Architecture Commons^™

Layered Scamming: Exposing How The Desires Reflect In The Architecture Design, Alejandra Charrabe

Architecture Senior Theses

Based on the essay “Learning from Las Vegas: The Forgotten Symbolism of Architectural Forms” by Robert Venturi, Denise Scott Brown, and Steven Izenour the terms “decorated shed” and “duck” take on a different meaning when speaking of architecture. These terms specifically described a relationship between the program and the façade of a building. By taking such terms an applying them to an analysis of brothel facades, an interesting relationship can be created between the marketing strategy desired for such brothel and the way in which the façade represents such strategy. I will be analyzing the relationship between public/private, commercial/cultural, container/content …

Configuring Narrowness: Formulating Vertical Vernaculars In The Forgotten, Teriya Lee

Architecture Senior Theses

The thesis is convinced that a memorable narrowness can be achieved in an urban void if the architect shifts focus from the horizontal plane to the vertical plane. Indeed, a large portion of what can be seen when approaching a narrow street is not "the front," but "the sides." By using the current vernacular palette to develop vertically-oriented shacks, the thesis proposes two alternative designs to reimage these cracks in the city, in order to fill these cracks in memory.

Materializing Light, Lirong Tan

Architecture Senior Theses

Artificial light, especially volumetric light, can be materialized and transform the existing ruin. Specifically, I would choreograph the interaction between people and light to exaggerate, or dramatize, the tragic feeling of Hiroshima Memorial Dome.

Blur Out, Hye Rim Shin

Architecture Senior Theses

Blur Out explores ideas about architecture that seeks ephemerality rather than legibility, eidetic affects rather than demand of focused attention and atmospheric or emotional spaces rather than conventional spaces.

The exploration of Blur Out is situated within the research topic of different states of snow that are generated from avalanche phenomena of Iceland, which develops site specific understandings of the phenomena and effects. The project aims to build a blurred boundary both literally and experientially between the built and natural environment to challenge representing and re-presenting the spectrum of tangibility to intangibility. By exploring the dichotomy between the built and …

I Want This! I Want That!: A Speculation On The Future Context Of Architecture, Olivia Flores-Siller, Steven Worthington

Architecture Senior Theses

We are hypothesizing a potential future reality where architecture is in the hands of the common person, projecting the idea of mass customization and the expanding scope of DIY into the larger scale of ‘building.’ Hyper-individualism, experimentation, and expressionism characterize this ‘world’ because increases in technology have led to there being little commitment and consequence attached to actions and ‘building’. Technology works harder for us; and as we work less, we play more.

Our values and lifestyles are echoed in our architecture; what, then, is the condition an urban landscape focusing on individualism and mass customization? In this story, architecture …

Axon-Orama: A New System Of Architectural Representation, Fei Wang

Architecture Senior Theses

A codified architectural representation, the axonometric drawing is objective, yet an audience's reception of a building is perspectival and constructed through a spatial narrative over time. In response to this paradox, Axon-orama is proposed as a new representational technique - a set of variational drawings with pliable arrangement and hybrid expression - explored through the use of the British board game, Myriorama. The work blurs the boundary between objective and subjective representation and perception, offering a new system of architectural inquiry.

Metabolism For Cyborgs, Christopher Bressler, Colin Hoover

Architecture Senior Theses

The networked device is becoming an integral part of the ways in which human beings interface with their environment. This project seeks to explore the architectural implications of this trend as it reaches its logical conclusion in the cyborg mind. Access to information concerning specific geographic and architectural locations is already a tool used in the creation of communities and defining spatial boundaries. The ability to do so relies on the interconnected layers of virtual and physical objects. This relationship is described in Benjamin Bratton’s “The Stack” which labels the mass of connected devices and users as an “accidental megastructure.” …

Emergency Homes, Denise A. Lee

Architecture Senior Theses

“Designers cannot just stand by and watch as the refugee crisis unfolds,” and although architects and designers can’t save the world, through design, we can alleviate consequences of scarcity. It’s not about creating a structure that will withstand the ends of time or endure the most extreme climate, it’s about how to respond in an emergency with the most geographically intelligent prototype that utilizes the utmost importance of on site materials so the bare minimum of an instruction manual or few key tools to offset distribution obstacles. This thesis is aimed to design for the 99 in disaster relief.

Dinner Parti, Evangeline Soileau

Architecture Senior Theses

This thesis is a body of work that investigates the architectural relationships among event, documentation, material production, and user interaction through the lens of social dining. A Picnic, Thanksgiving, and Solo Dining are the three dining scenarios that are the subject of these analytical and design investigations. Architecture is treated as a form of creative nonfiction through the design of artifacts that perform as the events’ material and spatial analogs. These artifacts aim to create new readings of the social dining event as it is understood, misunderstood, and taken for granted in the contemporary context.

