taarant-arc111-blog
taarant-arc111-blog
Introduction to the Built Environment
25 posts
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Desires of Life (Final Design Project)
Italo Calvino’s Cities & Desire 3 describes two paths to reach the same city; one by camel through a desert and one by ship across the sea. To each traveler, the city is viewed as two opposing yet similar things; both dreading the desert of their travels, one literal, one figurative. Both see the city as an escape from the eternal mode they traveled in. Both imagine breaking free into the other’s landscape, just to experience something, anything, new. They see the city as a rest stop, a transition point.
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As the desert traveler approaches the city, he sees the physical beginning of civilization. In his mind, he sees respite from the harsh desert and something to be with; other people, movement, socialization and life. Through breaks in the dry heat, he feels the sea’s wind against his skin and hears the laughter and conversation of people. He has arrived at the ocean paradise.
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As the sailor approaches, he sees the end of his watery world. In his mind, he sees a break from the harsh ocean and something to be with; other people, movement, socialization and new life. Interrupting the cool ocean breeze he feels the heatwaves against his skin and sees them bending and distorting the view of the city. He sees shade, fresh water, and the tops of towers reaching into the sky. He has arrived at the desert palace.
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This model illustrates the view of the desert traveler coming up to the city. He sees tall skyscrapers and buildings adorned with flags, chimneys, and antennas. The brown sandy ground gives way to the blue backdrop that is the approaching ocean. Relief and liberation overcomes him. In the distance, the caps of the whitewashed palace the sailor saw can be seen peeking over the tops of the buildings. This was done because both travelers envisioned the desert they were not in and the city as a division between the two. The combination of both perspectives represents the infinite loop of desire for something new, a new experience and stimulation for the mind and body from the plainness and eternal feeling of their voyage, independent of the path they chose. The desert traveler dreams of the sea, the sailor of the desert; if their mode of travel was switched, so too would their longing for their absent desert and the glorious transition into it. This is true for any voyage a person must take or any dull place they must spend time in and why good design and architecture are essential components to life.
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Living Connected – Living Light (Guest Lecture #2)
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James Rose presented a UT-led project called Living Light, an energy efficient home made for the Department of Energy’s Solar Decathlon competition. Groundwork for the technology used here was laid in another project he was involved in called UT Zero, a small home that intended to be powered off the sun and use no other forms of energy. This idea was taken to the next level with living light. The entire home maximized productivity and efficiency through its connection to nature. The home implemented new solar panel technology that could capture sunlight at any angle, even reflected light. The almost entirely glass facade was made more energy efficient than any standard home wall despite its thinness and translucence. The walls actively heated and cooled the home depending on the Sun’s location during the seasons. This and the rest of the home was all connected and controlled by a custom GUI web app.
Architecture must solve problems and provide required needs based on the end user in an effective manner. Rose and his team took that and completely blew it out of the water. Rose said, “We essentially brought a gun to a knife fight.” The implementation of technology and efficiency with variable conditions based on the Sun and weather really made the home feel like it was living and breathing, but was overdone for this competition. They placed first in many categories and quite highly on others but ultimately did not win. What makes this home great is the interaction and relationship that people have with it. It is not a structure to be looked at, it is a living thing that works, functions, and provides an experience for people to enjoy living in and give them ultimate control and efficiency.
Living Light - James Rose & UT, Knoxville
Photos: http://archdesign.utk.edu/institute-for-smart-structures/ut-solar-house-living-light/
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Immersion. Remembrance. Pentagon Memorial (Guest Lecture #1)
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Julie Beckman, together with her husband Keith Kaseman, entered a competition following the 9/11 attack for a memorial located at the Pentagon. With an idea of a personal, immersive memorial, they won and began work to honor and remember the lives lost in one of the most devastating terrorist attacks on American soil.
Through capturing the experience and infusing that into the built structures and landscape, she created a program that pulled people in and brought them back to sense everything and how it occurred; communicating the story without words, but through architecture.
The core piece of this project was the benches and the stories and feelings poured into them. One bench was created for each of the 184 lives lost, and each name was engraved onto it and any family member who also passed is listed in the pool underneath the benches to ensure families remain connected despite their age. Organization was done by the victim’s age at that exact moment in time. The age range was laid out and spaced evenly throughout the memorial, and benches were grouped by age and aligned with a line parallel to the trajectory the plane took when it crashed into the Pentagon. The direction the benches’ name engraving was read in also pointed to where they were when they died; away from the Pentagon indicated the plane, and towards indicated they were in the Pentagon during the crash. It all has a very quiet and humble presence as it individually recognizes ordinary people; not by a wall of names or simple nod to remembering, but separate structures allotted to each life.
