Archinect - University of British Columbia

Gun Sculpture

2006-04-20T02:43:44-04:00

Not mine. Keep reading below...

I'm working on my final project for the year: a look at an extremely large refugee camp that existed on the Thai-Cambodian border from about 1979 to 1993. The camp held up to 200 000 Khmer refugees in a space of about 3 square miles.

In any case, it's not done yet. You can find some good pictures on the Internet in a few places:

members.iinet.net.au/~pictim/site2/site2.html
www.peshawar.ch/portfolio/portfolio-5.htm
www.kheow.de/html/camps0.htm
www.mikefarrell.org/Journals/Thai2.html
www.asiahorizons.com/CAMBODIABOOK/index.html

But, mainly, I recalled once taking pictures for my student newspaper of this amazing gun sculpture built from 7000 deactivated weapons. You could actually step inside and see bits of light shining through from the outside. But it's the creepiest thing in the world. The gunpowder smell hadn't left it at that point, and it was like standing inside some kind of death. It was just overwhelming. Anyhow, if you ever get a chance to see...

Could this woman be any better looking?

2006-04-18T02:11:56-04:00

That's a rhetorical question, by the way...

Isn't it enough to just be a good architect?

2006-04-15T05:10:28-04:00

I'm currently slogging through a theory paper that was due yesterday. It's slow-going, but I find the topic interesting. Basically, this is my thesis statement:

--
Power and preferred urban form: Coercive infrastructure and the politics of participation
Is urbanism possible without power? Contemporary theories of urbanism embrace multiplicitous models that empower urban agents (i.e. citizens) in ways that encourage them to engage their environments. Their collective actions make urbanity exist. However, the (infrastructural) elements that make urbanity possible are instruments deeply symbolic of power, be it political, economic or social power - or a combination thereof. The following seeks to understand the role of power in the structuring of urban form and to understand how theories of urbanism tend to encounter and accommodate power.
--

Anyhow, as I'm doing that, I'm reading a clip from Tschumi's Architecture and Disjunction's "Spaces and Events" when it struck me: Goodness ...

"Interesting" is killing architecture

2006-04-13T02:09:51-04:00

This was brought to my attention last term: people in our school (students and professors alike) use the word "interesting" way too often. "I found such-and-such interesting," or "What you've done here is really interesting," or "So-and-so presents some interesting ideas on such-and-such." It doesn't matter what you fill in the blanks with; these statements lack precision and thus more or less resist inquiry. If it didn't interest you, you probably wouldn't have begun talking in the first place, yes?

Fellow UBC accomplices: let us work together to expand our vocabulary and begin to explicate the reasons/causes for our intellectual arousal.

Thank you.

Your friend and neighbour,

David Zeibin

PS Any banal words at your school?

On Google Earth, it is daytime, 24/7/365.

2006-03-31T13:45:44-05:00

This occurred to me just now, while sitting here in theory class. It's student presentation day.

Anyhow, I think it's a bit weird, you know, being always daytime...

What is the opposite of ephemeral?

2006-03-12T23:59:06-05:00

Architectural Execution

2006-02-08T12:14:40-05:00

They are demolishing an add-on to the Main Library building here on campus, and rebuilding in place. The Library itself was quite beautiful, but this add-on was, well, pretty terrible.

Execution of the innocent and defenseless, or or an architectural criminal?

Is demolition like euthanasia for crap-ass buildings?

(I'll try to post a picture when I get the chance.)

Fifteen.ca, the Avalanches, my favourite class, my internal debates, globalization, Kitsault, the Radio, and Grey's anatomy: we all love you

2006-02-06T03:40:53-05:00

fifteen.ca/

That's my friend, Raymond Biesinger, who's based in Edmonton, Alberta. He's one of them freelance illustrators, and I'm rather proud of him. I was just breezing through some of his recent stuff and wanted to share. You can also check out some of his gig posters here: http://www.gigposters.com/designers.php?designer=7829 Buy some of his art and tell him I sent you.

Anyhow, listening to the Avalanches' "Good Word for the Weekend Mix" of Badly Drawn Boy's "The Shining." Find it, and listen to it. Also, check out an Avalanches DJ set on "Morning Becomes Eclectic, KCRW." Watch out for the amazing bit of America's "Ventura Highway."

