Architectural Technology Commons^™

Additive Manufacturing Applications: From Personal Protective Equipment To Sustainable High-Performance Construction Systems, Nicholas Van Son

EURēCA: Exhibition of Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement

Additive Manufacturing (AM) (3D-printing) is still an emerging technology, and many of its applications have yet to be explored; all the while, we still use age-old industry methods in a variety of fields. This research investigates the potential for AM to serve as a solution to the problems presented in these methods. With the support of UTK’s Office of Research, the following research focuses on two main objectives: improving the ergonomics, effectiveness, and production of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and improving the sustainability and structural performance of large-scale construction systems.

The first objective came as a response to the COVID-19 …

Boolean Architecture, Amber Michaela Stanfill, Tyler S. Sanford

EURēCA: Exhibition of Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement

The Grande Boolean Concert Hall uses architectural features to draw in the passerby and creates a pull for those considering Knoxville as a destination. The design infuses natural curves into the downtown area creating architectural intrigue and seats just over 1800 patrons for concerts or events. Boolean logic informed the programmatic flow and overall form celebrating the three Boolean operations: difference, intersection and union. The geometries informing circulation, enclosure and organization were the cone, sphere, and ellipse. These geometries were operated upon to create a plaza, entrance, and roof geometry directly relating to acoustic performance. A detailed acoustic simulation allowed …

Transecting The Heart: An Atrium Investigation, Aubrey Sofia Bader, Sandra Ghabrial

EURēCA: Exhibition of Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement

An oxbow in a river creates a peninsula with a unique environment, distant from the surrounding land. Similarly, the oxbow-shaped Federal Center South Building 1202 contains a peninsula, an enclosed atrium, with an environment unlike the flowing current of offices that surround it. The cool modern offices are contrasted with the warmth of the central timber structure. The exposed timber beams and columns consist of wood reclaimed from a warehouse that previously stood on the site. In conversation with the modern oxbow of offices, the timber is reinforced by steel beams, giving it new life.

During our initial research phase, …

Integral Perspectives, Henry Brian Cheek

Masters Theses

Integral Perspectives is a method to architectural design that encompasses four different approaches. The four approaches, or perspectives, I chose to focus on include: Cultural, Experiential, Performance, and Systems. Designing with each of these perspectives in mind, I intend to create a more holistic and integral design solution. My thesis explores this methodology using the affordable housing crisis in Nashville, TN.

Logistical Bodies Of Fulfillment, Michael Steven Frush

Masters Theses

existence occurs in a spatial assembly of multiple scalar experiences that is intensified and brought to perception by the exponential advancement of a virtual extension.

the physical realm that human cognition experiences acts as a bound container influenced by natural law and trusted forces. the virtual realm exists as a medium through which linkages are made that suppose unseen law, forces, and connections. the human existence experiences an interface between the multiplicities of the physical and the virtual. as technologies advance exponentially the recognition of a multiple temporality is intensified by digital networks and spatial extensions. the trusting of physical …

Operational Jakarta: The Problem Of Representation, Kevin Patrick Jeffers

Masters Theses

As the twenty-first century unfolds with newly formed degrees of hypercomplex interactions and reactions amongst space, time, economy, politics, social dynamics, and cultural paradigms, we are observing new typologies of urbanism that are different in kind, rather than degree, from the previous “urban” upon which the vast majority of present theoretical and practical discourse has been based. The techniques, strategies, and methodologies of the twentieth-century no longer serve to adequately represent or to explain the phenomena of today’s incipient mega-cities. A new vocabulary must be developed. A new way of seeing is required in order to understand and therefor to …

Membrane Dissection: The Bechtler Museum, Mike Lidwin, Rachel List

EURēCA: Exhibition of Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement

A windowless façade becomes the inspiration for an experimentation of materials. Through the use of terracotta cladding, Mario Botta crafts a local landmark and structural masterpiece in his design of the Bechtler Museum of Modern Art. The Bechtler Museum is located in Charlotte, North Carolina, and appears as a giant terracotta-red cube in the downtown cityscape. Instead of including several exterior windows, Botta focuses on the materiality of terracotta to function as an attractive facade and as an effective enclosure system.

