the rest of the studio.  We are all architecture majors in the studio, after all.  For this portion of the project, we are each developing a building scheme of our choosing that is appropriate to our urban design visions for the neighborhood extension.  Here is where I surprised myself- rather than choosing a commercial or community building to round out my portfolio (which had been my goal upon entering my final project), I chose a housing complex.  It is still a larger scale than most of the single family to small multi-family development projects that currently dominate my portfolio, but it is still housing.  Apparently I love the subject, which, of course, I already know I do. I find places we live, our homes, to be of the utmost importance in our emotional states, and therefore some of the most important and meaningful architectural spaces that we can design.  Which translates to difficult, which translates to fun.  So after a short debate with myself, I decided why not go with something you would love to design and have some pre-existing experience with?  It worked for my undergraduate final project (a surf “shack” at a time when I was throughly in love with surf culture and had lived with a surfing romate for two years), so it could work for my thesis.

I chose to design a cohousing apartment complex right on my new plaza, sort of a beacon of community to this newly established extension.  For those of you who are not familiar with the term, cohousing is “community housing.”  It is not a commune, although it does have a strong community association and shared community spaces that the members are encouraged, and sometimes required to use.  Each resident still gets their own private apartment, although its size is somewhat reduced because of the plethora of community spaces available.  My professor compares it to European apartment living.  The ideals behind every cohousing community include a strong sense of community with each member providing support and friendship to eachother (much like an extended family) and the encouragement of diversity in all its forms. These ideals line up with my vision for the neighborhood, so I thought it an appropriate “catalyst” project for the neighborhood center.  It is not a living situation for everyone, but I think the neighborhood I have envisioned would benefit greatly from such a beacon in their community.

Over the past few years it seems that carbon emissions and the push for a zero carbon world has dominated environmental news.  Part of this is due to its high-profile advocates such as Al Gore for global warming, of which carbon emissions are a major factor, and impressive projects such as Masdar City in the U.A.E., the world’s first zero carbon city, by Sir Norman Foster.   The other part of its news domination is the cold hard fact that it is a major contributer to global warming.  Since the industrial era, the amount of carbon in the air has increased 35%.  As we “modernize” (i.e. cut down trees and use our natural resources), we reduce our planet’s natural carbon sinks (places that either store or exchange CO2 into other gases), and its percentage builds up.  The bad part is, that as this gas builds up, it warms our planet, thus reducing its ability to handle the carbon even further.  For example, our oceans are the largest carbon sink on our planet, handling up to 30% of all emissions ever. However, as the temperature of the ocean rises, even a fraction of a degree, its ability to dissolve the gas reduces, thus releasing more into the atmosphere which causes more warming . . . . it is a vicious cycle.  And one that is already in motion, which is why scientists are so concerned about reducing carbon emissions so drastically so quickly.

I am currently involved in an independent study that is looking to see if the layout of the urban grid in a city has any factor on carbon emissions.  If it does, then we may be able to lay out the cities of the future in a way that naturally promotes a zero carbon lifestyle.  I thought I would share the introduction to the study, with perhaps more to come later.  Enjoy!:

Introduction

In a world of dwindling natural resources, it is more important than ever to create places that are inherently less taxing to our natural environment.  For years people have understood that there are techniques to building in a way that demands less from our planet.  By existing more in harmony with the natural world, we call these built places sustainable.

The extent to which a building can be made to harmoniously exist in its environment certainly depends upon the locality in which it is placed.  In the past, we have understood this term “environment” to encompass climate and natural resources. However, with over 50% of the world’s population now living in cities, we are residing more and more in an environment of our own making.  City forms have a large factor in forming the location in which we are creating sustainable buildings.  Unlike the natural environment, we have a say in the shape of this form.  As such, is there a certain basic form we should be encouraging in our cities in order to allow our built environment to demand less from our dwindling natural resources?

