IAAC Blog » RS1. Emergent Territories

MAA in LA – Day 4,5,6 – Visit to Architectural Projects

admin — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 09:40:56 +0000

The MAA Research Trip to Los Angeles of the Emergent Territories Studio culminated with visits to some of the most important architectural projects in LA.

The students had the opportunity to visit important projects, such as the Eames House (Ray & Charles Eames), the Binocular Building, Indiana Avenue Houses and Walt Disney Concert Hall (Frank Gehry), Stahl House (Pierre Koening), Shindler House (Rudolf M. Schindler), Caltrans District 7 Headquarters (Morphosis), Getty Center (Richard Meier & Partners Architects), The Blue Whale or Pacific Design Center (Cesar Pelli), Lacma Museum, etc.

IAAC MAA in LA-Day 3-Master Class by Hernan Diaz Alonso

admin — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 20:25:35 +0000

The MAA Emergent Territories Studio workshop finalized with an Master Class titled “Monstrous Forms” delivered by Hernan Diaz Alonso at the C-HUB in Sciarc Kappe library. The lecture provided the framework for this studio, that “will explore the predominant effect of ‘isomorphism’ being the aggregation of diverse forms of design intelligence into an almost universal condition of image production”, expecting “a full development of bridges, drawings, models, and animations.”

The Emergent Territories Studio will continue this collaboration with Sciarc during the development of the projects in Term 3 of the Master Program.

IAAC in LA – Day 2-Emergent Territories Studio – Workshop in SCIARC.

admin — Sun, 31 Mar 2013 06:56:42 +0000

The Emergent Territory Students continue their Research Trip to Los Angeles, actively participating in several activities hosted by Sciarc faculty throughout the day:

+ Andrew Atwood introduced the team, activities, research and equipment available at the Robot House.

+ A live presentation of the synchronized robots was directed by Brandon Kruysman and John Proto.

+ The students had also the chance to interact with some robots, leaded by the technical robotic team instructor Nazareth Ekmekjian.

+ Ivan Bernal, provided a comprehensive overview of MAYA modelling, rendering and animation techniques.

+ Afterwards the students participated in studio presentations at Sciarc.

+ Finally, they attended a lecture by Todd Gannon: Prelude to the Confederacy at the W.M. Keck Lecture Hall, with an Intro by Eric Owen Moss.

MAA in LA- Day 1-IAAC STUDENTS PRESENTING AT SCI ARC

admin — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 18:05:14 +0000

IaaC Emergent Territories Studio students presenting their projects at Sci Arc during the research trip to Los Angeles, California, with IAAC faculty Willy Muller, Areti Markopoulou, Lucas Cappelli, and Maite Bravo.

The jury was composed of Sciarc Faculty, who provided valuable feedback for each of the studio projects developed during Term 2 at the Master Program.

The Emergent Territories Studio is developing a collaboration between Hernan Diaz Alonso (Sciac), Peter Trummer (Sciarc), and directed by Willy Muller and Maite Bravo.

Operational Landscape: Mumbai "slum" Renovation

Thu, 06 May 2010 13:39:43 +0000

Urban scale and it´s complexities

TEAM: Moises Gamus, Michael Harrison. FACULTY: Luis Falcon, Hemant Purohit

Research on the reorganization of flows and forces that give shape to a city. Starting point: THE VOID (i.e. public space).

Finding optimal walking distances between main public spaces (250 mts), a network of movility and interaction mingles through the built environment, emulating the current urban tissue which is a result of self organization… Learning from self organization, understanding its simple rules and its emerging complexity.

Mumbai´s reality:

TOO dense and still growing.

Scarcity of resources: Water, energy and waste management; conflict in movility and lack of personal living space.

THE SITE: Saki-Naka / Asalfa

Site Analysis

SWOT Analysis

Insolation analysis and WindFlows

ZONING DIAGRAM. Based on urban densitiy and context (natural and urban)

ZONING DIAGRAM // DENSITY STUDIES

Program organization based on distance from metro station and topographic conditions.

Green City for 10 000 people/300ha

Wed, 21 Apr 2010 10:08:53 +0000

The starting point is having a pedestrian movement, which is the most obvious decision about a 10 000 people city/neighborhood. That means I had to set up some distance rules between the different component and programs. Based on that distances, I had the plot for my city (how big it should be according my rules) and the next question was how to keep only good orientation for all of the buildings. For that reason, I had to thing for some structure which will give me only south and no north orientation, which is the worst possible orientation in my country and in whole Europe as well.

I decided working with the specific conditions in my hometown (Varna, Bulgaria), having a sea south of my plot, same temperatures and climate conditions, etc. I was thinking how to create buildings, which can be used as a landscape inside the city, and also which can remain private as they usually are, and at the same time public spaces. The decision I made was to use the roof of the buildings as a public green spaces, which will also add more area for farming and the city will be more self sufficient in terms of food. At the same time, the roofs can be reached by a slope which can be also used as a public spaces, farming, recreation zones, playgrounds etc. The slope itself can be a shield from the cold north winds during the winter, could have no shadows during big part of the day and also they can be used as recourse for heating or cooling the building by using the constant temperature of the soil. The only question was how many degrees the slope should be? So, I decided to try with slopes between 1 and 24 degrees (the minimum angle of the sun during the winter in Varna, Bulgaria) and see what happens with the density. I know how big the city should be as a maximum to keep it pedestrian, I know how many people I need to live in that city, so now I had to find what is the angle which will form buildings big enough for 3000 apartments. The slope I finally choose is 20 degrees and it gives me a little more than 3000 apartments.

