Materials...

I think that my building would benefit from the use of timber. Not only is it sustainable, but it also contains an innocent quality, that can bring the building back down to a human level and tie in with the ground easily. Not only this, but the site into which this building is being placed is predicted to become a green zone and so, with added greenery, trees and grassy patches, the timber will start to blend over time. Especially as it weathers.

Additionally, it can be seen that a number of small buildings and infrastructures along queen street are made of timber, and therefore this building would not be too contrasting or out there for the existing context.

 

I also enjoy the way light can interact with timber, and this is the sort of effect I expect my building to obtain at night.

 

For structural elements, such as the ground floor shops, it should be made of concrete to without the loads, while windows frames etc and roof columns should be constructed using steel. Tiles will be used along the platforms and walkways.

Week 13......New Scale

Another way to make this building unassuming was to reduce the scale of it. Namely the length. At 50m and then 40m the building was too large, and left a lot of unused spaced on the platform above. Therefore the new building is 30m long, and has dropped the original idea of having 2 walkways and just incorporating one in the centre.

 

The end design consists of 4 ground floor shops, including an information centre, a coffee shop, a ticket office and a newsagents. These rooms were all fitted out before moving onto the platform level above.

 

 

It was also envisaged that the building would a number of green elements which would project it into the future. Here the idea of a green wall can be seen, using little planter pots running up a wall facade.

 

 

However, it was time to model the shops and in the end they looked like this....

 

 

 

 

This is the newsagent located at the end of the building, it is intended to have roller shutters that can lock the building at night.

 

This is the ticket office, including ticket windows, lockers and filing cabinets.

 

This is the information centre, however it is intended that more stands will be placed in the floor in the middle.

 

This is the coffee shop, it has the possibility to have seating which spills out of the shop into the street, therefore connecting with the outside.

 

Although the idea of materiality hasn't been discussed yet, it can be seen to be played with here, a number of timber elements can be seen, especially the timber screens which cover the glass windows. It is expected that these battens would host green vines and other green elements in order to provide shade and also improve air quality.

 

New Idea...

After thinking about how to make the building not look so stark in its surrounding, I remembered something I had learnt about Frank Lloyd Wright and how he often imagined his buildings as an extension of the landscape.

I therefore started to look at ways in which this building would look like it was coming up from the ground.

 

The obvious answer to this was to have the actual building rise up from the ground and be connected on each side via steps or an escalator. This was because it was impractical to have a ramp which would reach 4m into the air and not take up all of queen street.

 

In essence, this began to make the building feel like some sort of bridge.

 

Here were two futher examples of how the building could rise from the ground. The first creates a new landscape or ground plain, which acts like a small hill, while the second leaves the exisiting ground floor building in place and merely makes the roof fly over the top, connecting the ground floors on either side.

 

 

This is an example of how the roof can connect the two sides and fly over the top.

 

I therefore began to change my model to incorporate verticle curves such as this.

 

 

Due to the fact that there would be no access through the centre of the building except for the pods, it was implausible to have a sweeping roof, so as such, it was determined to have these curves on either side, on the platform area.

 

Additionally, these curves began to double up as a wall for customers on the platform level.

 

New Model....

 

I began to model the original idea again, and decided to try and morph it to suit what I wanted. In essence, I tried to keep with my original dream and not give up on it, but rather to try and make it more possible then before.

 

I began to add in the platform level in the hopes that having more of the stucture modelled would allow me to get a greater idea of how the building would look within it's context.

 

I had also started to look at more human scale elements in order to understand how people would use the building. For example here are some ticket office windows.

 

I also began to look at the roof, and how the three levels would interact with each and revolve around the transport rail level. However, I decided that I would prefer to have a more interesting roof to make it more futuristic.

 

 

 

I wanted to create a more curvy and free flowing roof which would protect the occupants, let light in and also allow for the Brisbane climate.