Cities are incredibly severe on the natural world.  Such a concentration of people demands large-scale buildings and transit systems, which in turn intensify the modern problems created by our built world.  For example, buildings alone cause more than a third of the emissions for carbon dioxide, the greenhouse gas mainly responsible for global warming. Transportation emissions comprise another third.  Cities incorporate both these sectors.  Being dense in their layout, there is little natural world to mitigate their problem at the site, which in turn is detrimental to both the city’s long-term health and the landscape that eventually receives the high concentrations of its emissions.  Many cities have recognized this major problem, and have vowed to become “zero-carbon” in the near future.  Most of the current efforts for a zero-carbon future focus upon mitigating the effect current levels, a massive undertaking in and of itself.  However, it may be possible to use the form of the city itself, the basic city grid, to self-regulate its emissions by encouraging less vehicular traffic and providing maximum opportunities for zero carbon building.  Such a possibility could drastically reduce carbon emissions from cities effortlessly.  Thus it becomes a worthwhile endeavor to ask:

Can the layout of the city grid effectively reduce carbon dioxide emissions?  What key factors of the grid influence its effectiveness in mitigating its own carbon dioxide emissions?

As a first step to answering these questions, we propose to compare and contrast different existing block forms within one city in order to learn if there is indeed a singular grid form that is more sustainable. For our purposes we have chosen Portland, Oregon- one of the cities seeking to become zero-carbon and the location of our university.  After choosing neighborhoods of similar density but varying block size, we will collect data such as traffic counts, size of streets, current CO₂ “sinks” (sites that absorb CO₂), average distance to amenities, street to lot ratios, and current carbon levels. From this analysis we hope to identify one particular grid system that provides the most potential for self-reliance, and thereby develop and ideal city grid form. 

I have a new painting. Like most of my paintings, it deals with opposites- this time, dreams versus reality. Also like most of my paintings, its theme was not planned but rather developed over time as my thoughts slowly seeped themselves onto the canvas. In other words, I have been working over this relatively small canvas for about a month for little tiny spurts at a time, every time I felt sure of where to take it next. I like working this way because it does allow me to develop a theme over time, and the results are typically solid.

I am intrigued by the theme I have hit upon in this painting. I understand its development at this time in my life because I am of an age where I have developed a memory bank of major past dreams and thoughts to compare to my present reality and wide-open future. However, I find it especially intriguing because dreams have recently taken a center stage nationally with Barack Obama’s election. Here is a prime example where we will see how the dreams of a campaign, dreams a whole nation rallied around, take shape in reality.

Perhaps most intriguing of all, though, is the coincidence of my painting and consequent intellectual dwelling upon the difference of dreams and reality with the death of Jorn Utzon, the visionary behind the Sydney Opera House. Here is a man who won the Pritzker Prize, the nobel prize of architecture, for a body of impressive work, but will have his legacy shaped by the creation of one building- or rather, the legendary fiasco surrounding its construction.

Utzon won the competition for the Sydney Opera House with what can best be described as a “napkin sketch”- a simple vision set forth in a quick sketch. His vision was bold and beautiful enough to win the unknown architect an international-level competition, beating out 800 other entries, but not calculated to the level needed to rescue itself from the onslaught of very real engineering and construction limitations.

Utzon’s project spent years in development as he and his engineers tried to figure out a way to build the flying concrete shells of the vision, spectacularly burning through money and time in the pursuit of fusing reality and Utzon’s dream without compromise. In the end, Utzon completed only the concrete shells of the exterior before he and the Australian government that hired him parted ways. The interiors were finished by another architect, and were never to the vision of the original sketches. Utzon himself never set foot on Australian soil again, never reconciling the fiasco. In the 50 years since Utzon won the architectural competition, the world has not stopped talking about the project; but mostly, it is a constant discussion of the Opera House as a dream deferred.

No matter how much praise Utzon received for his spectacular concrete shells, the shadow of the project’s shortcomings and tumultuous construction has constistently haunted this once golden vision. Utzon sought the ultimate- a dream that was reality, but in his quest he failed to work within reality. His legacy will always include this lesson to the rest of us.

Perhaps we are better for it. Dreams are not an easy reality, and are not always meant to be. But that is not to say they should not be sought nonetheless- to dream and achieve is perhaps the best part of being human. The key to achieving their fusion not in constant defiance of one for the other, but rather seems to lie in simply understanding the differences in dreams and reality. My painting poses this question- I leave it to each viewer to figure out the answers for themselves, hopefully in a better fashion than Utzon did.

I took this picture near my house. The neighborhood is so old that there are horse tie rings embedded into the curbs. Although no real horses are now tied to these rings, many of my neighbors have replaced them with small plastic replicas such as the ones pictured above. What a creative and fun use for something now obsolete.