The Oppelaland: An Underground Refugee Theme Park In Aleppo, Rui Bao

Architecture Senior Theses

This thesis operates on the perception of Syrian refugees as a threat and a burden to European countries by architectural means.

In emergency situations, architecture tends to act only after the conflict by providing temporary aid, such as refugee camps. This kind of emergency remedy displaces a large number of refugees to countries all over the world. Refugees may be discriminated and treated as second class citizens in the host countries. They may be restricted in small areas like prisoners rather than citizens with equal rights.

This thesis propose a hyper-real project in the form of "Refugeeland" to call attention …

Ruin-Naissance, Fatma Gonca Tunc

Architecture Senior Theses

Ruin-naissance is the term I use to describe not only the resurrection of an archeological site, but also the rebirth of an idea about how we think about ruins and how new construction can enhance the experience of these kinds of sites.

The principle contention of this thesis is that a better understanding of the fragmented evidence presented by an archeological site can be seen through the lens of a contemporary architectural intervention that responds sensitively to an ancient site. In doing this, the intervention needs to address issues of identity, narrative and historiography. The new architecture should not ignore …

[Ar] You Ready?, Trang Tran

Architecture Senior Theses

This project challenges the obsolete existence of signage and billboards and seeks to explore how augmented reality (AR) advertisements change the relationship between signage and buildings.

Reconnect: Amplifying Circulation Typologies To Radically Rethink Urban-Aqueous Relationships, Tiffany Pau

Architecture Senior Theses

This thesis proposes a radical rethinking of city-water relationships to leverage existing infrastructural and architectural divides; because it holds great architectural and social value to work within and challenge existing systems, and because access to the waterfront– for sustenance, transportation, commercial, or leisure purposes– is a core human need. The project questions what happens when connections are scaled extra-large, yet aim to maintain the qualities that are imbued within them at the micro scale to generate increased public activity at the water’s edge. It looks to create a new type of urbanism, one that prioritizes the very act of circulation …

Iiid: A Detailed Look Into System Integration Of Material Types Through The Use Of 3d Printing, Johnathon E. Phillips

Architecture Senior Theses

This thesis wishes to pursue the potential of 3D printing ornamented designs with the use of shale/clay powder. This material compound, through this research, had been shown to be compliable with 3D printing technology so that it can be sculpted by the tools of the architect into complex geometric “blocks.” These can then be printed and red allowing them to become the tectonic building bricks for a new way of building. Through researching this material, I will demonstrate the usefulness and possibilities of this time-tested substance in the creation of new architectural spaces.

Ritual Place, Dabota Wilcox

Architecture Senior Theses

What is a ritual? Its connotations are rooted in the vocabulary of religion, but essentially a ritual is a repeated or singularly significant act meant to instill a deeper meaning or reinforce a belief. Beliefs are supported through the practice of rituals. Rituals are special because they facilitate experiences that separate us from the mundane. They serve to pull its participants to recognize and participate in something of worth. But what would it mean to imagine the new ritual? If for a moment this distinction were expanded there are countless moments, activities, or seemingly insignificant acts that could be considered …

Zones Of Entanglement: Nigeria's Real And Imagined Compounds, Joseph Godlewski

School of Architecture - All Scholarship

This article is part of TDSR, Volume XXVII, Number II, 2017

From the article abstract: This article examines the architectural and discursive configurations of traditional walled compounds in Nigeria. It begins by discussing the spatial and social organization of compounds in different regions of the country, focusing on the impermanent structures of the Èfik in and around the southeastern port city of Old Calabar. It then examines archival evidence to highlight the ways that compounds have been rhetorically constructed by European observers and post-independence scholars. It concludes that a more productive reading results from understanding the compound as a zone …

Schloss Sanssouci (1743-1745), Jean-François Bédard

School of Architecture - All Scholarship

This article is a general overview of Schloss Sanssouci, a summer palace of Fredrick II, King of Prussia. The architect, Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff, depended heavily upon Fredrick's idiosyncratic designs, giving Scholoss Sanssouci a unique character.

Vierzehnheiligen (1742-1744), Jean-François Bédard

School of Architecture - All Scholarship

This article traces the ways in which competing architectural plans for the Vierzehnheiligen (currently known as the Basilica of the Fourteen Holy Helpers) in Southern Germany evolved from its 1735 until 1744. These changes reflect changing ideas of church architecture and the pragmatic realities of the site.