Architecture Commons^™

Animal Cities: Post-Human Urban Wildness, Jing Huang

Architecture Thesis Prep

This thesis contends that architecture should be designed in a way to foster closer human-animal relationships. Cities are typically designed solely with the human in mind, and over time, animals have been pushed out of the city, decreasing biodiversity. Peoples’ tendency is to separate themselves and domesticate animals, resulting in sterile and tame urban centers. This is a result of the different attitudes humans have cultivated towards animals; dirty/clean, pleasant/annoying, useful/useless, harmless/dangerous, awe/disgust, etc., and utilizing architecture as means of filtering the presence of those that are beneficial to us, rendering animals as an afterthought. In a way, humans have …

Industrial Intervened, Xige Liu

Architecture Thesis Prep

The structure of China industrial company is quite different, because the company had many other related service only available to people who work there and their family, such as kindergarten, college, food factory, theatre, apartments and etc. That is the culture and social contents of a typical industrial company. It is also the characteristic of socialism of China. Like what Tschumi said, the social relevance and formal invention of architecture cannot be dissociate from the event that happen in it. It’s also related to what Cedric Price had done for the Fun Place that the architecture should be highly adaptable …

The Seed: Urban Vertical Farming Germinated, Michael Lima

Architecture Thesis Prep

This thesis is proposing a mixed use commercial and agricultural building within the Warehouse District of Minneapolis, Minnesota. With a population rise of 1100% in the last ten years and close proximity to areas in need of food justice action this building investigates the ability for buildings to act not only as shelter for people, but also as life springs for those living within its proximity. Food production, water filtration and education of the human connection to their role in nature are three of the tenants that “The Seed” addresses. The Seed will germinate the concept of Vertical Urban Farming …

Absorbency In Tidal Resiliency, Shauna Strubinger

Architecture Thesis Prep

This thesis responds to the current threat of the impact of sea level rise on coastal population cities and proposes to create a blurred, absorbent condition, similar to the relationship between water and land.

The Question Of Slim | A Critical Look At Manhattan's Recent Trend Towards Slenderness, Raymond Sova

Architecture Senior Theses

Manhattan’s real estate market since the turn of the 20th century to present day can be characterized as an extreme optimization of the economical elements of architecture. Most of the buildings in Manhattan’s diverse and complex skyline share a tenacious desire to maximize the profitability and feasibility of a site while minimizing overall building expenditure. This concept is defined in Koolhaas’s ‘Delirious New York,’ as the relationship between “the Needle” and “the Globe.” Seemingly immeasurable wealth and investment have given rise to a new sub-typology of super-tall strikingly skinny (Slim) residential skyscrapers that may very well result in the demise …

(Urban) Waste Producing (Urban) Space, Mrunmai Fulambarkar

Architecture Thesis Prep

Although heat is the primary waste produced by industrial processes, designers can transform this by-product into energy that can allow for the creation of new public amenity and data center hybrids that integrate, celebrate and provide benefits to the urban realm.

Where Wellness Begins, Chelsea Wheeler

Architecture Thesis Prep

This thesis contends that if occupant health is placed at the forefront of design, utilizing a proposed process of design that selects and addresses three out of nine suggested elements of health through demographic mapping and utilizes these elements to construct human-centric drawings during the initial stages of design, the resulting architecture will promote occupant wellbeing.

Aesthetics And Performance Evaluation Of Post-Industrial Public Parks, Adel C. Vaughn

Landscape Architecture Undergraduate Honors Theses

Post-Industrial sites are often un-utilized and deserted places that are an aesthetic, social, ecological, and physical hindrance to the realm of the cities in which they lie, however they possess enormous potential. With respectful and transformative design, these new public parks gain a variety of benefits that extend well beyond the typical benefits exhibited by public parks due to their rich history, fascinating existing structures, high levels of visual and sensorial stimulation, one-of-a-kind traits, and opportunity for impactful change. By evaluating these post-industrial public parks, knowledge can be gained about what specific elements in the landscape contribute to their overall …

Exploring Emerging Technologies For The Built Environment Circa 2015 For Use In Architectural Engineering And Related Majors, Connor J. Hanlon

Architectural Engineering

For this senior project I am seeking to combine my knowledge of Structural Engineering with Construction Management. For this task, I have decided to look at Building Information Modeling (BIM). In this project I investigate the BIM tools Trimble Tekla Structures and Autodesk Navis- works Manage. Tekla is a modeling, fabrication, and design program. Navisworks is a visualiza- tion and Clash Detection tool. For this project I have identiÅied two main goals relating to Navis- works and Tekla:

1. Create content to allow students and professors learn how to use Tekla and Navisworks

2. Determine the capabilities of these softwares, and Åigure …

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Tron 2.0 - The Experience, Alecsandro G. Vitale, Alexander W. Billings, Jordan Delfino, William Beechinor, Kelly Rorden

Architectural Engineering

The goal of this senior project was to come up with a structural-engineering-related schematic design for a roller coaster to be installed in Disneyland called TRON 2.0: The Experience. This involved looking at both design processes that we had already learned through our curriculum as well as researching concepts that were previously foreign to us, namely the dynamic application of loads and the effects of fatigue stresses.