Of all, the most compelling idea to me was the mood and feeling of the memorial that KBAS created through architecture. The zero-line marked the beginning of the memorial, but it was more than that. Walking across that line, visitors are brought back to 9:37 AM on September 11, 2001 and frozen in time and left to experience that tragic event in safety; to experience the physical loss, the emotional turmoil. Yet they can feel connected to every one of those who lost their life and feel what happened there. This memorial does not just allow us to remember, but to go back; immersed in that devastating moment to see how it all transpired and continue to do so for generations of Americans to know, to relive, after those who lived through it have all passed.
Pentagon Memorial - KBAS
Photo #1: https://washington.org/DC-guide-to/pentagon-memorial
Photo #2: http://kbas.co/home-3/uncategorized/pentagon-memorial/
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Beauty in Efficiency (Blog #8 RE-SUBMISSION)
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Beauty comes with simplicity. If a structure is cluttered with details in attempt to force its beauty, it instantly fails. This chapel, constructed of mostly glass and cast concrete, is not about decoration and extraneous detail, but elegance and simplicity. Its glass walls seem to fall away to embrace the surrounding land and distant mountains and yield an illusion of a free-floating roof, further expressed by its two-dimensional sinusoidal pattern. The invisible walls are not even walls at all, but a boundary that defines and encloses a new use of space while leaving connections open to the world; like a tent made of one large window that provides both safety and exposure. To maintain this idea, cross-shaped beams are used where structure and support is necessary but are minimal in size and also function to connect to the experiences inside. The roof reminds me of a scene with bright white sheets drying on a clothesline during a warm summer day. The breeze sends waves across the sheet as it ripples and sways above the ground revealing the beauty underneath; the church inside. Unlike many large churches that shoot into the sky and spread across a large area of land, this one is known because of its simplicity; and that is a good thing. It is only one level; one room, but within that small space is contained raw beauty without anything extra to complicate things and distract from the purpose and focus of the space; heaven and Earth. Here, less is truly more.
Steyn Studio’s Bosjes Chapel
Photo & Project: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/03/07/bosjes-chapel-undulating-roof-steyn-studio-tv3-architects-vineyard-witzenberg-south-africa/?li_source=LI&li_medium=bottom_block_1
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Cities & Memory 4 (Blog #3 RE-SUBMISSION)
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“Beyond six rivers and three mountain ranges rises Zora, a city that no one, having seen it, can forget. But not because, like other memorable cities, it leaves an unusual image in your recollections. Zora has the quality of remaining in your memory point by point, in its succession of streets, of houses along the streets, and of doors and windows in the houses, though nothing in them possesses a special beauty or rarity. Zora’s secret lies in the way your gaze runs over patterns following one another as in a musical score where not a note can be altered or displaced.”
Beyond six freeways and three supermarkets rises another typical city’s suburban neighborhood that is not unlike the one just a mile down the road. “Though nothing in them possesses a special beauty or rarity,” the homes are memorable for their efficiency of space and the window into the life of their residents. Underneath it all lies logic and order in an organized grid from which a unique personal style blossoms in each componential square of the grid of a different home in color, material, door, roof; and varying cars, trees, shades of grass. This neighborhood is compact and interconnected, yet each component is its own story; every minute detail possesses its own memory. The vehicle with which to experience this in its clear and concise pattern is the direction and flow of the street as the eye trails along to observe the individual qualities of each home in precise succession.
Photo: http://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-aerial-view-of-suburban-homes-in-columbia-village-subdivision-boise-12924776.html
Quotes: Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Ayres Hall & Neyland Stadium (Blog #2 RE-SUBMISSION)
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The placement of Ayres speaks to its symbolic image of UT. Synonymous to the Parthenon looking over ancient Athens, it sits atop “the hill” of the university and looks over the entire campus to display its beauty and integrity, and the power of the university. Its clock-tower serves as both a visual and auditory reminder of time to those lost in their studies and those captured by the game below. The circular wall of buildings surrounding Ayres define the boundary between education and athletics; work and play; the community of the university and the community of Tennessee.