 

 

 

I began to look at a roof which would separate spaces between the two tracks, be free standing and could also act as a wall, or surface which customers could wait against. It became apparent that this structure would need to be transparent however to create a connection to the outside.

 

Week 12...

The lecture this week was the last lecture of the unit, and therefore the last lecture of my undergraduate course. The topic of this lecture was the final presentation and what was to be expected of us and our deliverables.

It was said by Yasu that the time had no come to stop developing your concept and to start to work towards producing a presentation. This was unwelcome news to myself, as I had recently had a brief (slightly irratic) change of mind and hurriedly started to change my design to accomodate my new ideas. I decided that the time had come to start to get something together and begin to dedicate myself to it to make it work.

Further into the lecture we were shown examples of presentations and videos which help to sell a building. I found each one really interesting and was taking more of a look at animation techniques and presentation styles more than I was the architectural projects. Some basic ideas, such as opacity of certain models and grey scale were very effective, and I also enjoyed elements such as panning and zooming along one large image and giving pop up windows of increased detail.

I decided I was going to strive to do something similar.




I also really appreciated this quote, as I often feel that I am fighting against myself to meet my internal expectations. I began to realise that work, no matter if it was a success or a failure was always worth doing and ultimately always helped me to improve my skills.

I wish I had seen this quote in first year.

King George Square....

Before moving forward, I decided it was time to look back and begin to analyse existing architecture that I use everyday and try and gain an understanding from how they are successful. I started to look at King George Square, a bus station 100m away from my proposed site.

 

 

The use of materials and finishes was apparent throughout the design, with a lot sleek, shiny surfaces. Since the station is underground, the designers have gone out of their way to ensure that the space is well lit and spacious, reducing feelings of claustrophobia and containment.

 

Here is an example of a lighting detail which has been used to emphasise the linearity of the space and ensure that it is well lit.

 

Signage is an important aspect of transport station navigation and here a number of electronic displays can be seen which display announcements, advertising and helpful information.

 

Digital screens are also used to display timetabling information within the common area of the station. Also in the background the use of ticket machines can be seen to speed up the boarding process.

 

Finally, adequate manual signage is provided to navigate the space. Also apparent is the idea of the ceiling and recessed lights, however, as my design is out in the open, this idea is not necessary. However, a number of lights will need to be fitted.

Changing the Idea...

Due to my unease of the previous mass being too imposing, I decided to start to look at other options of arranging this transport system.

A few quick sketches were done as below.

 

I played with the idea of inverting my original concept and moving the "tracks" to the outside and including a central platform. This would make the building seem to come out of the ground more in an extension of the landscape. However, it would cause issues with connectivity and access to the elevated walkways which are apparent within our urban context.

 

I decided to look at it in a different way and create a vertical system, which would promote a narrower and therefore less imposing building upon the ground plain.

 

I started to draw conclusions about how people would access these pods from a horizontal location and it was found that the overall connections to the walkways would be disjointed, with no way of getting from one to the other.

 

 

I therefore decided that it was a good idea to redesign the pods to include two doorways and have two platforms on either side of the pod.

 

 

I then began to model the tracks up for this idea in sketchup.

 

Without changing the building on the ground floor, I could already see that the new idea would create a skinnier structure throughout the street.

 

However, it didn't take long before it occured to me that in order for this vertically to work, a number of connection points would be needed to reach the upper levels, including additional walkways, as well as stairs to access them, which would ultimately make the lower walkways wider.

 

As a result, while this idea may have kept the final building slimmer, it would only help to increase the size of the urban context and therefore, ultimately would look more messy rather than just having one large building in a smaller overall system.

 

I decided to revisit my old design and keep working to make it less assuming.

Further Modelling....

After finding the final shape which I thought would be functional and interesting, I set about modelling it up to make sure that it responded well to the site.

 

 

After doing my first initial mass, I decided that it was still going to look imposing upon the site, and there I started to think about making the building seem more open and transparent through the use of glazing and shop fronts.

