Design as Research project

Below is the A1 poster produced for my Design as Research project, relevant for the Odeon project...

Odeon gone..

See this link:
http://cclblog.wordpress.com/2012/09/10/the-odeon/

Internal materials

Seats - different kinds, different prices for different seats
Seats - materials that have a distinct smell and feel: old leather & wood
I want the auditorium to smell like the inside of a vintage car

Ways to represent this....tell a story
For final presentation, perhaps do a large hand drawing of a section with shading etc...

Talk with Engineer - Lloyd Ellis

• Need to go down roughly 17m to hit bedrock in Christchurch
• Piles down 17m from ground, spaced 5m apart

• Structure under the old building (ie. the new bits) will most probably be concrete

• Existing masonry will require reinforcing with a steel frame on the outside - steel will go down into a large concrete footing to stabilise. Then the new building (ground floor down) will be placed inside this.
• Either put steel frame on the inside around the whole existing OR steel frame for auditorium and tie the existing back to this to stabilise
• Circular auditorium space could be poured concrete with layers or GRC - can be coloured (either)
• Facade will need strengthening also

Dome of the Rock

Rock floor for the atrium area?
Bedrock...significance for Christchurch - solid rock, important to send foundations down to this for stability in earthquakes etc...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dome_of_the_Rock

Approach to 'ruins' (existing building)

Notes from Detail journal peice on Approach to Existing Buildings

Ruskins vow of chasity as an approach to the ruin is often quote but rarely fulfilled. The general taboo against improvement often raises the issue of fake versus authentic. However, what actually ammounts to corruption and dilution of the authentic?

Regardless, it is critical to investigate the historical/material/archeological history as well as assessing the significance of each element of the building before intervening. You must understand the existing building before knowing what to repair/how to repair.

Architect - the ruin may be manipulated as any artefact can for visual effect, any number of solutions

versus

Archaeologist - every fragment is a part of a puzzle to which there is only one answer...

Cross crit comments

Things to change after discussion with Michael Milojevic:

• move the entire auditorium 'sphere' up one level which serves two purposes:
• (1) provide service spaces closer to the stage eg. dressing rooms
• (2) removes some of the 'wasted' space I was concerned about
• put roof on, don't leave 'open air'

These were things that were niggling at me in any case so am very happy with these changes.

The 'sphere' will provide much needed reinforcement for the brick masonry walls..

Nieto Sobejano - Moritzburg Museum extension

 

Modern architecture conveys the image of the architect as the lone designer who has complete control over the final outcome. However, this image is inconsistent when working on a building designed by someone else - just as there would be little sympathy for an artist who alters another's art. This could explain why modernism, with its tabula rasa mentality, viewed historic buildings as isolated monuments and/or simply replaced them. Conversely, some of the most significant projects completed recently have been refurbishments and additions to older buildings which exhibit a dialogue with the past. To do this successfully, the changes that have occurred over time must be confronted. In their work with existing buildings, Nieto and Sobejano have suggested that buildings may possess the genesis of their own alteration so that we just need to uncover their intrinsic codes and translate these into how to extend, disguise, enwrap, subdivide.

"Refurbishing or adapting an existing building is perhaps nothing more than decoding the original designer's hidden intentions, being able to read a building like a palimpsest, as the sum of various coexisting texts upon which the traces of an earlier inscription - at times barely decipherable - are perceptible."[1]

---

[1] Fuensanta Nieto and Enrique Sobejano. "Reading the Existing Fabric." Detail (English Ed.), no. 1 (Jan-Feb 2010): 6.

 

 

 

To do list for next week...

To do:

(1) Resolve gallery levels - placement & seating
(2) Resolve the shape and programme for the atrium space on basement level 3 - bar/cafe/meeting place before theatre (yes) Plantings on the walls, green organic/ozone smells like being outside
(3) Investigate requirements for walkways/access across the atrium
(4) Flesh out the rooms in fly tower (green room, studio, dressing rooms, scene dock)
(5) Start to do drafts of materials for auditorium
(6) Look more closely at the Moritzburg Museum extension by Nieto Sobejano
(7) Flesh out the rooms at the front-of-house

Notes after talking with Mark since last presentation:

• Keep the shapes (eg. auditorium) pure/simple/uncluttered
• The circular auditorium shape could sit just apart from the existing brick wall (eg. museum, plus look also at  Moritzburg museum treatment)
• Existing brick walls - should these have 'windows' inserted anywhere or leave as found?
• Model the actual walls as they are now...
• Roof - no roof as planned over main acting area, then flattish roofs over remaining.

Auckland Museum Atrium

The atrium at the museum reminds me of how I'd like the atrium space in the Odeon design to feel - the same qualities of space though of course my space will be on a much smaller scale:

• layering, warmth and texture of the wood
• contrast between the new wooden 'bowl' and the plaster/stone facade

It's easy to make the association between this and my original teacup concept as an auditorium space...

Noel Lane was responsible for the development of the overall idea, he was given technical support from a team of architects from Peddle Thorp Aitken.

 

"...the bowl is structurally isolated, suspended from a large steel cruciform and supported by four towering legs. The bowl has been compared to many things, including a sea craft, but Lane considers it more as an artefact: It's a reflection of the objects it contains and the ground it stands on. However, every aspect of the design is doing more than it appears – there is no frivolous decoration. The material choices and the sculptural shape are functional decorations.
Unexposed to the elements, the Fijian kauri cladding with its band-sawn finish is not designed to weather. Instead, the texture and patina, and the method of application – which was influenced by the woodturning of artist John Ecuyer – provide a contrast with the white plaster ceiling. As a whole, the atrium pulls spaces together.."

 

 

 

http://trendsideas.com/Article9048/NewZealand

http://trendsideas.com/Article9068/NewZealand

GEOMETRY - ad quadratum & the Globe & the Odeon...

What makes a good theatre?
Harmony. Proportion. Intimacy. Verticality. Volume.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/stage/2007/sep/04/theatre.westend

400 seats?

ad quadratum geometry to describe relationship between the galleries and the stage; these plans above were my drawings of the reconstructed Globe floor plan using this geometry

Odeon translation...

However, my diagrams above need slight adjustments in order to comply with Vitruvius' rules - the proscenium line should be at the lower horizontal line of the first square within the top large circle (ie. this circle could be moved downwards towards the back stage wall...
That is, see the line A-B in the diagram below from book VII, Greek Theatres (Vitruvius' Ten Books of Architecture):