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The physical presence and sheer size of Neyland Stadium needs no introduction. It has become a crowning piece of the experience of not only UT but Knoxville as well. The location relative to Ayres speaks to a dichotomy between knowledge and sport. Neyland sits vertically lower than Ayres, lending to a feeling of a loss of composure and sophistication in the name of destroying the other team, akin to a nation gone to battle, yet returning home from war and moving up to Ayres to return to a superior level of thinking and prepare for another day. 
Ayres Hall and Neyland Stadium celebrate UT’s achievements and successes. One of academic rigor and the other of athletic triumph. Both serve as a meeting place; whether for intensive learning or exciting football games, they act to serve for students, faculty, and anyone in between to gather and be a part of one campus, of one group. Ayres displays the power of education and the university, made to be seen both as a singular definition of academia but also as a part of the whole experience of the campus, as is Neyland Stadium. As to why these buildings receive so much attention and praise is partly due to their design itself; they are the epitome of architecture at UT, especially so when compared to the mostly hideous buildings that also must call UT home. The other answer comes from their order and defining of experience within their walls; as all important architecture, both Neyland and Ayres tell a story through their design and history through architecture.
Photo of Ayers Hall: math.utk.edu
Photo of Neyland Stadium: bigorangefootball.com
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Norwegian Landmarks (Blog #1 RE-SUBMISSION)
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Amid high mountains and heavy plant life juts out a modern style outlook comprised of wood, metal, and a single glass pane. Its curved drop off follows the steep slope of the mountains themselves and seems to flow straight down into the river below. Another view of this mountain overlook shows a glass barrier both to keep visitors safe while allowing them to see straight through it, like it was never there. The drop off accentuates this effect even more by quickly disappearing out of sight like a wooden waterfall over the edge of the cliff. This is not a cave nor a tent, but a direct imitation of nature in both design and in the way it exposes us to the world for unobtrusive observation. In that moment looking out from the glass barrier, visitors are given nothing to feel within the confines of human influence on the world. They feel naked, like they have been stripped of all internal security and grounding and left to experience the landscape for what it truly is.
Photo #2: https://www.tripadvisor.com/LocationPhotoDirectLink-g678207-d2108391-i118748496-Stegastein_Lookout-Aurland_Municipality_Sogn_og_Fjordane_Western_Norway.html
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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The Binary Library (Review #2)
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This project offers a solution to the issue of very little public technology resources in an ever-increasing technological world. A center was designed especially for children and young adults in low income areas who cannot afford to have that technology in their own homes. Nicole deals with a specific area of east Tennessee scattered with low income schools, but I could imagine centers in any location worldwide regardless of income status. She proposed a center in a pre-existing Knoxville building that will be redesigned in a K-12 youth center layout consisting of spaces and rooms for learning code and exposing kids to technology to allow them to create anything and dream big. It is marketed as a hangout center with everything from large computer labs for kids to work on their own projects while seeing and learning what others are doing in an extremely social and connected way down to personal areas for quiet work. When ready for a break from work and study, there are areas designated for kids to interact with each other in a tech-free space. The main exterior wall would be filled with an array of computer monitors to attract newcomers and anyone just passing by. Underneath this amazing solution and implementation of technology lies an equally interesting architecture for such a creative, connected, and technology focused environment to exist and function in. The space was designed using a 3-D grid with specific zones and intended circulation paths for people to flow through as they move about the center. All walls and many surfaces were created using a modular felt tile system that magnetically attached them to a steel grid wall and helped to deaden the sound in such a smaller, more dense area. This idea was truly amazing in both being a moveable tile, two words that used to not go together at all, and something that shared an idea with the eventual use of the space; to encourage creativity and change as minds expand and grow. The critics praised her for breaking the assumptions and challenges with the previously permanent tile medium she chose to employ in the space. One critic also suggested using pull out wall dividers to create a more flexible layout and diversity of uses. They expanded on her idea in suggesting more and different types of tile and material used based on the use of space like desired sound deadening, reflectivity of surfaces, and translucence to give sight into new, unexplored areas of the center. The Binary Library reinvigorates the idea of the stale, boring public library and brings it new life in the 21st century all while fostering creativity and reaching out to families and kids who could not otherwise afford to use and experience technology. 
