Monday, 22 October 2012

Could be interesting to get involved...

Take a look

Water Light Graffiti Installation | Antonin Fourneau Sustainably Leaving a Mark on the City






During his residency at the Digitalarti Artlab in Paris, Antonin Fourneau realized a spectacular and poetic installation that manages to surprise and engage the passer-by in a refreshing way. With his Water Light Graffiti project, the French artist built an LED-based surface that reacts to water, creating light patterns and effects that allow anybody to create fascinating paintings on the street.
Installed in Poitiers in July, the wall was met with great enthusiasm by people of all ages, tapping into that kind of playful interaction only great public art can unlock. Apart from the sheer awe inspired by the possibility of painting with light, it is worth mentioning that – while allowing anybody to express themselves in a public space – with its natural graffiti approach, the work maintains a sustainable impact on the environment in which it sits.
This work is reminiscent of other remarkable endeavours with comparable effects – albeit utilizing different technology – like the famous light projections by Graffiti Research Lab and eco-friendly ad agency Green Graffiti.

Photos courtesy Antonin Fourneau.



















Peoples Meeting Dome | Kristoffer Tejlgaard & Benny Jepsen









Canadian architects Kristoffer Tejlgaard and Benny Jepsen have slightly altered the mathematical elements of a geodesic dome to form a new modular pavilion.
To generate ideas for future housing, the architects adapting the triangular composition of a standard dome to enclose a kitchen, bar, dining area and stage for a temporary installation.
By using different sized triangular frames with both spherical and perpendicular surfaces, a new lattice form was birthed from that of a traditional geodesic dome. The result is a method of construction that allows surfaces to be extruded, scaled, pushed and pulled while maintaining logic.
Through this altered composition, small niches and crevices opened. Custom-made steel footings connect the wooden frame, made of locally-sourced pine. Steel nodes were made to fit standard rafter sizes of 2x4 and 3x6 inch timber, making the whole design movable and adaptable.
The façade's curved surfaces are covered with recycled wood panels, creating opaque faces. Perpendicular surfaces made of PVC film allow light to enter while opening views to the outside. The project was commissioned by BL (Denmark Public Housing) for the Peoples Meeting in Denmark.
Photos courtesy of Kristoffer Tejlgaard & Benny Jepsen.


BIM!

Bim Burton is our very own Bim who works in the Bartlett workshop. I came across this blog that one of his children has made about his projects. Bim is quite often working on his own commissions downstairs, last year I found him making more of these stools below. Feel free to bug him, he has some great stories!


Workshop 1: Trestle

Reference: ‘The Art of Japanese Joinery’ – Kiyosi Seike [Published by Weatherhill 1996]

In this 24 hour design and make exercise you will be introduced to timber jointing techniques and will be asked to work in initially in pairs to reproduce half each of a pre-selected joint. Photographs of the joint types will act as a guide and it is essential that the joints are tight and require no glue or fixings.

You will then individually design and make a Trestle.
Definition: ‘A framework in the form of a horizontal member supported at each end by a pair of splayed legs, used to carry scaffold boards, a table top etc.’ New Collins Dictionary

The Trestle can draw upon any of the jointing systems either made or inspired by those illustrated in ‘The Art of Japanese Joinery’. This design charette also calls for adaptation of the techniques you have learnt and also invention within a short period of time.

You will each be issued with one length of 50x50mm PAR (planed all round) softwood from which you are to make a Trestle that is 450mm high and capable of supporting a timber bench-top or table-top.

We advise that you do some research on types of Trestle before the session but use the workshop time to design, develop and refine details.

 Sammai-Gumi | Adapted open slot mortice and tenon joints by SH
Ai-Gaki | Adapted cross lap joint (centre) by XZ
Kashigi-Oire | Adapted notched mortice and tenon joints by JS
Kashigi-Oire | Notched mortice and tenon joints by KS and PN
Hira-Hozo | Adapted  mortice and tenon joints by FL

Moss & Co. Timber

Just added to the sidebar on the right, are Moss & Co. Timber: A timber merchants in Hammersmith with reasonable pricing and a student discount. Their website is also very useful for starting out in researching different types of timber, as there are photographs of the timber's colouring, and grain, a description of the types of crafting process best suited to each timber, and its general applications.

Image of wood sample

They have a comprehensive catalogue which can be downloaded, and they also have a price list indicative of what kind of price you will need to be paying for their wares. The staff are very friendly and it is good practice to take a cutting list and/or drawing with you to the yard as they will be interested in the project you are undertaking, and how best they can suit your needs.

Saturday, 20 October 2012

Scatterings | CITA




Scatterings A research project by CITA (conducted as part of the PhD research by Jacob Riiber )The project Scatterings explores how the principles of self-organizing systems can be applied as a means to distribute component based material structures. This is hypothesized to allow architecture access to a novel non-linear complexity permitting a more adaptive and reactive design space.
The project departs from a conceptual framework addressing the idea of composite materials; here specifically the idea of combining individual sheets of acrylic plate material by casting them inside a frame of silicone rubber. These components where within the project distributed within a bespoke digital design space in two steps. Firstly, components where distributed as a 2 dimensional diagrammatic agent based system in which different kinds of relationshipsbetween components where formed. Secondly,as a 3 dimensional simulation determining the behavior of self-organizing structure under gravity. The initial distribution was prepare for this simulation by distributing the components onto a circular area on which the placement of folding and pulling operations would naturally force the structure out of its 2 dimensionality.
The project was finalized as a 1:1 demonstrator as part of an exhibition for DAC (Danish Architecture Center), where a structure consisting of several hundred individually cast elements occupied a vertical space within the building. In this context the individual components where developed with colored acrylic plates in order to apply functionality to the structure inspired by the concept of stained glass windows:coloring the exhibition space by projecting light through the structure. Placing the system within a concrete context like this allowed us to examine the accuracy of the simulation and the possibilities, as well as potential disadvantages, of using an agent based approach to design.

Team:Jacob Riiber Andrius VilcinskasMartin TamkeHenrik Leander EversMalene HvidtHans BærholmKristjana Sigurdardottir