Manchester Design Awards

It's been a while since I finished this project (over 18 months) but it was one that I really enjoyed doing. I submitted it for my first portfolio of second year and got a really good grade for it so you can understand my disappointment that it wasn't including in my final portfolio at the end of the year and therefore my grade for second year.

However, it got its moment (rather, two weeks) of glory this year when I entered it into the Manchester Design Awards - my first real competition experience. 

It took a while for me to eventually decided to enter that project and then I spent the entire morning practically re doing my images and putting my sheet together but I got it finished and gave it a touch of Wainwright.

Since doing that project, I've gotten really into hiking and I wanted to show this in my work - making references to Alfred Wainwright and using his style of illustration to present my project. 

Last night was the awards night and although I didn't win it was a good evening and kinda cool to see my work up on the wall along with other students and professionals. (I did see a few people looking at my project!)

Back at Uni

I will be honest here. I forgot about writing. Although I haven't made many significant additions to  my project since last time, I was too busy packing last week and too busy partying this. I did get the chance to sit down and do some hard core AutoCAD yesterday. I also began my presentation sheets and even made a passable attempt at a photo montage. 

Yesterday's work also included me working out the joints for my frame and building it properly on AutoCAD. This was either very simple or my skills are improving significantly! From having my frame built, I could then go on to explode it to show how it all fitted together. 

So, like I said, I am back at uni now and had my introductory lecture this afternoon. We have been given the new brief: to design and (some of us) built a pavilion for Dunham Massey.  We are heading out there next Tuesday to see the house and make some site analysis etc. 

Frame with posts that will eventually support the walls
and the roof.

Plan of the frame showing the holes where the posts sit.

Probably the best bit of news we received today was that, for the time being at least, we don't have to get the A1 poster and film together to present. We simply have to put the work we have done onto a sheet and bring it with us on Tuesday to show to the rest of our group, to give them an idea of our skills etc, as we will be working in groups for this project. Sweet!

Up to Date

Ok, I realise its a bit late but I felt it was about time I blogged due to the slight change in design plan. It's kinda cheating, but I tried to create my design on AutoCAD and SketchUp. And I couldn't. Maybe later on I will be able to but for now I can't. And I did try. Promise.

So I went back to the cardboard wedges and had another play around with them. This time, instead of trying to make a 3D shape with them, I tried looking at them as if they were a plan and I came up with a simpler but I think even more effective design.

I was able to stick to my idea of a narrow space opening onto the landscape and making the most of the view, which I am really please with although I had to make a couple of alterations to it.
These aren't the best models in the world and they do need and will be having a lot of work done to them but I hope it gives a bit of an idea.
I created the design by laying out the wedges in a semicircular shape but fanning out to break up a perfect curve. The rest of the design, such as the walls and the doorway (although like I said, some adjustment was needed) just fell into place. Even AutoCAD was useful in that it actually showed me how I was going to build it, if I get to build it. The frame, columns, walls and then roof. There a no windows, so it is all open to the elements but thinking about it, and looking at it now, I might alter the roof slightly by making it overhang a bit, to provide a bit of extra shelter. But that is something for later.

Along with packing, I plan on getting my video well and truly nailed tomorrow. I know what I want to do but I know how long it is going to take so it could be an all day job. But if I get it right, it should look amazing!

After that, what is left to do is the presentation sheet, for when I find the right software, and produce the drawings etc showing the structure and how the shelter is assembled.

After chatting to one of my studiomates from last year, I am eager to get on with this again, as despite (nearly) finishing off my computer models, I've hardly touched it this weekend. Which isn't good.

Getting there . . . .

Ok, so after looking at some precedents and, well, doodling really, I think I have come up with my design.

I should probably start at the beginning (she says reaching for her sketchbook). I decided the most important thing my design should focus on is the view from it. So I began making some little sketches - and even did a parti diagram!
This moved me onto a circular design, thinking observation towers and 360 view etc.
Then I cut up the circle and starting thinking wedge shapes, starting narrow and opening up to the view at the end.
As I was sketching, I suddenly thought back to the map I had drawn of Lake Windermere and the OS symbol for a viewpoint and went from there. I looked again at one of my precedents, a ferry shelter in Scotland.

















The idea behind this three-pieced shelter is to direct the users view to different areas surrounding it. The long white corridor has high walls, causing the viewer to look up at the sky. The black tunnel has an open slat floor and lower wall, allowing the user to look down at the rocky dike beneath it. At the very end of the walkway is a glass box where the view is out across the sea and along the island, as well as up to the sky, creating a full panoramic scene.
This reminded me of something that I had recently read in one of my books:

'Our experience of an architectural space is strongly

influenced by how we arrive in it'

Basically, an expansive view, for example, will look even bigger after approaching it through a narrow and small space. I decided to try and use this theory in my own design.

