Archinect - Kunstakademiets Arkitektskole (Antonio)

Thesis semester

2011-02-16T10:21:24-05:00

Another semester goes by. I’m entering the final semester of the master’s program, the thesis semester. Last semester was different to what I expected. It was not a design semester but rather we researched and prepared for out thesis preparation. The last month of the semester, January, we spent time writing our program booklet. It is very open on how you handle this booklet and approach your program. I decided to include a lot of information of the research that led me to choose my project.
Last semester I started by analyzing the fort typology and by researching into the current use of the Fort Ricasoli (my site). As I mentioned on previous posts it’s being used for filming movies, particularly ones who deal with ancient cities and civilizations. Fort Ricasoli has been the site for movies such as Gladiator, Troy and Agora. Malta, is a very prominent place for movie filming due to its geographical location, its history and the ability to resemble to a variety of place, including ...

Fort Ricasoli and Trip to Italy

2010-11-02T17:27:13-04:00

I was not allowed to photograph on the site, due to restrictions by some of restrictions of the company leasing the grounds of Fort Ricasoli. It was a nice challenge because this forced me to draw more and I even dared to explore again my roots and watercolor a little bit. One of the nights in Malta I attended a party of some of the bachelor projects at the architecture school in Malta and I met Matthew. His bachelor project (and of some other 5 people) was in Fort Ricasoli. He hooked me up with a lot of good information including, CAD drawings, aerial photographs, a sketch up model and some historic background as well. I also found some information at the Malta National Library and also at the National Archives. We found the Maltese to be very generous and willing to share the information they had. While doing my research on military architecture and the fortifications of Malta I found a good architectural historian, Steven Spiteri. His books include some his hand sketch illustrati...

Fieldtrip to Malta

2010-10-20T04:34:34-04:00

I'm writing from Malta. We are on the final week of our 2 week field trip to Valletta. Similar to last year in Sarajevo our aim in this trip is to pursue our interest(building program) and to find a site where we would like to spend the next semester researching and preparing material for our thesis project during the second semester. It's a very ambitious but exciting task. The city of Valletta is a limestone fortress surrounded by two harbours and the Mediterranean sea. Valletta is only 0.3 sq mi, is highly dense at about 19,000 inhabitants per sq mi. This gives a population of around 6,000 people. There are other cities across from Valletta and around the coast which creates a larger urban area of around 350,000 inhabitants. It is one of the most dense islands in the world. Valletta's Grand Harbour has been the scene for some of the most important naval battles in history. The strategic location of the Island has attracted a whole range of civilizations, including the Phoenician...

From Sarajevo to Malta

2010-09-30T22:17:35-04:00

I’m back into blogging mode. I stop writing last semester and I didn’t
get a chance to even wrap up the first year of my Master’s. As I
mentioned on my previous postings we focused last year on projects in
Sarajevo. The first term the goal was to develop an architectural
proposal. The second term consisted in redefining the proposal,
finding an area of interest and further developing them. The
parameters that we got were quite broad, so it gave us a wide range of
possibilities. It was very interesting to see what everyone developed
at the end of the semester. The year culminated with a mini-conference
where we presented our projects in a digital format. That was also a
challenge since most of the students in our department at school put
most of their effort in building physical models. The topic of the
mini-conference was “Architectures of Persistent Transform”

A flyer for the mini-conference:
http://www.karch.dk/files/cita/phil/ekblog/briefs/100617_EKmini-conference.pd...

Woven wood workshop

2010-01-13T03:45:16-05:00

Some weeks ago we finished an 8 day workshop with CITA, Center for Information Technology and Architecture. It’s one of the four Institutes at the Kunstakademiets Arkitektskole. Their research and execution focuses on the intersection of architecture and digital technologies. The theme of the workshop Woven Wood Architecture is an example of one of their ongoing projects. During the workshop we explored the possibilities of using wood, thin strips of MDF, as the material to weave walls. We explored a variety of joints and methods of treating the wood to understand the performance and later we build them at 1:1. It was a good break from our studio projects. We also got a chance to learn Grasshopper, a plug-in for Rhino. With Grasshopper we introduced a variety of parameters into the design, and we were able to have a clearer concept and design. Here are some images of the workshop:

We started another workshop this week in conjunction with Unit 14 at the Bartlett. We will be worki...

