Archinect - UCLA (A Center for Ants?)

In reflection

2009-09-19T20:17:51-04:00

Wow. I can't believe that it's been almost 3 months since I graduated. In the last 3 months, it's been a roller coaster of emotions in every respect. A ride that I definitely wasn't anticipating when I first got to grad school, but my classmates and I were well aware of the grim reality of the "real world" months before we were to graduate. I have to say, also, that I didn't expect needing a while to recover from school, but the time has been nice. School's sustained intensity and the resulting isolation from the outside world totally shifted my mindset and it's taken a while to adapt to the pace of things. Another thing that I've realized was the amount of independence you have as a student. You're really able to do what you need to do in order to get things done and that kind of freedom is insanely liberating.

I've been bouncing around LA working for a few firms and doing odd jobs to get by, and consider myself lucky to be still active. However, working FOR someone is a strange ...

Wow, done! (almost)

2009-06-11T01:32:35-04:00

This will be a quick one as I'm taking very well to the luxuries of "regular" life. Finals was crazy. Absolutely crazy. Never has it been so drawn out and difficult. It also is amazing how things went considering how little sleep I got. But I'd never want to do it again.

Final jury was equally crazy. The undergrad studio I TA'ed for did very well and I was excited to see their work. Most of them pulled off good projects and I was psyched especially since we got Thom Mayne and Jesse Reiser to be on the morning session of the jury. The discussion was great and I think the kids were a little starstruck at times.

On our jury included: Eric Owen Moss (who we were unaware was showing up), Thom Mayne, Paola Antonelli, Hernan Diaz-Alonso, Florencia Pita, Kivi Sotamaa, Sylvia Lavin, and a grand entrance by Frank Gehry, who rolled up with an entourage 4 deep. Halfway through my review nonetheless. The jury of superstars attracted a huge audience and it got to be standing room only with peo...

Rearranging deck chairs...

2009-06-03T00:33:23-04:00

As we hurtle towards our final deadline (friday) I can't help but get a bit of the feeling that we're all just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. The industry's crippled at the moment and anyone who even bothered to put together work samples and a resume hasn't heard anything.

Meanwhile we're all scrambling to laser cut, 3d print, model, and draft. I'm fussing over little fillets and lineweights. The ivory tower of architectural academia has been a blessing as we're a little insulated from the stark realization of how bad it really is. Those of us that left work to come to school have heard horror stories trickling down the grapevine from former colleagues or smatterings of faculty gossip.

But first things first. Lineweights and boards. Plan on a very lengthy, perhaps a series of posts, post-graduation on school. It's been a wild ride and a few pangs of nostalgia have been creeping up. But that's usually soon replaced by the morning nausea from lack of sleep.

Fire up the ...

It's Architecture!

2009-05-21T01:00:56-04:00

I used to watch this all the time when I was a kid.

The nitty gritty

2009-05-01T00:51:48-04:00

First of all it's official. I'm finally a "candidate" for the masters degree.

Just an interesting visual survey I've started. It's always interesting to see what people are reading/researching. I've been doing an independent study creating a book of research and projects we've done in the last few quarters. Books are interesting. The other night, Jeff Kipnis noted a certain "forgetability" of magazines in that we see the same things over and over and are always drawn back to them (*ahem* Dwell or any men's health or women's interest magazines). But then books have an aura that's entirely different. Here are a few book collections on a few desks around here.

Formal Processes, Part III

2009-04-22T01:47:45-04:00

Interested in taking a more formal approach to design, I was experimenting by starting with a few formal techniques that I was interested in and then using diagrams and program etc. as a secondary organizing element.

So to begin with, after looking at the Zaha and UN Studio projects, I was interested in the idea of surface and how it remains undifferentiated in the development of a lot of projects. I think this is a positive thing for architecture. It implies a tectonic sensibility that is not bound to orthographic projections that we're accustomed to. The problem is always in dealing with continuity say between transitioning between floor and wall and how the limits of material continuity always come into play (which we don't have to worry so much about in 3d models on the computer). But despite these concerns...

Lets start with the idea of a twist...

The geometry generated in the twist becomes particularly interesting and elegant as the direction of the surface also bend...

