Lorem Ipsum: Narratives of Architecture is the first studio to be subjected to the experimental format of a jury presented in Pedagogies, the Public & Juries. The rounds of this jury will be released and segmented as the studio was experienced by the students. Here we begin with Nolli in Los Angeles, the first phase of Lorem Ipsum.

The first stage of the studio takes its name from Nolli's map. Students were to make a direct tracing of Los Angeles through its representation of Plan, bringing it further to trace the representation of its figure-ground relationship. The task was to not simply produce a script that read as a city but to take an image and translate it into objects. From there the studio was to begin to consider the activities that take place within such space on a daily basis. As this continuous tracing occurs, one cannot help but daydream about what occurs in the proximity of the line we are tracing. This brought a deep understanding of the corners, nooks, and cracks of Los Angeles’ mapping. This sensibility opens the tracer to discover nuances within formal relationships and instill them in their work.

Questions regarding each stage of the studio were posed to the students prior to posting. What follows is the students’ experience of this studio as expressed through their answers.

What did you learn about Los Angeles? 

• Pierandozzi
  • I learned that there is always something to learn or observe about the city that you had not imagined. As an LA native and someone who frequently visited the fashion district I found things that I had not expected or observed before, just by changing the lens through which I observed them. There are parts of my culture as an Angeleno that I expected to see as I always do there but I became extremely intrigued by the things I had not seen before, like someone bathing themselves under a faucet a few doors from where I bought my prom dress. 
• Yupeng
  • I learned that Los Angeles is a city with a low density that shows totally different characteristics from other developed cities: vast land with low blocks and highways, so vehicles becomes a necessary factor in urban planning and people moving. As shown in the interlacing model, space can be divided by air and ground, which origins from Los Angeles’ physical representation.
    
• Ordaz
  • I learned that Los Angeles has changed the way I experience time. A city like L.A. has taught me how to prioritize momentum, because as soon as you slowdown in any aspect of your life here, you lose momentum in everything you hold on to. Los Angeles is a place where you come and hold on to for as long as you can. Being a global city, it brings a lot of competition, and with competition, it brings the ambition out of most people. It is a domino effect and it has led me to this moment in my life. Los Angeles is a great place to experiment and test your own boundaries, but I do not believe that this city can be trusted with things we hold close to. 
• Rose
  • It is constantly under construction, you can see the detour sign all over in downtown. It is such a big city that if you don’t have a car you can’t really go anywhere.
• Alhomaidah
  • It has layers in how it can be experienced.
• Liu
  • I learned that Los Angeles is a city with discrete scenes. A factory sits right besides residential area, but you don’t see a clue of each other. It’s a collection of activities, plazas, life, people pick their life and ignore other things. Every two scenes have their connection, and you hardly notice other things when you go from one place to another. Los Angeles is full of fragments.

How should we understand cities? 

• Ordaz
  • It is up the individual to make their own set of rules to understand cities. As a society, we might know where other people’s morals stand, but one can only hope that our intentions are good. In my own opinion, a city is not just composed of buildings and objects, but of culture, and how society functions in it is what makes up a city. So I'm not here to tell anyone how to understand it.

• Pierandozzi
  • We should understand cities at a wide range of scales that relate to human activity. The main scale being the individual. Not just proportionally, but as a life that is interaction with the space.
• Liu
  • When people gather together they build a city, the elements of a city are very similar to each other. But after hundreds of years, cities develop different lifestyles. A city receives its identity once its people find their way to live in it.
• Wu
  • This question reminds me of a story I saw a long time ago. It said that there was a famous architect, he got a chance to design a building in a totally strange place. He had never been there before. Instead of just visiting the site, he decided to live in that town for two months. Every day he just walked around and talked to people. Then he designed an amazing building that was perfect for that site. I think the best way to understand cities is to experience them. 

• Peng
  • We should understand cities in how each part of it makes up the whole. I think every part of the city is unique in its own beauty. For example, Chinatown has its beauty in their characterized/cultural shapes. While such a difference in culture architecture and modern architecture comes together in one pot give the city its own flavor. 
• Rose
• By experiencing it.

How does memory play a role in this project? In Architecture?

• Peng
  • Memory plays a role in defining key characters of LA. It is the moments of certain corners, or maybe buildings that capture what Los Angeles is about. While in Architecture, we capture moments in buildings, spaces, and where we live to help us feel memorable about our lives.

• Rose
  • Usually, the focus on buildings is in their form; the understanding of a city is based on our experience. The memory of what I’ve seen and heard when I traveled through the city does affect what I make. These memories subconsciously influence my choices on the appearance and placement of objects, as well as the composition and movement of cities.
• Ordaz
  • Our memories are our main sources of inspiration. With the tasks that we were to complete, it was critical that we kept referring back to them. The gestures, figures, and movements that were drawn kept referring back to our personal memories we encountered throughout the city. There are times we look for inspiration, happiness or even nostalgia. When we seek those things that cannot be physically encountered, we look back into our own memories and try to recapture a certain feeling those moments provoked. I don’t see it any differently when referring to architecture. We draw so much from our own memories that we find ourselves in deep thought of what those moments made us feel at that time. 
• Wu
  • While I film I have a memory of what is happening there and how I want to interpret it in my spatial diagrams. I want to show different movements in my diagram, including cars' movement in the tunnel, trains' movement along the track and also electric current's movement through the wire. That movement happened at a different level, different direction. So I had an idea in mind that I am going to create some space in my drawings that different circulation happens at different levels. Then while I was doing my drawings, I would unconsciously use this kind of space organization. I feel like that's how my memory works for this project. It's more like I had a really vague space concept in mind through filming, then I interpreted that thought into space while I doing my drawings.
• Liu
  • People describe an object based on their memory. When they describe architecture they describe how the space was used. Memory is the subject of this project, also the impetus of it.