OK, so then, architecture.

I have a bit of a weird term. I have a studio course, plus three other classes: Architectural Structures II, Contemporary Theories in Architecture, and a seminar titled "Internally Displaced," which is run in tandem with the studio.

The seminar is easily the most interesting class I've had so far. Here's the brief:

...

Accreditation Party

2006-02-03T12:55:16-05:00

UBC is being accredited starting tomorrow and going until Wednesday. Been through an accreditation at your school lately?

As regulars of this soapbox might know, I think architectural education needs to be reworked from the ground up (pun completely intended), so I find this kind of exciting. I mean, I'm not naÃ¯ve - I know nothing will change after said visit - but the prospect of change is invigorating on its own.

However, apparently my studio work from last spring has been lost (they were collecting projects last year in anticipation of this visit), and even though it was just my posters and a model that was quite crappy and I have decent pics of it, this annoys me to no end.

-----

I have no classes on Tuesday and Thursday mornings this term, which is great. But it makes me stay up late on those days, which kind of ruins me for Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings. But the sleep on those other days: priceless.

-----

I wish this had actually been built, so we could have se...

I BELIEVE IN ...

2006-02-02T00:13:12-05:00

I was bored, so I made these.

My sources:
news.spirithit.com/index/articles/more/islam_and_the_west_in_a_transmodern_world/P0/
www.belgium-architects.com/content/profiles/index.cfm?fuseaction=profile&architect=2788?=e&locale=e

Use the Rasterbator to blow them up stupid big and post them in your office or studio. Send me a picture so I can laugh.

Sneak-a-peek

2006-01-23T00:41:49-05:00

OK. Just a quick one. I should have posted this with the other one, but that was funny, and this one is more, um, astonishing. Hence, it's more important and deserves its own post.

For studio, were in the research phase, and I'm looking at El Ejido, Spain. Go on, type that into Google Maps, turn on satellite view, and scroll down a bit. (Or try this link. Let me know if it actually works for you: El Ejido, AlmerÃan Peninsula, Spain

All those white bits are greenhouses. The whole area is an agricultural "factory." In fact, this bit of whiteness is apparently visible from space.

Reference Keller Easterling's new book "Enduring Innocence" or her essay "Tomato World" for more info. I need to get back to reading for my seminar tomorrow morning.

If anyone has ideas (or information) for diagrams explaining Spanish-Moroccan labour relations, international agricultural trade mechanisms, or supporting infrastructure of this area, feel free to let me know. I have some heavy diagramming to...

Imperial Star Destroyer

2006-01-23T00:14:16-05:00

Some folks in the studio are planning on pinning up drawings of an Imperial Star Destroyer as a precedent for their project. I really hope that goes over well.

www.obh.snafu.de/~madley/starwars/dataimg/imperial_star_destroyer.gif

Yet another post that has nothing to do with architecture

2006-01-20T04:01:32-05:00

I'll post something about architecture soon, I promise. It's shaping up to be a bizarrely fantastic term.

Right now, we're enduring days upon days of fucking rain in Vancouver. We missed breaking the record for the most consecutive days of rain ever here (28 days) by 2 days. Weirdly, the city has never been so pissed at seeing the sun on a Sunday afternoon. Nevertheless, it continued raining the next day, and the forecast shows rain for at least the next week.

Then I was listening to a band just now - North Atlantic Explorers - and their song "Anchors Away." It's really gorgeous. You can listen to a bunch of their stuff here: www.newmusiccanada.com/genres/artist.cfm?band_id=15500 and download a couple MP3s here: northatlanticexplorers.com/ Very epic.

Anyhow, as I was browsing my live-in girlfriend's iTunes collection listening to NAE, I came across a song I had put on a CD for her. Aptly: "Here I Dreamt I Was An Architect" by the Decemberists. The mix CD was called "August is rea...

Can't sleep.

2005-10-25T07:55:42-04:00

I actually have a bazillion things to write about. But I always have trouble sitting down to take care of it.