A story was established based on the source material: the TRON movies produced by Walt Disney Studios. Thematic elements from the story were used as the basis for design implications that would become …

Best Practices In Community-Based Water Projects, Deborah Anyaibe

Architecture and Planning ETDs

International potable water projects are becoming more common in underdeveloped countries. The necessity of getting clean drinking water to remote areas, or areas with limited access to water is becoming more desperate. This desperation is causing more people to seek to give aid to those in need but often times this comes with a price to the community. This price comes in the form of infrastructure that is unsustainable, building materials left behind instead of disposed of properly, and systems that require upkeep without proper training, as well as many other cultural and economic negative impacts. Many times aid organizations …

Cycles Of Life, Henry Jake Foreman

Architecture and Planning ETDs

Engaging storytelling is both the means and medium of Cycles of Life(COL). This thesis project consists of a video documentary and curriculum magazine that highlights the visioning process, implementation, and cyclical design of this transformative learning model. Throughout the COL co-creative process, students collectively utilize Indigenous research methodologies to examine innovations in planning, design and education from diverse sources including guest speakers, social media, and contextual multi-sensory experiences. Incorporated into the COL curriculum is a regenerative process where students vision their own curriculum model that impacts health, education, planning and design. It is my hope that these seed projects will …

Subjective Perception Of Varying Reflection Densities In Room Impulse Responses, Hyun Hong

Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Reverberation time (RT) is a metric commonly used to describe room acoustic conditions, but different rooms which have the same reverberation time can have different reflection densities. Much less is known about how humans perceive different reflection densities and how sensitive humans are to changes in reflection density. Previous investigations in the existing literature have studied the upper limit of distinguishable reflection density using artificial impulse responses, but not with more realistic impulse responses simulated in room acoustic software or measured from real rooms. The aim of this dissertation is to investigate methods for quantifying reflection density from measured impulse …

Discomfort Glare From Small, High Luminance Light Sources In Outdoor Nighttime Environments, Yulia I. Tyukhova

Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The overarching goal of this research was to examine humans’ subjective and physiological responses to small, high luminance light sources in outdoor nighttime environments. Currently, discomfort glare is rarely calculated in lighting practice (Remaking Cities Institute (RCI) 2011), partly, because it is not known which metric predicts glare most accurately in the given application.

This dissertation describes a parametric experiment evaluating the effects of three glare source luminances (20,000; 205,000; 750,000 cd/m²), two source positions (0°, 10°), two source sizes (10^-5, 10^-4 sr), and three background luminances (0.03; 0.3; 1 cd/m²) on the …

Are Bay Area Cities Inclusive? Evaluating How San Francisco Bay Area Cities Can Address Environmental Justice Challenges By Strengthening Their Engagement Practices With Low-Income And Minority Communities Through The California Environmental Quality Act Process, Kenneth Antonio Rosales

Master's Projects

No abstract provided.

Hacking The Urban Village | Architecture As Board Game, Xuyun Liu

Architecture Senior Theses

This thesis proposes the board game as a new research methodology and platform for the study of southern China's urban villages.

Hacking the Urban Village examines the urban villages that have, in recent decades, become a common but informal settlement type in China as a result of China's unprecedented period of urbanization.

This research forms the contextual core of a board game where game settings present the current urban conditions and players may explore alternative forms of urbanism. The board game offers players the opportunity to investigate both he formal conditions of the urban village life along with it attendant …

Sponge Logics | Rethinking Thresholds Through A Porous Mass, Tanvi Sanghvi

Architecture Senior Theses

This thesis contends that the separation and distinction between the envelope and the mass in contemporary architecture is to be resisted. Architect and theorist, Greg Lynn, argues that mass “is not only the outward shape of a building; it’s also the projection of shape, plan organization, spatial and sectional type, and façade”1.This critical reevaluation of the mass, and its relationship to the interior spaces and the building’s face, is particularly pertinent to the modern construction in Jaipur, Rajasthan, India. The character of the historicist and postmodern buildings that make up Jaipur is made solely based on the applied façade. This …

Releasing The Unconsciousness | Visualizing The City, Taihui Li

Architecture Senior Theses

This thesis explores how subway stations lost their identity as strategic node of connectivity which constructed the prevailing image of New York City. In Civilization and Its Discontents (1930), Sigmund Freud famously compared the human mind to the city of Rome. He argues that both contain strata of memory and history which have accumulated over the years through a messy and ad-hoc process. Like Rome, New York City also has a layered history, albeit not as deep.

This thesis contends that the subway entrance serves as an experiential entre into the unconscious experience of the unknown elements of the past. …

Risk Analysis And Disaster Recovery: A Florida Lihtc Case Study, Valerie Hammett

All Dissertations

In spite of numerous programs and policies that encourage private investment in affordable housing, particularly after hurricane disaster, insufficient numbers of affordable units exist to meet demand. Some low-income households are displaced in the course of disaster recovery, and others face severe housing cost burdens as demand for affordable housing outstrips supply. Some suggest competitive uses for limited funds impede production. Others suggest that disaster and recovery policies tend to favor homeowners and economic recovery. Little attention has been given to the development decisions of affordable housing developers during disaster recovery. This study examines LIHTC development risk after the 2004 …

Housing Projects And Cityscape In Vienna: Apartment Buildings As Fortresses From Metaphor To Reality, Michael J. Zeps S.J.

History Faculty Research and Publications

No abstract provided.