Making World Connections [iar 432]

Beautiful Architecture with design language derived from some of history's most popular pieces of the built environment, can be found all over the world...even in our nation's capital. Over Spring Break I took a visit to Washington, D.C., where I experienced first hand, how history influences modern architecture, and how it is applied to places of importance to imply power, strength, and solidity. These buildings house some of the most important meetings, documents, pieces of art, and even memories which make America what it is today. My photographs (above) are paired with some of the places we have discussed in class...





-Washington Monument | Washington, D.C.


-Trajans Column | Rome, Italy

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-National Gallery of Art | Washington, D.C.


-Crystal Palace | Hyde Park, London, England

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-United States Botanic Garden | Washington, D.C.



-Hall of Mirrors | Versailles, France

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-United States Capitol Building | Washington, D.C.


-St. Nicholas' Church | Helsinki, Finland

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-National Gallery of Art | Washington, D.C.


-Parthenon | Athens, Greece

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-Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool | Washington, D.C.


-Gardens of Versailles | Versailles, France

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-National Gallery of Art | Washington, D.C.


-Pantheon | Rome, Italy

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As we can see... Architecture has been borrowed from all over the world.

Jenga 5.0 Design Charrette

Jenga 5.0 was started off differently from the previous projects with a 2-hour design charrette, in which we paired our group of three with two other groups of three and experimented with the combination of our buildings. For each hour we were assigned with a different team.


ALLURE | JIVE
My team, Allure, was first paired with team Jive. I was personally assigned, along with Austin, to work on the three stages of diagrams- design language, circulation, and systems. For the design language portion, we further studied the exteriors of the buildings, focusing on the façade, and breaking them down into geometric patterns where we would find similar shapes. For the circulation portion, we put our focus towards the layout of the individual complexes and studied how the public met the private spaces. Lastly, for the systems portion, we took a different approach, finding ourselves looking back towards the Italian Renaissance and their idea of public spaces being closer to the ground and outsides of the building, and the private spaces being higher up and closer to the inner core of the building.









After our charrette was over, we found ourselves very successful in the marriage of our two buildings, and excited to move forward in Jenga 5.0.







ALLURE | CARRAVAGGIO
Secondly, my team was paired with team Carravaggio. I again was placed on the diagramming team along with Dajana. We found that our concepts were similar, but the way our individual teams went about it was completely contradictory to one another. The buildings were very different and we found diagramming to be a challenge after trying to further grasp one anothers concepts. For the system portion of diagramming, we focused on the buildings exteriors, grouping floors one and two, and three and four. We then alternated floors creating a staggered façade. For the circulation portion, we focused on the egress and progression of an individual through both buildings. The exiting and entering of the elevators, we found important and slightly similar to one another, so in turn we placed a diagram for each building on top of one another. Finally, for the design language portion, we focused on materiality and its importance to each of our buildings. We found glass to be a major material in both and created a diagram focused on the vertical and horizontal elements of each.






At the end of the charrette, we found it extremely difficult to bring these two buildings together. We all put our best foot forward at it, and did as much as we could, but even then found that it would be a challenge to be married into one group of six.