It's 4:30am and I can't sleep. I ate a "I'm 120% full now" sushifood meal last night to celebrate the raise I got at work. Went home, watched one episode of the Chappelle Show, and then fell asleep on the couch - at 8:30pm. After the standard 6 hours sleep, I woke up at 2:30am and couldn't get back to sleep. So, this:

I'm working full-time this term, and only taking one class: ARCH513 Environmental Systems and Controls. However, I'm also working on a competition with two other people, and we worked out a "directed study" thing so we happen to get school credit for the competition. So, in the end it works out well. I get 6 credits for the co-op term, 3 for the class, and 3 for the competition (=12, regular course load is 18), and to top it off, I get paid. Still have to pay tuition for the term, though...

The competition is quite fascinating: http://vanalen.org/urbanvoids/...

SALA

2005-09-02T03:17:10-04:00

I keep forgetting: the UBC SoA is no longer. For a number of reasons (most of which I can't really remember) the school of architecture and the school of landscape architecture have merged, making it SALA: the School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture. I think part of this whole merger thing also recognizes the BENDS program (Bachelor of Environmental Design) as formally offered by SALA. And that's neat too.

I think it will be good for the school(s).

I've been working, but many of my cohorts have spent the last week prepping meals for the new first-year architecture kids as they barrel through the intro workshop (they had their drawing workshop in four days the week previous). It's a weird year, though, because they have 15 students (of 45 admitted) that are getting some pretty serious advanced standing. In our year, not a single student was able to skip ahead in any studios. And now, these advanced folk will essentially be dropped in with our crew.

Not that it matters, t...

FRONTIERSPACE: A SPACEAGENCY installation: Balloon Caught

2005-08-25T22:12:58-04:00

As part of my busted-laptop-harddrive saga, I haven't been able to find a good time to post these images. (The archinect.com cover photo ain't mine.)

Last Thursday, SPACEAGENCY hosted a party in downtown Vancouver (Gastown, specifically) to celebreate the completion of the FRONTIERSPACE design competition they held earlier this year.

The winning entry/installation was constructed (or, inflated, in this case) and the night marked the opening of the exhibition. The competition intended to reconsider Vancouver's alleys as vibrant public space, rather than as the secondary access routes we tend to know them as (more info.... The winners were Satoshi Matsuoka and Yuki Tamura of Matsuokasatoshitamurayuki from Tokyo, Japan, whose entry was titled Balloon Caught.

It was a good evening, and quite interesting to see many of Vancouver's designey folk emerge from their hermitey studios. SPACEAGENCY had a DJ all set up and had put it to ARCHUS (the UBC SoA student society) to coordinate the...

Homo milk as a low-fat alternative to cream?

2005-08-24T17:32:54-04:00

In other news: My Mac's hard drive got weird and kinda crapped out. I think I fixed it, but I didn't trust it, so it's in the shop now. In the same weekend, my work computer's power supply blew out, so that's in the shop too. My digital life is currently stored on a 40GB hard drive I've been carrying around with me. Lame, huh?

Big event last Thursday here in Vancouver. Will try to post pictures this evening.

Now, back to milk vs cream:

When bands break up...

2005-07-25T00:27:42-04:00

... I get sad.

I just discovered that one of my favourite bands - ever - broke up. I hadn't paid much attention to them recently, because they just released an album in 2004, and, you know, it usually takes bands a couple years or so to pop out another solid one.

Anyhow, the band is Despistado, of Regina, Saskatchewan. Their official site is even defunct, but you can still check them out at Jade Tree (the first Canadian band to ever be signed to this seminal indie label): www.jadetree.com/bands/artist/despistado

I have special promo/pre-release of the first album, and I just downloaded (legally) the most recent one - which they dropped while announcing it was time to quit.

Obviously, this has nothing to do with architecture. It's an odd feeling. I only saw them live once, but something about this "suicide note" of an album is painfully inspiring.

MP3s (via Jade Tree):
www.jadetree.com/mp3/Despistado-A_Stirsticks_Prediction.mp3
www.jadetree.com/mp3/Despistado-Burning_House.mp3

My new printer

2005-07-21T02:57:10-04:00

I bought a laser printer. Not just any laser printer, though. An industrial-strength high-capacity 11x17 B&W HP LaserJet 5Si MX. This thing was top o' the line back in about 1998.

I bought it for $150 CAD, but realized after getting it home that the dude I bought it from had stripped its extra memory and is JetDirect ethernet card. I was pissed. Majorly pissed.