I was walking down the street near my house one beautiful day, lost in thought.  At the time, I was marveling at the beauty of the brightly colored turn-of-the-century homes that fill my neighborhood when my attention was caught by the juxtaposition of some brand new infill.  This new house was just as nice as the older homes on the street, quite well done with obvious ties to some of the more prestigious local firms. I would safely categorize it into the “successful infill” category in my architectural file.  Yet, despite its overall success, I still have one slight complaint to make, a point I would like to call to attention as a plea to my fellow architects.

It is an absolute necessity to make a good front porch.

On all of the older houses surrounding the new piece of infill, large, comfortable, and obviously well-used front porches existed.  On the new home, a small, harsh platform had been tacked on to the front of the dwelling, and looked as though it had never been used.  Not even a deckchair had been placed upon it.  Upon noticing this fact the otherwise beautifully designed dwelling immediately went on my personal “uninhabitable” list.  Perhaps the home would not have made this list if it had not been so surrounded by successful front porches, but as it was, I could not help but compare. Plus I knew that if I ever actually lived there, I would daily be jealous of my neighbor’s porches.

It is not that contemporary architects do not know how to make good front porches.  The criteria for the development of outdoor spaces, like indoor spaces, is well-taught in the architectural curriculum.  Even so, it seems to be a modern trend to overlook the importance of the front porch.  Instead the porch is treated it as an afterthought, as it was in this particular new home.  It is added, and some of the design necessities met, but not all, and as a result, the porches fail. 

Good porches incorporate thoughtful location/orientation, sizing, separation, and sight lines.  It takes all of these criteria, not just some, to create a successful space that will be utilized by its inhabitants.  Older homes always have good porches, most likely due to the need of cool, well-lit spaces in times before electricity and its sibling, air-conditioning.   These spaces are large enough to comfortably sit multiple people, like a living room.  Successful porches, in fact, are literally outdoor living rooms.  Like other living spaces, they are oriented to provide the best light and views.  They are often sheltered from the elements by roofs, and elevated off the ground.  Both of these architectural moves separate the space from the street, thus providing its occupants with a sort of transparent shield.  Everyone, both porch and street dwellers, are still seen but fail to interact “on common ground,” thus providing privacy for both parties. Even without a roof or a raised platform, porches are provided with other means of separation, such as fences or vegetation.  Often, many of these moves are employed at once, in endless variety.  Yet sight lines, particularly with the street, are always maintained.  These sight lines enliven the room, providing it with ever-changing scenery, like a television.  Thus, with these criteria met, a successful porch arises.

With the rise of modern amenities, successful porches are less of a necessity than they have been historically.  Yet their necessity in the creation of a vital street has never disappeared.  Successful, occupied porches extend the warmth and vitality of the home onto the street, thus creating a warm and vital neighborhoods, places where people want to be.  Successful neighborhoods then create vibrant towns and cities, which contribute to successful states, and so on.  When you think about it, so much of the success of our space depends upon the public front we put on our private spaces, such as porches.  And somehow, afterthoughts just never cut it.

Over the past few weeks, energy sourcing has become a hot topic.  With oil costs on the permanent rise and a draining war in the mideast, it seems everyone is suddenly eager to research and invest in alternatives.  Every magazine, blog, etc. has something to say about where we should be looking for energy to power our modern lifestyles.  It certainly makes for interesting reading- one business magazine that I recently read had articles on everything from ethanol production to the future of plastics and hydrogen fuel.  Since the magazine was targeted at the businessman, the articles mainly focused upon the investment opportunities and risks, and the people already leading the charge for each source.  While incredibly informative and smartly-written, this magazine, like many other discussion of this topic that I have recently crossed, still failed to address the underlying cause of our energy crisis- our energy-intensive lifestyle.

We depend upon energy.  We live far from the things we need/desire, preferring to ship ourselves and the items hundreds and thousands of miles.  Our networks of mere existence are incredibly far-flung.  Imagine, for a second, if these were somehow interrupted; where would you get your food, your water, your clothes and books?  How far do you go on a daily basis for work, or even simple groceries?  How far do those people and things travel to get to you?

Here’s an short experiment that I encourage everyone to try:  for two days, eat only local food.  Define local for yourself, then go shopping, and try to think about where even the ingredients that make up your food purchases originate, and see how well you can do.