Formal Processes Part II, Germany and Austria

2009-04-03T10:52:55-04:00

So in this past winter quarter, I had Dagmar Richter's studio. We were to design a ski resort hotel that was at a site of our choosing. Getting an opportunity to go to Austria and Germany, we took a week-long trip, staying southeast of Munich and jumping into Austria to look at ski-resorts there. I won't detail out the trip, but it was great loads of fun and we got to see a lot of great projects ranging from the little modernist gems like the Oud and Corbus at the Academy of Arts in Stuttgart to Zaha's Funicular Stations in Innsbruck. Good stuff.

Here's a brief slide show:

UN Studio Mercedes Benz Museum

Corbu @ Academy of Arts

HdM Allianz Arena

BMW Welt

Zaha Funicular

Innsbruck

Whiteout

Formal Processes... Part I

2009-04-03T10:35:17-04:00

So I've been tinkering around with the notion of process for the past two quarters now. For a long time I've been taking route that's much more of a bottom-up kind of process: identifying specific challenges, problems, etc. Through an iterative sequence of research, analysis, diagramming, I'd utilize primarily organizational solutions to create generative diagrams that would lead to the formalization of the project. The last two quarters, starting with the Tsukamoto studio, to a large extent, I've been experimenting with a more top-down formal approach to the process. Still I go through a basic series of analysis and research and some diagramming, but these would all lead to a more intuitive series of sketches in which the issues would be more loosely addressed by a larger formal sketch or idea. This formal sketch would slowly then be hammered out to architectualize it. It's been quite an interesting process and it's certainly helped develop a better series of techniques for me espe...

Crises in the studio. Is YOUR project next?

2008-12-07T14:41:09-05:00

So turns out all these students had their projects wayyyyy overleveraged on sleep. As projects have all run into the grim reality of studio, increasing numbers of students are finding they have to default on their sleep loans. Designers were overconfident and frivolities like explorations in window details and such minutia have been discovered when quality or even production of basic plans and elevations have gone largely ignored. Dark architectural times indeed.

My project is teetering on the brink but I'm getting a small bailout courtesy of Peet's Coffee. Some experts say this will not be enough. It'll have to do. For now.

Brilliant!

2008-11-28T18:26:47-05:00

Ok. I've had a long time fascination with Thomas Kinkade. The whole low-brow / high art / Benjamin Aura thing has always been of great interest to me. Oh, you've never heard of him? Well then... May I present Exhibit 1 which I consider one of the seminal works of his current contemporary period.

These are available at the nearest Kinkade Retailer in your mid-western shopping mall.

What's really interesting now is that Vanity Fair just published a memo within the Kinkade company that was leaked.

What I find fascinating and here's the connection to architecture is the absolute parametricization of a certain "mood" or "affect" that he's trying to achieve. I think this exemplifies both the good and the evil that can be contained within parametric architecture and design.

Kinkade is actually surprisingly articulate about the dissection of mood and affect. I'm going to have to think about this one more but it was too juicy not to post.

If you don't follow the link, here's the actu...

The eye of the storm...

2008-11-27T04:12:51-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving! And thank god for it. The quarter definitely started off a little easier than usual. Very light and well paced. So I thought it was going to be nice and easy. Then the storm clouds rolled in. I participated in a 6 week long competition called the NAIOP Southern California Real Estate Challenge. It was intense and tough but finally we get a VERY much needed break. Because of the competition I definitely fell behind in studio and now am racing to try to get back on top of things.

Now first a huge disclaimer, this is NOT an architecture competitiong. It's actually more focused upon real estate and finance. I participated with a team of 4 students from Anderson. In not so many words, you are given a site and a timeframe and have to come up with a development proposal which you pitch to the jury as you would a group of investors. We would have our UCLA team of 4 Anderson MBA students plus myself up against a team of MREDs and MBAs from the Marshall School at USC. Th...

John Entenza vs. Paris Hilton

2008-10-27T04:29:59-04:00

So I'm in the midst of prepping for a midreview that'll happen in about 13 hours. We're formatting our research for LA and the case study houses for a juried review. No design yet, but this will finalize the overall direction and hopefully we should be designing soon.

Since we're in the middle of putting together stuff I'll update after the review. In the meantime, the Mark Mack research studio is off traipsing across Europe in search of the fab'est prefab. Check out their OFFICIAL STUDIO BLOG for all the goods. Just got a check in from the group and they're in Copenhagen.