So, back to the view point symbol, I cut out a number of wedge shapes from cardboard and had a play around with them, trying different shapes.

This was one of my first ideas, one a particularly liked and after making a sketch or three, I moved away from it to try some other designs. After a while, I felt I had exhausted most combinations but realise that I was assuming the wedges were flat and solid. Of course I couldn't model a curved surface with card so I went back to my paper template and came up with this design.

 (rubber not to scale or featuring in final model!)
Instead of having five wedges joint at the top and openings between them, creating a fairly open 'shelter', I used seven, one of which, the centre wedge, curling underneath in order to create a opening whilst keeping the view fairly hidden from those outside.
I realise that it would either be a very high apex or a very low entrance but I still need to work that bit out and scale it properly.

I also have to keep in mind that it is to be assembled by no more than five people and I have to somehow put it onto AutoCAD! But I'll work that one out when I get there!

Precedents

My books arrived this week. Along with two books about Manchester, XS and XS Green were on my reading list and are perfect for this project. For those unfamiliar with the books, there are three in total, the other one being XS Extreme, and each one features a range of small projects, exactly what is needed for this brief. After reading through them, I marked off relevant projects for future reference. Last night, I began the sketches of my precedents. However, as my output all has to be in digital format, I think I will be planning and roughing it out in my sketchbook before enhancing sketches and drawings and putting together the project on using various CAD programs.
Over the weekend I am hoping to get my precedents organised and have a couple of sketches and notes done for them. Hopefully, I can the have a play with CAD and start putting it all together.
I am going to start by brain storming everything - I've got so many ideas buzzing inside my head that I need to get them onto paper before I can do anything with them. This could require a large piece of paper!

One problem I am having is getting past the lack of site. I realise that I could design it whilst having somewhere specific in mind, but chances are, the site where we will be building it, if we will be building it, will be somewhere completely different. The alternative is to design something that is flexible enough that it can be sited in lots of places.

And so it begins . . .

Three weeks before I am due to be back in Manchester and I already have work. I shouldn't really be surprised: I am an architecture student after all!

A bit about me. I am from North Wales and after scraping through my A levels (thinking back to results day still gives my shivers) I got into my first and only choice of architecture school. Manchester. Not only choice because it was the only one I liked and wanted to get into and was smart enough to walk in but only choice because no body else wanted me (plenty of stress let me tell you!) I worked my arse off that year and after thinking I had gotten my A in D&T, results day came around and I ended up with a B (due to my coursework being marked down from an A to a C - and I STILL don't know why). This jeopardised my place but in the end I got in and it has been the best thing that has happened to me yet.

So. Year 2. The hardest one apparently. I was told at the end of last year - by a couple of students who had survived 2nd year - to quit if you didn't think you would make it. Brutal. 
I got back from my holiday in the Lake District with my family last Friday only to discover that we have been given the new project brief. It's Tuesday now and I have finally begun.

The Brief

I was thinking about it most of the weekend and getting my thoughts together etc etc. Although I'll admit that I wasted most of Sunday and yesterday playing the Sims (VERY guilty pleasure). But I needed to get a new sketchbook and I need my ordered books to arrive before I could really make a start any way (excuses, excuses). 

This blog is going to be like my design diary (a habit I got into while doing A level D&T). I will record my progress, any ideas I have and hopefully keep up with it! Today (after getting my sketchbooks), I began my project by drawing Lake Windermere. I promise there is method behind the madness! Like I said before, I was on holiday in the Lake District, Bowness-on-Windermere to be exact. And as most people know, the views up there are stunning and inspired many artists, poets, authors etc etc. The brief is to design a 'single space structure' with a specific purpose and having just got back from the most scenic places in the country what better purpose than as a place to sit and enjoy the view, do some sketching, writing, reading, relaxing. Whilst walking last week, we came across Claife Station, a viewing point built at the end of the 18th century for the purpose of enjoying the view out over Lake Windermere. It is now owned by the National Trust and has fallen into disrepair. This is going to be one of my precedents in the way of function and possibly even design. I have already started to research this and came across a video on the National Trust site which could prove to be quite useful.

By default, I think my site is somewhere in the Lake District but I am hoping that my design could be applied to anywhere as a sort of shelter for the arts. 

Tonight I am hoping to finish of a little map of Lake Windermere to get me started on this project. It is already past midnight but ah well. I've got to add some place names and make it into a bit of a site analysis, showing views, titles, orientation etc. My OS map is out on the floor next to my drawing board and pencils. It all looks quite civilised actually!



After that, bit of reading (Pillars of the Earth - it's only taken me all summer but nearly finished now!) and then off to Speke Hall tomorrow. Plan to get plenty of sketching done. 

Signing out!