Nicole Niezgoda’s Binary Library
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Environments for Living (Review #1)
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The project dealt with issues of middle-class American housing and improving the problems with the way homes are marketed and sold and ultimately breaks the barrier of how homes are perceived to explore the experience of good architecture and the qualities that come with it. Currently, connection to nature has given way to a mechanical model of residential life; modern housing has become machined living. Psychological needs like a feeling of love and belonging, esteem, and self-actualization are not being met. No consideration is given to peoples’ lifestyles and the many potential uses and functions of space. These issues are what Environments for Living intend to solve through a new digital platform and create a space to display homes qualities and the potential experience within versus the purely quantitative selling points currently used. The website would list homes and educate and emphasize qualities of health, performance, energy, and creating a personal experience for owners. Quantitative specifications like square footage, price, and number of bathrooms or bedrooms are still important and necessary, but what matters and what comes first are these qualities. It does not matter how big a house is if its space cannot be utilized in a way that engages and benefits those who live there. After the closing date, it is quality that has the most significance. One critique of the design suggested a need to better analyze what people want before they begin to search for a home; similar to data collection that retailers like Amazon use to suggest potentially interesting products to consumers based on search history and previous purchases. I agree with this statement. If that could be solved, the daunting task of home buying could be eased if suggestions could be given to buyers on a more personalized, experience based level that even realtors could not provide.
Logan Higgins’ Environments for Living
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Living with Nature (Blog #12)
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At first, I almost skipped by this Dezeen story, as the vertical boards that encompass the exterior walls made the home look like a huge heatsink clad with fins abound, but it quickly grew on me. The more I looked, the more I realized how perfect this home is. The vertical boards serve to give a full, relatively uninterrupted radial view of the South African landscape while still providing privacy by blocking inward views from all directions except straight on. The resident can experience the surrounding world without feeling as if they are also on display for the whole world. The immense detail in the construction alone is incredible. Here, everything matters. The direction and placement of wood planks, the fastening of wood and steel, and the geometric art that is the exposed frame is all pertinent to the idea and the experience of the house. The clash of natural and industrial, wood and steel, is embraced and celebrated. The steel has already begun to slightly oxidize, but this was intentional. The entire home, including the wood, was left untreated. Today it looks new, tomorrow and many years from now it will have aged and changed alongside the life around it. This dynamic design intertwines and connects it with nature itself. This house is not an aesthetically everlasting structure; it is now a part of the experience of life that will live and die with it.
Malan Vorster’s Tree House Residence
Photos & Project: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/04/19/malan-vorster-treehouse-residence-views-cape-town-forest-architecture-residential-south-africa/
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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des_read.listen.write
1. Romance
Seeking a beautiful Island flower, the naive and inexperienced man wishes to steal a woman off her feet. He is warned of what is to come of disgracing the Island women; a hundred men armed with swords would surround him and a great war would befall. Careless of his mother’s warning, he takes the best of the stallions and rumbles off to woo the Island flower. The hilly countryside lush with greenery of tall grasses and colorful flowers fly by as his horse gallops towards the island.
2. War
Inside, a warm crackling fire and smooth flickering candles dimly light his wooden home. He sits around his table, without his Island flower, to hear the news of her betrayal, of her lies. Outside, a strong storm is brewing in the night; lightning in the distance bleeds light into the home through the gaps between the wall’s boards, and rain begins to loudly pierce the tin roof while ensuing thunder rattles the door in its frame and shakes the ground beneath his feet. Like the storm, anger and fury builds inside him. He seeks the taste of war, the plunder of gold and silver, and lust for women. Beneath his iron armor and steel weapons and thirst for blood, he is impervious to all and is ready for battle but not without the warning of oncoming hardships if war ensues.    
3. Hunt
Abandoning his Island flower, he seeks a new wife. In demand of the best of the flock; the tallest, the loveliest, and the fairest of all the daughters, he must first defeat the Demon’s elk to prove worthy of the greatest of the daughters. Challenged, he begins the hunt for the infamous and invisible elk. He once again gears up and seeks a pair of skis and poles to travel in search of the beast. Drudging across the land, he remains quiet and patient, for any alert to the elk and he may never come to see it. White powder blankets the land. He travels across snowcapped mountains, swamps, open glades, and all the land between. The trees are empty and dead, plants buried in the snow. Life is frozen in time as is his in this infinite and unending hunt.  