 

 

I chopped off the end point and made it flat and then started to add in large sections of glazing. In order to make the building look more futuristic, I started to design differing shaped windows with unusual mullions between them.

 

I also added the walkway in the middle and produced some window display areas for the shops on either side.

 

When viewing the model from the inside, I found that I liked the space created by the two curving walls.

 

 

Despite the fact that the windows have started to make the building seem less imposing, I still feel that the building is too solid in its appearance and is pushing itself too much on the context. As much as I want this building to become a central hub, I do not want it to become the only focal point within the street and definately do not want it to appear too strongly within the context.

Week 11...

The lecture this week was once again by Phil Crowther, and he was discussing the prospect of the masters course in architecture after my undergraduate came to an end at the end of this semester.

While I would like to continue with my education further and eventually hope to become registered, I agreed with Phil's advice about not going to masters straight away. I feel that there are a lot more skills that I need in architecture to be able to complete further studies, and I also believe that these skills can only be learnt and understood within the workplace. Therefore, I think I'm going to take a few years off after my bachelor, to gain some work experience and really discover what it is that I'd like to focus on for the rest of my career.

Otherwise I think I'd come out of university with a masters and still not really know what I was doing, or why I was doing it. Eventually however, I am sure I will return.

Massing...

Now that I haven't designed the transport system, including the structure and transportation vehicles, found a location for my building and decided upon what the overall intent my building is to be; it is now time to begin to plan out the building or start to "mass" the building.

 

When starting to mass, I always begin with a basic geometrical shape and start to modify it as I go through the steps.

 

 

In order to maintain a healthy flow of pedestrian traffic through Queen street, I decided that the building should have edges defined by current traffic patterns exisiting within the site.

 

To ensure a smoother transition of the passers-by, the edges of the shape were rounded out to create a gradual increase in shape.

 

 

This then created an oval shaped building footprint.

 

However, the building was still quite imposing and left no permeability to it. Due to the fact I didn't want to turn Queen street into two seperate spaces either side of this building, I decided to cut walkways through it.

 

The resultant ground floor would look similar to this, a pattern of small shops and walkways stretching from end to end.

 

This sketch shows the three layers I was hoping to incorporate into this design. It has the ground floor plain, with shops and permeable walkways. Then it has the platform level and pod system, while on top it has a small retail space which would become useful in a centralised and compact urban envornment such as our idealised future.

 

After getting this overall shape from the ground floor on which to work on, it was time to start to model it within context to attach a scale to the building.

Design Intent...

After choosing the way in which the transport system would work and the location of the proposed station, it was time to decide what I wanted this building to be like, how it would respond to the environment and the impact it would have upon it's context.

To sum up my design intent within a sentence it would be:

"To create a functional, yet compact transport station, which can help to enliven the ground plain while remaining unimposing upon the site."

Within the strict confines of this urban site, the idea of creating an unimposing, yet functional and quite large building (relatively) is going to be quite a challenge.

Location for Transport Station....

In order to start to design my building, I first need to look at possible locations within Queen Street.

As my building is intending to simply be inserted within the street, it needs to minimise possible intrusions to the context.

Two possible locations were chosen for the site of the transport station. These were at the two ends of our site on Queen street.

 

The two possible locations. Each location contains minimal infrastructure and small shops. However the one to the right contains the most open space and has a greater connection to the myer centre and other elements within queen street.

 

The area of queen street was also explored.

 

 

It can be seen that queen street contains a number of timber and steel structures.

 

 

That there is a lot of greenery and seating areas.

 

 

 

Small businesses dotted around the pedestrian area, each with interesting roof structures and connections to the outside.

 

 

As well as large retail buildings with interesting heritage facades.

 

There are a series of walkways between structures making the street more permeable and fluid.

 

 

There are meeting places and central points within the street, bordered by small businesses.

 

After examining Queen Street some more it was decided that a pod station would be better suited to the proposed area on the right of the first image with more open space and places for people to move about.