This research project analyzes structural and enclosure elements of Mario Botta’s Bechtler Museum. Through diagramming the building in section, …

Speculative Future Metabolic Architecture, Haley Erin Moore

Masters Theses

Speculating the implications of a metabolic architecture provides a platform for thinking about a new way of future building. Disaster scenarios such as floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, nuclear fallouts, and others are unavoidable events. Instead of building compressively, meaning building to defend against scenarios such as disasters, the future should include building in the way a natural system behaves, in flux, with material dependencies, and as an output produced from the exchange of materials, reactions, or responses that occur in a metabolism. Architecture must be thought of as an output of a metabolism, an altered input, where this output is unknown …

Working With Paul Rudolph To Make Rudolph Work: Reclaiming, Conserving, And Adapting Sarasota High School (1958), Katherine Marie Armstrong

Masters Theses

Sarasota High School, designed by Paul Rudolph in 1958, physically embodies the central ideas of Regional Modernism that developed in Sarasota, Florida in the 1940s and 50s. Covered breezeways, monumental sunshades, deep overhangs, and sliding glass doors promote natural ventilation and sun shading as ways to deal with Florida’s hot climate. As an example of progressive architecture of the time, it is a seminal work of Rudolph’s and significant to Sarasota’s architectural legacy of climatically responsive, modernist buildings that captured international attention.

Sixty years later, Sarasota High School is now unoccupied and in a state of disrepair. The school board …

Revitalizing A 19th Century Industrial Complex Into A 21st Century Research And Learning Technology Center, James Lawrence Wines

Masters Theses

The revitalization and repurposing of the Domino’s Sugar Plant will foster a vibrant and engaged community for the neighborhood in a distinct way differing from the recent history of growth. Williamsburg is located in a north Brooklyn, New York, community that has been struggling for its identity since the 1970’s. The reprogramming of this abandoned industrial site will include the addition of a new technological research center that will contribute to economic growth and stability for the neighborhood. The new jobs will help bring more people into the neighborhood who will be committed to both live and work there. At …

Interactions Between The Urban Environment And “The Homelessness”: Observations And Responses, Jeffrey Charles Stahl

Masters Theses

Homelessness and people living on the streets is a phenomenon that is facing every major urban center in the United States. These people are a commonality in the urban landscape and are often seen a problem to be fi xed. Due to the interactions between the urban environment and persons experiencing homelessness, there needs to be a paradigm shift in how policy is written and how we design an intervention for these forgotten people. The goal of this thesis is to gain a clearer understanding to what it is like to survive on the streets: how dose someone fi nd …

Parametric Design And Artificial Wetlands’ Adaption In Landscape Design, Xi Wang

Masters Theses

The philosophy of sustainable development and design has become a widely accepted idea by today’s landscape architects. One of the most recent examples of a sustainable design trend is the application of the constructed wetland in an urban environment. By providing a water purification system for damaged water bodies and potential habitats for wildlife, artificial wetlands are considered as panacea to many cities challenged by water pollution and other ecological crisis. Yet artificial wetlands have obvious disadvantages and further improvements could still be made to them.

This Thesis will introduce basic information about artificial wetlands, their typology, advantages and disadvantages, …

The Architect As Developer, Samuel David Funari

Masters Theses

The current architectural landscape of strip malls and big box stores is the antitheses of what nearly every practicing architect avails to while in the security of the academy. Upon entering the real world of budgetary constraints and hard deadlines, it seems that most architects are content to simply earn a paycheck rather than produce meaningful work. This destructive method of designing is a result of a supposed lack of choices, and can only be combated when architects have more to lose than their principles. By architects playing the role of both designer and developer, it is possible to see …