But back to the Case Study program... Now I don't know whether its a grass-is-greener nostalgia, but the dinner jackets, party dresses, and suits in the classic photos of the case study houses seem so nice. As laid back and "modern" as it may have seemed, at least people took the time to look put together. Now every just things they're some budding starlet or rock star which justifies looking like... well... j...

It's a marathon, not a sprint

2008-10-20T20:08:33-04:00

So we're entering week 3 of 10 and things are off at a full clip by now. Our research studio has been doing background research on materials with relation to boat building and that's been quite interesting. Seems like there's a great deal of potential in carbon fiber but it's just so damn expensive and difficult to manufacture. Interesting stuff also with buckypaper making headlines today.

In addition, we've gotten a chance to have tutorials on Gehry Technologies' Digital Project through the Greg Lynn studio. It's an incredibly complicated and nuanced program who's power in parametrics is evident right off the bat. In a lot of ways it seems a bit similar to the language of computer programming. Very orderly and explicit. Everything is defined and has a name. We've been just going through and doing small projects like instancing a panel across a surface etc. but the results are amazing and everyone acknowledges that it's extremely powerful. However, the interface leaves a lot to be...

First Week / Last Year

2008-10-01T12:36:33-04:00

M.Arch I, Third (FINAL) Year
So for the first time, the quarter has not forced me to hit the ground running and it's been more of a gradually ramp up; a refreshing change. As I mentioned before, for the quarter, I have Yoshiharu Tsukamoto of Atelier Bow-wow (as a visiting professor) for studio. Last year, my studio briefly met with him in Tokyo. For research studio, which is UCLA's version of thesis, I'm under Greg Lynn. The direction of the studio is taking the impetus from the other fields of design such as automobiles, naval architecture, and aerospace. These fields have a much tighter integration between material/technology research and development and practice, while architecture has lagged behind. As a result, we're going to use naval architecture and sailboats in particular as a starting point. The first quarter is material and construction research, the second prototyping and framing the project, and the third will be design.

As for the other years, the first years are en...

Beginning of the end of the beginning

2008-09-29T21:16:08-04:00

So this is a quick entry before the Bjarke Ingels lecture in 10 min.

This quarter, I'm in the Yoshiharu Tsukamoto (Atelier Bow-wow) Studio. We're using the idea of the Entenza Case Study program as the starting point and then creating a new framework to update the program.

For Research Studio (UCLA's version of thesis), I'm in Greg Lynn's Studio which will have something to do with sailboat construction and materials and using that as a point of departure.

Other studios are with Craig Hodgetts, and the continuing Make it Right Thom Mayne studio. And the Neil Denari Suprastudio (new for this year) is running concurrently.

The two other research studios are run by Hitoshi Abe and Mark Mack. The former being an extension of the focus on Tokyo/Japan, and the latter a study in prefab housing but in an "anti-dwell" sort of way. Not my words.

Updates to come soon...

On architecture: education, practice, and the pursuit of happiness or late night musings in the beginning of the end... Part I

2008-08-21T03:59:13-04:00

I'm going to preface this and the subsequent follow-up entries and say it's all written stream of consciousness. The last year of school is upon me within a few weeks and it's prompted me to really think about the last few years. Specifically what's led me to this point and where I'm going next.

In about a month, I'll be starting my final year at UCLA. So I've got two solid years of school under my belt along with the equivalent of basically three years of working experience (2 +change of full time years + 3 summers) at 4 different firms and other little peeks at a few others through freelancing on occasion. Looking forward towards this final year, I've been thinking a lot about where I want my career to go and how I should ultimately shape this last year at school. But that ultimately is a product of how I envision and what my goals are for the next few years.

I keep mulling over where I'd like to be, who I'd like to work for and learn from still, and at the same time have a som...

Summertime!

2008-08-11T02:37:41-04:00

I know that summer is riding it's way into the fall, but just a few photos to prove I'm doing something. I'm working for a professor right now having jumped from one project to another but in a good way. Enjoying the work and realizing it's the fourth firm I've worked for. It's really nice having that kind of perspective and getting to see how everyone works. There's only one year left for my master's and it's somewhat daunting and terrifying that it's almost certainly the very end of my formal education for the rest of my life. Both excited and scared of the future. But first things first.

Fun time. Summer's been great to me. I've also discovered that summer TV actually doesn't suck with premium cable. Weeds as well as Generation Kill are my new shameless indulgences. But I digress! So here are some of the recents that are more arch related:

Santa Monica Glow - July 19th

High pressure water hit a diffusing disk that sprayed water in this semi-circle. Then projectors that were link...

crumble = rapture??

