Gebauede Analyse (Building Analysis)

This is the Building Analysis I did after a long and Interesting series of lectures.

We looked at a Huge range of buildings and building types, breaking them down into their simple elements. Unfortunately like all my courses this one was in German so I didn't pick it all up. I learned a lot from it, maybe I could have learned more.

What was amazing was how quickly and simply the professor could break even the most complicated buildings down into a simple parti diagram.

My project was on Peter Zumthors Kunsthaus in Bregenz Austria. We had to pick a Gallery building and compare it to 2 other buildings of the same type. It was a very useful Excercise for really studying a Building or Architect and will hopefully be useful for 3rd year coming aswell.

We also had to do a little presentation of this project, In German.

Stegrief

Some examples of the Stegrief (workshop) projects we do here most weekends. Due to the short timescale of the projects I didnt make photographs of my drawings/models etc before handup (clever, I know) and found that some of them were very difficult to get back so unfortunately some of the work (including my favourite one) has become lost.

Firstly was a small site In a little Village on the Rhine. In germany they seem to have a strict sense of planning. They seem to prefer things to melt into the existing historical buildings with certain traditional aspects being key points. The very typical steep pitched roof is one along with the exposed timber construction. I initially had an Idea for a very cubic building of brick which broke up the line of the street and incorporated an Interior garden as the site is currently a nice garden. In hinesight I should have stuck to my guns and went with my instinctual Idea, I cowardly took the route of appeasment and made a building which looked monotonously traditional. In plan It wouldnt have been much different. In section with the pitched roof and size/shape of the windows its not.

The building is a community home for old folks, with private seperate flats mixed with common areas. All fully wheelchair accesible except for the carers flat which is in the roof. I organised all the spaces around a central atrium for light and passive thermal controls. I tried to keep the circulation spaces to a minimum.

Second was a day long project, it involved designing a small residential area on the outskirts of a rural village. I tried to create quite a varied area with a good mixture of different housing stock and a good mixture, of private/ semi private outdoor areas. I also tried to use the outside area to tie it back into the surrounding woodlands and farmland areas. Once again some students gave us the tip of sticking with a pitched roof for that particular tutor.



Lastly was my favourite of these stegrief projects, an outdoor swimming pool in another small village on the rhine. The swimming pool had an L shaped building of dressing rooms and required a restaurant with amenities and small outdoor kiosk on the end of the L shape and facing the Rhine. Due to this beautiful aspect of the rhine I designed the restaurant as a glazed box with a canopy like roof inspired by a wave with a good overhang to avoid overheating and provide some shading. The kitchen and toilets are in a concrete box and help define a little outdoor square facing the pool and incorporating the kiosk.

One problem and one defining factor was the steep slope down to the river as well as the fact that the flood line of the river reaches right up to the building. Therefore I kept the restaraunt elevated with concrete or stone steps leading up to the restaurant with an outside balcony area.




Along with these 3 examples other projects also Included designing the Interior of a youth centre, An more obscure project where we had to choose a building of Irregular grid or form and give it a more structured regularity, and designing a beach house.

Platz=Square In german.............OR "Place"

Our main project here in germany is to turn a large space currently occupied with an eclectic mix of housing, schools and one church into a Public square. A public square which we are to surround with buildings of mainly residential use with associated amenities. A modest meeting point for the surrounding inhabitants.

But first!

We had a precedence project, after much deliberation I decided to do Grand Canal Square In Dublin. I thought it would be nice to add some Ideas from my own country to the class.

Beginning of Erasmus

Starting off In Mainz was tough........

getting a grip on the language took a little while (I studied german in school)

meeting people took a little while (the student apartments are horrible, and everybody in them is really boring and shy)

figuring out what to do in Uni took a little while (people are a little more friendly in Uni and lecturers are nice but they're semester and class system is crazy)

Basically you can do any class out of any semester as long as your timetable doesnt clash i.e you can kind of do whatever you want. We were told we're in semester 6, a year ahead of ourselves in Dundee but thats fine, no harm in a little challenge. One of the assistant tutors had helped to explain what each course was so we basically spent the 1st two weeks going to every lecture and class in semester 6, I think we went to some in semester 5 and one in semester 7 aswell.

Lots of the classes were exam based with not really any

practical work which we decided not to do obviously because they're all taught in german and quite technical. We opted for mainly practical subjects.

I also figured out that the Architecture school is a mix between "design" Architecture and Architectural technology which i studied in DIT. some of the subjects were super theoretical and maybe a bit boring. ie structures which was totally mathamatical.

One cool course which they have here is stegrief or workshops....most fridays you get a project that lasts either friday afternoon or the entire weekend so its a bit intense and quick but it gives a chance to just be expressive, dont worry too much and just launch into something. here are some pictures of the 1st one we did.....a beach house or a lifeguard hut..........

Waiting for Erasmus

I decided I better do some Research while i had my 3 month leave before Erasmus, so I looked mainly at good old P. Zumthor, the building directly below is in cologne, a mere bus ride away from Mainz so worth a visit.

I also got extremely lucky enough to get a job as a part-time substitute teacher (I already have a degree so i can do this) and even more lucky to get art for nearly two weeks!!! which was great, really good fun, learned a lot......as well as teaching a lot. I had classes which ranged from 12 to 18 years old, two of which were exam classes so they were the most fun to work with, they had some great ideas and hopefully i pushed them all in the right direction...... Anyway thats why theres some portraits and doodles here! I needed a wee bit of practice as I was a bit Rusty

Marketplace Pavillion

I made a conscious decision to improve my presentation this year, therefore i spent the longest i've ever spent on presentation. I hate leaving a design which im not entirely happy with for this but i've come to learn that sometimes one brilliant key image can sell the crappiest of schemes.

The main problem with the site being a market, i.e essentially a pedestrian area is that it is completely segregated from any main pedestrian routes by the main riverside road. This would seriously inhibit the use of this area. My solution to this was a marriage between pedestrian and vehicular movement and also to intice a more leisurely, passive use of the vehicle. The actual covered market space simply covers an existing route to the riverside walk. From the entrance of the market the stage/cinema which cantilevers over the water can be seen and invites people to venture through the market.From the market you can either move directly through to the riverside walk or you can take steps to the west to a raised outdoor area, the bars and coffee shops can open out onto this are for business. As it is west facing this area is designed to be used in the evening to utilise and catch the low evening sun. On top of the bars and coffee shops is a flat green roof overlooking this area which can also be used as a leisurely zone which offers a different, elevated aspect of the river and also a viewing platform of the stage/cinema.The viewing level for the cinema is raised again by three steps, partially to allow adequate sight lines to the cinema, to allow for a stepped seating area along the riverside walk and to define it as a parking area during the day. The overall height difference between the existing level is no more than 1m.