Anyhow, I'm now procuring parts from eBay: 96MB of extra memory, a Postscript Level 2 SIMM, and a 10/100 JetDirect card. She'll be a pretty smokin' machine after I've tricked 'er out. That's right; it's a she. ("It's a she...") I think I'll name it Shelly.

Thank goodness I'm employed this summer, otherwise one might call such purchases, um, "foolish."

But damn. This thing is big.

--

Further to the reasons for the printer: I spent an unreal amount of money on printing last year in school. Of $1911.37 in school-related supplies/expenses over eight months (that includes ~$500 of hand drafting supplies, used about, oh say, ...

Work vs school: the endless controversy

2005-07-06T01:49:42-04:00

So, here we are. Struggling to keep this thing going.

I've been working this summer. I finished exams on a Tuesday, mussed around for a few days, and started work the next Monday. Here's my place of employment: www.actonostry.ca (I think the site is due for a bit of an overhaul soon.)

It's a nice place to work, with good people and all the rest. Totally Mac-based office; there seems to be quite a few of them in Vancouver.

I've been programming in VectorWorks's bastardized version of Pascal, customizing the software for the office's purposes. I'm doing some promo work and admin work too. I headed up an RFP submission that was due last week, so that was good times. What else....

Next week I'll be starting on some actual project work, probably doing drawing revisions and some FSR calculations. These are apparently the things working architects hate more than the plague itself, but for a newcomer to the game, I find it nothing short of fascinating.

That's the other "problem," I gue...

School nearly done

2005-04-18T23:40:43-04:00

We have our last exam tomorrow. Consider the following exchange over e-mail, formatted in chronological order for your viewing pleasure (these are all different people speaking):

> hi guys.
>
> i have misplaced the list that says what chapters we covered in Allen and
> CMHC... could someone please please please quick jot down for me the
chapter
> #s (or page#s where necessary)???
>
> thank you!
>
> it's time to break out the page-tabs again.
>
> cheers,
--------------------------
And so it begins with another rousing night of... E-MAIL!

:

Allen: chapters: 1-6, 7(pp228-244), 12, 16, 18, 19, pp 321-331

CMHC: pp. 17-158, pp 198-215

The readings are to be completed before the lecture on the date indicated at the latest.

Hahahaha
--------------------------

I think she was being serious about having the readings done on time.
I don't find it funny.

-------------------------

Relax, it's summer time.

-------------------------

Indeed it is. Maybe I'll wear flip...

My workspace

2005-03-25T20:48:36-05:00

Hi everyone,

I am sorry I have not posted in a long time. A big reason for this has been a general unhappiness with my work. I'm a highly self-critical individual, which can be quite annoying, even to me.

Anyhow, I realized I haven't shown you my home for this term. I have a window seat (click on it to make it big):

Usually we have something called Good Times, a small event every Friday at about 5pm where we get together, drink some cheap beer, snack on snacks, etc. I think many schools have such an event (I know SCI-Arc does, for example). And as with others, ours are also thematic. This week, since it's Good Friday, we had No Time For Good Times on Thursday instead. I was feeling good after a decent desk crit, so I got a beer but then sat back down to read the service manual for the giant, broken 21" CRT I just bought for cheap (you can see it on the left in the above pic. I'm in the process of fixing it. Sometimes having an engineering degree is handy). While I did that, thoug...

Greatness.

2005-03-01T00:22:24-05:00

I was thinking about a post that was something along the lines of, "What would you give up for greatness?" I tend to have architectural dreams about being famous, as I'm sure most architects do. I mean, sure, the starchitects get a lot of flack, and sort of become media darlings, often not living up to everyone's standard of them.

So, greatness. Can anyone get there? Does it mean just hard work? Are you born with genius, or does that even matter? All it takes is one high-profile job that goes over well before you get to stop searching for the next job and the jobs just come to you, closely followed by the media scrum.

Anyhow, we had a midterm review in studio today. I'm exhausted and heading to bed. I got a few hours of sleep, but it was the week leading up to this that's been so tiring. I'm not sure what to say. I'm unhappy with my project, but I think that has more to do with trying to live up to too-high standards, and not because my project actually sucks crap. I mean it's not...