2008-06-05T02:26:39-04:00

i am not a true believer so...

it has come to my attention via some astute classmates that rumble falls on 6/6 @ 6pm... yep. that's 666.

this is a live webcam image from our studio...

cRUMBLE

2008-06-04T15:19:48-04:00

So... our "Rumble" space that we are designated to install and present in is the same room that our studio is setup in. Which is fine.

The deadline for everything to finish is 6pm on Friday, which also has been known for a while. We install over the weekend. However, somehow some genius in the administration has scheduled professional movers to come in and move our desks out at 5pm on Friday. One hour BEFORE our deadline.

Secondly, this issue was brought up weeks ago to the administration by our representative. We are the only graduate studio that has to vacate our studio space for the installation and no consideration or coordination despite the fact that we've brought up our concerns have been acknowledged.

So somewhere between finishing our projects on time, we're supposed to actually pack our entire studio up before the deadline and be ready to move out. Of course all of this was done without notifying us until this week. They offered to give us a room for storage, but we're ...

overheard in perloff

2008-06-04T05:29:50-04:00

"aren't you worried about that thing catching on fire?"

said in reference to pam (the cooking spray) being sprayed on a vacuum forming tool.

"does it (PETG plastic) come flat?"
"well it comes in long sheets so you probably have to roll it up"
"oh that won't do, i need it flat"
"well it unrolls"
"but it's not flat..."

love the smell of laser cutter in the morning... smells like finals.

2008-05-30T18:40:46-04:00

It's time to start production. Last minute changes are made and panic is setting in. We have exactly a week before our pencils down deadline.

We students at Perloff only pray for one thing: (administration, please take note)

enough paper products in the bathroom and in the plotters at all times

and for someone to be on call to fix the laser if (more likely when) it goes down.

I'll see you when the dust settles....

Ay (c)Rumble....

2008-05-23T15:29:42-04:00

If you've perused the features section of archinect, you might've noticed the ads running for "Rumble".

Rumble is a new fangled idea that's been cooked up to help condense the final review period at UCLA in order to generate a little more excitement and interest. Until recently, reviews were spread out over the week of finals at UCLA. As a result, most students wouldn't go to sit on other reviews as they'd be in the studio working to finish their own projects. And afterwards they'd be too crashed-out and sleeping instead of going to reviews. Also, it was done to eliminate the zombie-presentations that we've gotten so adept at.

Thus, all projects will finish simultaneously in the school the week before finals (when classes end) and the weekend is spent assembling and installing your studio's presentation space. Then everyone pins up together. Monday is a public opening of the school and its work and final reviews happen over the course of a single day on Tuesday.

Sounds all goo...

More Tokyo...

2008-04-26T12:48:23-04:00

So we've been here six days now and it's been a whirlwind of subways, getting lost in prefectures, documenting urban conditions, photographs, walking for miles and miles a day and late nights drinking. The wheels are starting to come loose and might fall off if we keep this pace up. Tomorrow's our last full day in Tokyo so we're trying to make the most of it before getting back to LA. We've gotten to see some amazing projects and it's been an incredible trip. Learned a lot of the culture (sometimes through less than desirable and unfortunate circumstnaces) but wonderful all the same.

Moriyama House by Nishizawa was incredible.

You really don't get the full impact of it without visiting. The tight spaces and compartmentalized living somehow manages to work together as a whole. FOA's Port Terminal was also another fun one. Conceptually it's really nice but the experience of the section isn't as strong as I would've hoped.
[img]
Still really impressive all the same. Herzog and d...

And.... we're back OR Tokyo, Japan, Day 0.5

2008-04-20T18:04:20-04:00

Back with the blog. Sorry for the hiatus...

In Japan right now for a weeklong+ excursion for studio. Going to start the touring today (Monday morning). We left Saturday from LAX in the afternoon and arrived Sunday (Japan time) in the late afternoon. Didn't get to see too much as we were all exhausted from the trip and it was dark. Took a bus in from Narita and got into our little youth hostel where we're staying.

I'm jet lagged so I woke up super early. It's still only 7 am... but I'm compiling a few PDFs right now as we're making a presentation of studio research to Yoshiharu Tsukamoto of Atelier Bow-wow this afternoon.