A few of my friends are enrolled in a class where this simple experiment is one of the assignments.  I joined them for breakfast one day, and despite how abundant local food production is in our valley, my friends were getting quite frustrated even putting together a simple breakfast.

Many companies have begun to track their production in terms of environmental costs, and are using this knowledge for marketing purposes (also a topic covered in that business magazine).  The tides are turning in some portion of the world in regards to a deeper understanding of our energy dependence,  but most of the current discussion still circles around energy alternatives versus reducing dependence.  Instead of talking about the need to live closer to the things we need, such as grocery stores and schools and offices, we are focusing our energy on cars that get 100mph.  Although this is also an important step, it is not a well-rounded approach and does not in the end, solve much more than the oil dependence.  What happens when the cost of electricity begins to skyrocket because everyone is plugging in their cars?  The emergence of ethanol has already helped to drive the cost of corn, and therefore general food, up, thus contributing more problems to the crisis than its production is solving.  Despite which prevailing energy source wins this current clamoring to be the next energy source, we still are dependent upon it.  Not enough time and thought is going towards also providing a solution to this portion of the energy crisis.

Wintertime in the Northwest is a wonderful time for reading. Among the books I recently unearthed in my local library was REM Koolhaas’ Delirious New York, an urban architectural history of the city that he penned in 1978. I mentioned this publication earlier as a unique example of a book making an architect a star long before his building career. It also chronicles a city that I recently spent some time in, and examines it on the level of urban design, a subject I have always found engrossing. As such, I thought to pick up this odd little history and give it some first-hand thought. I am not nearly done yet, but I thought to go ahead and mention it for reasons other than its actual content. That analysis shall be left for a later entry.

I find this work worth more immediate mention because of the way it managed to capture my attention by the end of the first chapter. I already understand why this particular book elevated its author to the level of architectural celebrity upon its publication. It accomplishes a task that many non-fiction writers fail to deliver- it is well written enough to be entertaining. Not only are his theories of the city unusual and intriguing, but they are presented in a way that is clear, concise, and engrossing. And well-reasoned, of course. I find myself getting drawn into the book in the same way I get absorbed into some completely ludicrous statement that I cannot reason away simply.

Not to say that the theories presented in this book are ludicrous. They are more surprising. Trends that I never noticed seem so blatantly clear that I wonder how I ever missed them before. The true trademark of a convincing argument, and a good read. I highly recommend it to anyone with an interest in urban design, New York City, or just plain good nonfiction writing.

No post last week or this week as I have been hard at work on the more technical aspects of this website.  However, I thought to share a group project I did for one of my classes last week.

The class is a seminar on Green Building Structures, and for this project we had to invent a green structural component and then speculate on its performance.  My group invented the EcoPaper Beam, a supposedly light,strong and easy to recycle spanning alternative.  There are lots of inherent problems as it was a initial idea meant to spur discussion in class, but take a look and see what you think.

Yesterday I had a critique in my studio. We divided into groups of four on Monday, and had to develop a concept to pursue in developing our studio site by our weekly Wednesday pinup. Our professor is a stickler for concept, and although I consider that to be one of my strengths as a designer, I still went to bed very nervous about my particular group’s work on Tuesday night. At the time, I felt like we had developed a very nice set of ideals of how we wanted our design to look and feel, but no overriding concept that would determine the rule set for how those ideals are met. It turned out that I was over worrying (not uncommon), and as we all discussed the designs in pinup, a strong concept emerged. The idea was actually one we had discussed early and was something I had felt a strong voice in at the time, but had since forgotten underneath the stress that is fast track group creative work.

I think the speed at which studio must move in a term system is perhaps one of my largest qualms with my current education. I can’t even imagine how different my creative development would have been if my undergraduate program had been a term system instead of semesters as well. I feel it probably would have been much more stunted, simply because of how much of a struggle it can be to get into the groove of good creative conceptual development. Had I not had the time as an undergraduate to wrestle with the same topic for as long as I did, I wonder how long it would have taken me to learn to discern a concept with potential from those without, and then learn how to develop it appropriately. When you are learning that discernment process, 10 weeks is simply not enough to crash and burn on a bad design move.

I am glad the critique went well, and perhaps with the entire week (gasp!) that we have to develop our idea further for the next pinup, perhaps I can go to bed the night before unstressed (probably not).