Do you know where your First Aid Kit is right now?

2005-02-10T04:09:46-05:00

I can think of three separate occasions when someone has cut themselves fairly seriously in the studio since September. In fact, one person ended up at the hospital on Monday getting bandaged up.

Any good/gorey X-acto/OLFA stories?

Second term: eerily not much on the go...

2005-02-01T14:21:43-05:00

It's been a weird term so far. The studio I'm in hasn't been moving overly quickly, so I'm not sure what to report on exactly. My courses this term include Architectural Technology, a second History and a second Design Media.

This morning, for Architectural Technology (colloquially referred to as "Building Tech"), we visited a site on campus for a field trip. We wore all the requisite gear (hard hat, steel-toed boots, etc) and had a quick tour. In general, the class is focused on the building envelope, so that's pretty much what was talked about.

More to come later!

"Anexact yet rigorous..."

2005-01-23T14:05:21-05:00

Our studio work here has started off rather slow this term, mostly by the choice of the people in my studio group, despite the fact that it means we're probably digging our own graves...

Anyhow: Past the introductory studio everyone takes in first-term, first-year, we now move on to what are called "vertcial studios." The term comes not from the verticality of built architecture, but describes the vertical integration of students from all different years/levels in one studio group. In other words, the studios are designed to let you learn from those who have come before.

My studio this term is focused on the City of Richmond, which is geographically south of, and is essentially adjacent to, Vancouver. Recently, the Greater Vancouver Regional District approved plans to construct a rapid transit line connected downtown Vancouver to the Vancouver International Airport (YVR) and to Richmond. The Richmond-Airport-Vancouver (RAV) line would cut the Richmond-Vancouver commute down from 1...

Snowy Vancouver (?!!!)

2005-01-09T04:54:44-05:00

Also, after spending three weeks in Alberta braving the -25Ã‹Å¡C weather I used to be OK with, I returned to Vancouver expecting the glorious year-round positives. They say this weather should continue for another week or so:

I also saw folks sliding down the hill on campus (called "the knoll," I believe) on cafeteria trays. Some kids were doing tricks, like acid dropping onto benches and stuff, but I don't have a pic of that, sadly. This sap will have to do:

Working on the thesis

2005-01-09T00:01:36-05:00

UBC has this great karmic thing where younger non-thesis students (the whole place is MArch, though) help out the thesis students in the final days before presenting. This weekend is the thesis presentations, and over the past few days I've been helping Jacqueline Chan Ã¢â‚¬“ Jackie Chan to those who know her well.

(As a bit of UBC SoA trivia, a fellow told me two days ago that along with Jackie Chan there was a Jet Li too, and phone calls to the studio asking ofr one and then the other were always, um, seemingly suspect.)

Anyhow, I'm a pretty slow worker in the studio/workshop, so sometimes I felt like more of a liability than an asset, but it was fun and I learned a lot. I'm vowing to do my next models in beautiful wood, rather than the chipboard I've used previously.

Here's a pal, Ian, presenting his scheme to build atop an existing mall, regenerating an intense community in and around the new structure. It was something like that, I believe:

Also, MASA presentations were o...

Back to school

2005-01-05T15:36:08-05:00

Well, we're back at it. We had the studio presentations yesterday, ballots were due at 3pm, and today the studio assignments are posted at 1:30pm. Exciting, yes?

And now, here is a picture of what it's like to ride the bus to school in the morning:

Also, I bought myself a digital camera over Christmas holidays. Since I didn't have one before, it made blog posts quite a task. Life will be much easier now.

I love you all. Work hard this term, all my friends in academia, industry and other endeavours.

I'm a little bit, um, "busy."

2004-11-26T12:59:41-05:00

Is that any excuse for not posting? So much happening, so little sleep, SO MUCH EXCITEMENT.

Anyhow, couple things: we are gettin' shirts made up, and the design is very nice (designed by John Roddick, a third-year here at UBC):

Can you see it? "SOA"?

Also, here's a link to another UBC student's informal blog (courtesy Howard Kim, who makes some excellently detailed models). He's posted some nice summaries of the projects. I might get around to that, sooner or later, yes?

individual.utoronto.ca/howardkim/