Not much else to report as we're all just getting our bearings still but I'll be sure to keep things going on this end and watch for the blog to turn mostly into photos with a few captions...

Finally, sorry for the hiatus. The blog is a political monster especially in school. So rather than me getting angry and burning bridges unnecessarily I just took a brea...

Halloween!

2007-11-09T02:42:44-05:00

Yes. It's a week later. Several of the second years have been campaigning to do more social activites for the school. Better for a sense of community and bonding (esp. since we have a whopping 60 first years). And it's a chance to do something fun. So we got some small amounts of funding and got the pumpkins...

Here are the First Annual RW Memorial Pumpkin Carving Contest at the AUD.

The Lineup

Cannibal

Vacuumed Formed

THE WINNER:
Dick Cheney Pumpkin

It burns....

2007-10-22T05:48:46-04:00

Yep. Southern California is on fire. Fire i tell ya.

Pics from today in Ventura county:

And we're back...

2007-10-03T00:25:11-04:00

So it's all started up in ernest (since last Thursday).

So my own lineup is programming, structures III, and studio and I'm TA'ing a design culture course. Had a little bit of trepidation as school started. It's not so much the work but the lack of sleep and social life (outside of classmates) that I was a little scared of. I guess I had a nice summer, got to hang out w/ a lot of cool people that I haven't seen for a while. Even made a little bit of money. Naturally a little nervousness was to be expected.

So far we started studio w/ a really brief sketch project. The premise was based on real-life as there are new undergraduates in the architecture department's new bachelor program. As a result our weekly happy hour has been made dry. So the idea was to create basically a beer fence/garden of sorts all while trying to encourage interaction between the two groups.

Of course there were your typical maximum surface area fences that were presented and a few other architectural sepa...

LA Forum - Fall Lecture Series - "Out There Doing It"

2007-09-04T12:28:08-04:00

Not specifically UCLA related but here's the LA Forum lecture series schedule. All events are at the Schindler House on King's Road except for those noted... ($10 for nonmembers)

9/13 7:30pm
Hitoshi Abe (Dean @ UCLA and Atelier Hitoshi Abe) & Ramiro Diaz Granados and Heather Flood

9/20 7:30pm
Rene Peralat (Generica) & Michael Kovac (Kovac Architects)

9/27 7:30pm
Anthony Guida (Lushlife) & Roger Sherman (w/ cityLAB), Greg Kochanowski (office 42)

10/04 7:30pm
Alexander Elias (Alexander Elias Architecture) & Wes Jones (Jones, Partners: architecture)

10/11 7:30pm
Gaston Nogues & Benjamin Ball (Nogues-Ball Studio) & Darin Johnstone (Darin Johnstone Architecture)

10/18 7:30pm @ LACE 6522 (Hollywood Blvd.)
Mario Cipresso & Chris Warren (Studio Shift) & Chava Danielson & Eric Haas (DSH)

10/25 7:30pm
Paul Murdoch (Paul Murdoch Architects) & Tom Wiscombe (Emergent)

11/01 7:30pm @ Lace
Florencia Pita (Florencia Pita MoD) & Kivi Sotamaa (Sotamaa Design)

...

UCLA 2007 Fall Quarter Lecture Series

2007-08-31T12:19:41-04:00

10.01.07 KIVI SOTAMAA, Visiting Professor, UCLA Architecture

10.08.07 YOSHIHARU TSUKAMOTO, Co-principal, Atelier Bow-Wow, Tokyo

10.15.07 KAICHIRO MORIKAWA, Architectural Theorist, Tokyo

10.29.07 KYONG PARK, Director, International Center for Urban Ecology

11.19.07 SHUNJI YAMANAKA, Principal, Leading Edge Design, Tokyo

11.26.07 PHILIPPE RAHM, Principal, Philippe Rahm Architects, Paris

12.10.07 TOYO ITO, Principal, Toyo Ito and Associates, Tokyo

Vicious Rumors!

2007-08-24T14:58:41-04:00

Word on the street is that there are a whopping 60 incoming M.Arch Is to UCLA as well as approx 15 or so M. Arch IIs. Combined with the new undergrad program, which is rumored to have something like 20, that's a lot more bodies in Perloff Hall.

Also, word on the street is that the M. Arch IIs are showing some talent. Or was it just that they were attractive? I can't remember.

All hearsay...