Reasons to call the city self-sufficient:
Food and goods:
1-By these slopes I`m maximizing the area for farming.
2-Having less shadows between the buildings is making the land more productive by giving plants more light.
3-Producing goods out of recycled materials
Waste and Energy:
1-The buildings have less temperature losses because of the good orientation and for the same reason, they can produce electricity from PV panels installed on top of the handrails (see the detail).
2-Gaining energy for heating/cooling from the ground behind the building
3-PV panels can be installed on all of the slopes covering the industry (facing south slopes with area of 135625m2 can produce energy from PV panels enough for 4271 apartments). This is besides of the energy given by the home installed PV panels.
4-The organic waste tanks inside each block can give the inhabitants as a result water and natural gas-methane, which can be used for boilers.
5-Non-organic waste can be taken for recycling by the old fashion way
Water:
1-Using sea water by desalination plant (reverse osmosis process) and distribution system
2-grey water will be reused for farming
Transportation:
1-pedestrian city, which means healthy people and fresh air everywhere. The streets are not more borders.
2-Optimized underground transportation systems on 2 levels-public (ULTRA RTM) and private transport (also electrical) for long distance run. Private transport can reach every building but underground.
3-Separation between trucks and private transport inside the city.
Variety of functions, programs, components inside.

RE_DEFINING THE CITY BLOCK_ bove_gharakhani

Mon, 19 Apr 2010 10:19:49 +0000

Edgar Bove _ Ali Gharakhani

GREEN CITY

Fri, 16 Apr 2010 18:05:18 +0000

para.CITY

Thu, 15 Apr 2010 12:50:17 +0000

Urban loop system

By: Moises Gamus & Michael Harrison

Uncontrolled urban growth has caused social deterioration and environmental disequilibrium, especially in emergent global economies. Resource scarcity has set an urgent agenda to switch to renewable energetic resources and more efficient ways to distribute them.

Current models of urban planning have the limitation of extending the cities sideways, whereas this research explores the possibility of releasing the city from the ground condition, creating an infrastructural framework that can be adapted to different built environments.

The geometric surface is based on Barcelona´s Eixample grid to test the first logics of this system, since the urban fabric is already ordered and repetitive. Eventually, the urban system will attempt to adapt to more complex (uncontrolled) urban landscapes.Resources are prioritized in the morphology of this neighbourhood, setting up cyclic loops of energy, water and waste.

Based on the geometry of a hyperbolic paraboloid, the neighbourhood is arranged as a compact and integrated urban system whitin itself. Such geometry can be applied to various environments (weather conditions, urban fabric, local restrictions…). A logic of emergence based on the repetition and manipulation of a modular system.

Based on solar analysis and program distribution, the masterplan is setup according to proximity relationships.

The location of program along the site responds to time/distance relationships. All programs are connected through a green landscape, which serves as farm fields, interaction spaces and at the southern tip a solar collector field.

The residential clusters operate as adaptable modules, where the basic unit is defined as 5 x 3 meters section, varying in depth to adapt to different building configurations. Each building will change height and depth according to light penetration and visibility studies. Each module has a circulation and mechanical systems´ core, optimizing both supply and recollection of resources/disposals, providing thus the infrastructural loop to create closed cycles.

Residential circulations become another possibility for human interaction: a system of staircases and pathways connecting each residential unit to the whole. Different levels of permeability are achieved through the use of screens and voids, allowing for light access and intimacy. Below rests the city…. the old city.

Milling the desert

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 13:13:38 +0000

Geometry

As the city is located in an arid climate, conditions in the surface can be really strong. In order to avoit that, the city is created underground, so that a fresh microclimate can be created. Desalinating sea water and filtrating solar exposure, food production can be guaranteed.

The geometry of the city is created from a rectangle. There is a public attraction point in each one of the vertices:
V1: Industry / Water purification / Waste management
V2: Primary + secundary education / Leisure
V3: Administration / University / Cultural
V4: Market / Sports centre / Hospital

There is an external conection that reaches the exterior from each vertice, working as public space as well as conection.
C1: Sea: Desalinization plat / Auditorium
C2: Car parking / Solar-eolic tower
C3: Train station / Solar eolic tower
C4: Pedestrian access

Housing and tertiary working (offices & shops) are located near and in between these nodes. Meanwhile, fields for food production are located around the city, creating a green ring that also works as a big park.

By general law, housing and offices will be always profit two opposite orientations (north-south, east-west) in order to have good ventilation. In addition, facades work as shadow devices and the fact of being underground avoids direct sun exposure and high temperatures.

Energy production

Sun radiation heatens the air below the glass-skin, which acts as a big hot air colector. Hot air is lighter than cold air, so it goes up the chimney. After reaching the turbines, kinetic energy is created, which will be transformed into electric energy thanks to an alternator. After this use, clean air is expelled again to the atmosphere.

These two towers also act like transport conections, because they work as a train station and a car-parking. People will change scale in this nodes, to get down and enter in the city scale.

Secondary energy will be produced using waves energy, biomass energy and from burning the waste that canot be neither reused or recycled.

Transport

The aim of the transportation system is to have some external conections in the edges of the city, that will act as main scale-changing nodes. This avoids private transportation issues, as the compacity allows easy movement walking or by bicycle. However, a radial transportation ring is conceived to make goods, food or people transportation easier.