Climate Conference Copenhagen

2009-12-14T07:55:40-05:00

The COP15 started last week in Copenhagen. The city is packed of people from all over the world and there is a very tense environment in the city. There are a lot of police officers patrolling the city at all times. There was a big demonstration on Saturday around the city. Here is an image of the people marching through the city, as the sun is setting on the canal and with the coal plant in the background. There is a still a full week to go and I’m looking forward to some of the concerts, talks and events going around the city. It's a very interesting time to be around in Copenhagen.

Sarajevo-Part 3

2009-11-26T16:07:39-05:00

We are well in our way on our projects in Sarajevo. It’s been a while since the last time I posted on the blog, but I still want to share a bit more on our Sarajevo trip.
We had our first pin-up on the second week in Sarajevo to discuss mainly our sites, our analysis and ideas on the building program. It was a beautiful day in Sarajevo, so we held the pin-up outside our hotel, Hayat Hotel.

Pin-up

The hotel is located in one of the Mahalas (the Ottoman neighborhoods). It is a beautiful part of town and it’s very interesting to experience Sarajevo through the Muslim culture and it’s Ottoman roots.

Mahala

Sarajevo was founded by the Ottoman Empire in the 1450’s until the 18th century when it was conquered by the Austro-Hungarian Empire and burned down. One of the most important architecture buildings from the Ottoman era is the “Ottoman House” or Svrzo House. It’s a wood construction house, highly detailed through its complex wood carvings and rich plan. Through it’s layout cle...

Sarajevo Part II

2009-10-18T18:10:12-04:00

Ars Aevi
In 1992 during the siege of Sarajevo, a group of Intellectuals started an initiave to create a cultural project of worldwide artistic cooperation. The idea developed to create The Museum of Contemporary Art in Sarajevo. Artist from all over the world and other museums organized a yearly event where an assigned curator organizes an exhibition with world-class artist that will donate their artwork to the museum’s collection. Museums and cultural organizations from Milan, Istanbul, Ljubljana, Venice, Prato, among others have organized this yearly event and have achieved an impressive collection. The work will be exhibited on different spots of the city bridging the old town and the newer parts of Sarajevo. These new galleries will be designed by prominent architects and will adjoin to the main museum that Renzo Piano donated his design to Ars Aevi. Unfortunately, this art complex was intended to open in 2009, but it’s now delayed. Only a foot bridge that crosses the Milijacka...

Sarajevo Part I

2009-10-15T14:14:12-04:00

This year’s 2-week trip for department 2 occurred in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina (1 of 6 federal units in former Yugoslavia). The study trip involves students from every year at the Department 2. Each year class had different assignments and methods of approaching and analyzing the city and eventually relating it to the semester/year project. We are roughly 90 students plus professors, at Department 2.
The assignment for the English Master’s students was to absorb the city on your own and to start thinking of possible sites and a program for your building. Each day we walked for long hours, photographing, sketching, talking to people and essentially just trying to grasp the city. Sarajevo is located on a valley formed by the Dinaric Alps and situates itself along the Milijacka river. Sarajevo is a complex city to analyze without taking in considerations the religious diversity and the recent siege from 1992-1995 where the city was completely excommunicated from the rest of the...

Cheers from Copenhagen, Denmark

2009-09-28T04:46:18-04:00

Welcome to the Kunstakademiets Arkitektskole blog.
I’m enrolled in the new 2 year English Master Program at Department 2; Architecture, Town and Building. We are 22 students from a variety of backgrounds that will be launching this program. The group is composed of 11 local students (that did their Bachelor studies at KA) and 11 foreign applicants.
I personally come from Ecuador. I did my bachelor studies at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, USA. After graduating from school I moved New York City where I was working for the last 4 years. I decided to go back to school to get my Master’s and I found this new program in Denmark while looking at different schools in Europe. The program description caught my attention and decided to give it a try:

MA: Architecture in Urban Context
The Master’s programme in architecture is based on the Danish tradition of holistic, social architecture with an emphasis on field work, self-study and scale-gliding.
Inner-city field work seeks...