4. Capture
Following failure in capture of the beast once, he contemplates whether to try again or return home empty handed, without a wife. Hungry, cold, and with broken skis in hand, he pushes on and perseveres. He pleads God for skis which are straighter and lighter to embark on a quest for the Demon’s land, where the elk lives. A winter storm has passed over him. Through a blizzard of wind, snow, and ice, he must abandon all society on a trek across the slopes and high mountains. Through the thousands of needles on each evergreen, the wind whistles and screams like the screech of a Demon. With each breath, the bite of the bitter cold is slowly freezing his soul from the inside out. Determined to win, he endures the harshness of the landscape and the face of death in front of him. Many nights and many days elapse. The moment before admitting defeat, he finds the elk’s lair and coaxes the beast outside and captures it. He has won.
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Life and Death (Blog #11)
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This repurposed apartment in Austria used to be a workshop for military vehicles. While the building’s new life is far different from its past, its history shines through the aged brick left open on some walls. The open layout feels almost overwhelming, but the use and placement of furniture divides the apartment into distinct sections for their respective purposes. The implementation of lighting also plays a huge role here. A large majority of the light comes from sunlight through the many upper-level windows along with accenting lights. The openness and light coloration help this sunlight reflect and illuminate the entire space. The industrial feel of the aged brick is broken and contrasted by the sterile and modern look achieved by the lightly colored concrete and open architecture of the home. The combination of the highly detailed curvature and sharp angles of the concrete structure along with the ‘white’ sterile feel it gives off reminds me of a rendering of the future done by someone in the 70′s; like the inside of an alien spaceship made for humans. The arches and curves that connect the entire space together are like the connections of nerves in the human body; an interconnecting network providing travel of information and life. Life and sterility combined into one. This duality culminates in the outdoor garden; a plain looking and dead space yet it provides life to a single tree in its center. That is what makes this space so interesting. It feels dead and alive all at the same time.
Smartvoll’s Loft Apartment
Photos and Project: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/03/29/smartvoll-sculptural-concrete-staircase-loft-salzburgs-panzerhalle-interior-renovation-residential-salzburg-austria/
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Des_Writing_1
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Light of Enemy, Light of Freedom
Emerging from the darkness, I see the light posts illuminating the hazy city street and the green glow of the phone booth; my escape from the matrix. The light at the end of the tunnel. The dead of night is interrupted by the dooming headlights of those to kill me. In this last moment exists either my death or my freedom. I can taste the feeling of escape but not without the aftertaste of my enemies to ruin it all. Light shines on both. Life. Death. I must decide. Bleeding, fearful, tired. Yet I must remain strong if I am to beat the agent’s truck to the phone booth.  The squealing sound of spinning tires fill the silence. I can hear it ringing in the distance, waiting for me to answer. Waiting for me to live. Me against a steel beast. Both running for the same thing.
The Matrix, 1999
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Concrete in the Woods (Blog #10)
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Lush green hills surround this three-unit holiday resort, and it doesn’t seem as if there is any other human impact nearby. It is shut out from the rest of the world. It is a stretch to compare this to a cabin in the woods, but that’s how I see it; a concrete, modern version of a luxury cabin, with a pool. The resort incorporates many stacked cantilevered sections jutting out in different directions while sloping downwards along the hillside it sits on. One thing that stood out was how dead the grass looks, especially next to such thick foliage nearby. I think, however, that this was the point. The structure is in no way natural looking and it already contrasts heavily with the natural world around it, so leaving the splotchy sections of grass compliment that idea of natural and man-made worlds coexisting without too much imposition on each other. Inside, the relatively mono-colored concrete interior is by no means unattractive, but the contrast achieved by the sky-blue curtains is beautiful. The moment I saw the photo, my eyes were quickly drawn to them. I imagined them all closed on a bright, sunny day, and how it would look to see the sun light them up to look just like the sky outside. Not only do these curtains function for privacy, but they also won’t enclose guests inside. They can still feel as if they were looking through the windows at the atmosphere around them. The many angles and planes of the concrete apartments orient guests in different directions, different heights. They could stay in all three units and experience a different landscape each time.
Holiday Resort by IDMM Architects
Photos & Project: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/03/25/concrete-volumes-cantilever-twist-provide-mountain-views-u-retreat-holiday-resort-residential-architecture/
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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The Matrix_Des.Seq_1
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Light, and the lack of it, play an important role in this entire sequence. It leaves an eerie feeling in the air and it draws attention to lit portions of each scene. It leaves the memory in a trance of the unknown, allowing the brain to fill in the gaps.
