Recent posts
Aural Sushi.
We just found this link to a KPBS Radio interview with Anne Marie Welsh by Tom Fudge. Thought you might like it (< 5 minutes).
“…gorgeous new space…”
“…big industrial space…made quite elegant…”
“…malleable space…”
Logic Gates.
Capitalism OR Environmentalism. Why?
Logic gates are key components of a digital circuit. A logic gate helps to define a logical sequence of actions that take place under given circumstances with primary operators “and”, “or”, and “not”, plus their inverses. The typical logic gate will generate one output of either “true” or “false” with two inputs separated by an operator in the logic sequence.
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Selling Short.
Some have sold Building Information Modeling (B.I.M.) as a panacea tool to solve all the embedded and inherent problems perceived in the architectural profession: to streamline a firm’s productivity, to reduce errors and omissions, to better coordinate the work of the design team, to create more thorough visualizations of a project, among many other promises of such applications. Architects have in turn passed this vision on to our clients, our consultants, and to the general public; some of who now believe we have the option of just pressing the “reglet” button to automatically remove (or add) all the necessary and desired reglets in a project on a whim. The same is presumed true for walls, windows, flashing, and every commonly and uncommonly known building component. While this may in part be true (assuming you have very strict layering and can turn-off a “reglet” layer and the parametric objects “heal” themselves), what is missing from the equation is what happens then. Was the deleted reglet separating dissimilar materials to protect from differential expansion and contraction, was it part of the weather-resistant building envelope, was it an aesthetic device, or all of the above?
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What’s next?
We all know the economy has slowed down. It effects us all in different ways. Here at Open Architecture Workshop we are creating ways to keep our brains stimulated, our hearts fulfilled, and hopefully generate some alternative income streams along the way as we transit this recession.
Furnishing design is at the core of the founding of O.A.W. with our goal to produce holistic design solutions that enhance dwelling at all scales and with all senses; and now that we have a little time on our hands we have an extraordinary occasion to explore design at a slightly smaller scale. One previous furnishing project already posted here was a custom bathroom mirror. While designed specifically for the Re:House, it was intended to be a production-worthy design. Future plans include posting design documents under Creative Commons licensing to permit anybody to build their own. This is also the case with the new range of furnishings in design by O.A.W.
A Chula Vista Residence Remodel.
Many of the design opportunities presented by Re:House were repeated in the Chula Vista Residence Remodel (C.V.R.R.). First and foremost was another investigation into how to incorporate a more contemporary living mode into a traditional Craftsman-style house. In the case of the C.V.R.R., the desire to enhance access to daylight and to visually enlarge the size of the existing spaces without the budget for a true addition led to creating a more open plan in the interior “public” spaces through both selective demolition and interjection; contrasting to the solution for Re:House to open-up the private and semi-private spaces while keeping the public spaces more traditional.
Nice to meet you.
Introductions are exciting. Whether by accident or design, when you meet someone new you don’t know where it will lead - but just about anything is possible. In business, new contacts could be future resources or clients, new colleagues, employers, or employees; maybe even one of your closest friends.
In architecture, when that new acquaintance becomes a new or potentially new client, how does one go about getting to know each other quickly and deeply to assure compatibility for project success? Compatibility is acutely important in an Owner-Architect relationship as this relationship will usually involve months of time spent together working towards a common, usually intensely personal, goal often involving a lot of capital (both short and long term). So how do you get to know someone?
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Sushi in print.
The new Sushi Performance and Visual Art space has been written about recently in two local newspapers: on November 30 2008 in The San Diego Union-Tribune and on January 6 2009 in San Diego CityBeat. Both articles are great exposés for Sushi and positively mention our work! Here are links to the articles:
Another semester for Environmental Systems.
It’s been four weeks since the beginning of the Spring semester and Scott is again teaching Environmental Systems at Woodbury University’s San Diego School of Architecture and Design. The updates to the course this semester are more incremental compared to last semester’s significant update. Again this semester, the coursework focuses on the analysis of a small single family residence designed to show both good and poor thermal and visual performance. Follow along with the course summary (8 MB PDF file).
The year in review.
This was a year of discovery and learning (aren’t they all - or at least they should be). One of the more interesting lessons learned this year has to do with firm identity. When deciding on the name Open Architecture Workshop I knew it was a mouthful. But the “brand” has important meaning, focusing on the words “open” and “workshop” are key to the foundation of the firm (see previous post of our interview with Harvest HERE); and of course “architecture” describes the core business. As initially expected there have been some minor misinterpretations and shortened use of the name. While expected, we decided to see what our initial efforts actually produced in response and then act accordingly.
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That’s a wrap.
The team returned this week to the new Sushi space to finish the stretchwrap installation. Here they are in all their glory:
Creative Commons