 In the dead of night, police lights illuminate a dark alley awaiting capture of a girl when a dark vehicle approaches.
Inside a room lit only by a computer screen, the surrendering girl is pending arrest from approaching officers. At the precise moment, however, she resists and using the objects around her, fights.
She stands amid dead bodies, lit by flashlights and a dim wall light. She has what she came for, and now she needs to escape the building and the oncoming agents.
Down the dark hall, an elevator filled with agents begin to pile out in pursuit. In quick timing, she must decide quickly where to go and how to do it. One wrong move and she is dead.
She climbs a ladder onto the building’s roof. In the background, the skyline of a city provides all the light in this scene. The chase in this land of dark night is on.
From an upside-down view of an alley facing the night sky, she leaps from one building to another. The component of light here comes from a billboard and its glow onto the buildings. Soon following come the agent and clumsy officers behind her.
Now ascending and descending the rooftop’s crests, she sprints on the loud metal surfaces as a sunglass and suit clad agent is not far behind. The night lit skyline makes another appearance to light the scene.
She’s approaching the cliff of the building and a long stretch across a street to the next. She gains speed and springs across, just barely missing the edge and falling to her death. The agent also makes this jump, however, the officers abilities hinder them and end their pursuit.
She then dives across yet another alleyway into the window of the next building, tubling down stairs and lands facing the window, awaiting the agent to be next inside. She lies there, waiting for a shot in the almost black staircase with one ceiling light swaying back and forth off to the side of the window.
Outside, the telephone booth that is her way of escape is in sight. A truck pulls up, and spinning its’ wheels, is about to crash into it and trap her there. Both she and the truck make a break for the booth in the streets lit by the night sky and the ominous truck’s headlights.
The Matrix sequence link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxNiEEtYe4Q
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Living in Nature (Blog #9)
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This small tree house themed hotel in China provides a functional living space without imposing on the surrounding nature. Mimicking a tree itself, it joins the vast forest and provides full radial views of the mountainous land. Each room is separated into its own irregularly shaped box with a large glass window on the outermost wall. This method of sectioning off each space within the hotel yields to a feeling of observing separate sections of the life of those inside; like looking in the numerous windows of a traditional hotel from across a street and seeing the functions and tasks of the people inside in their everyday lives. Fully embracing the tree house theme, the hotel is made primarily from vertical wooden planks and boxes are stacked randomly around a central circular staircase that links each room to the others. Comparable to a tree’s trunk that provides connections and delivery of life to each branch. Above the spiral staircase a small tree sprouts above the structure. As this grows, it will further mask the built part of this tree house and become more and more tree-like. Many animals have come to call trees their home and now humans can as well.  
Bengo Studio’s Tree House Hotel
Photos & Project: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/03/22/spiral-staircase-qiyunshan-tree-hotel-bengo-studio-anhui-province-mountains-china/
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taarant-arc111-blog · 8 years ago
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Beauty in Efficiency (Blog #8)
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Beauty comes with simplicity. If a structure is cluttered with details to force its beauty, it instantly fails. This chapel, constructed of mostly glass and cast concrete, is not about decoration, but efficiency. Its glass walls seem to fall away to embrace the vineyards and orchards surrounding it and the mountains far in the distance. The roof is the first thing recognized; the way it flows over the building and encompasses it inside, giving view inside or out only when it curves towards the sky. Its white coloration and sinusoidal pattern are indicative of the blanket of safety and security inside its walls provided by the church. The pattern of flow is repeated below the chapel with a large pool in front of the entrance. The mirrored reflection of the roof into the water below is something of beauty, like an oyster opening to reveal a pearl inside. Except here the pearl is the worship of a God. The intended use of the building shows in its structure as well; the frame is in the shape of a cross and is repeated around all corners and walls. Unlike most churches, this one is known because of its simplicity. It is only one level, but within that level is contained raw beauty without anything extra to complicate things. Here, less is truly more.
Steyn Studio’s Bosjes Chapel
Photo & Project: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/03/07/bosjes-chapel-undulating-roof-steyn-studio-tv3-architects-vineyard-witzenberg-south-africa/?li_source=LI&li_medium=bottom_block_1
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