spring 2006
ARI 560R / ARC 560R/696:
Advanced Interior Design: Collaborative Studio :: Small Portable Dwellings
REFAB : A RENEWABLE ENERGY PROTOTYPE DWELLING
ENVIRONMENTAL CONTROLS ENVIRONMENTAL COLLABORATIONS:
a collaborative studio to stimulate the genesis of the next UT SOLAR DECATHLON HOUSE
....................SEEKING designs for a small dwelling that collaborates with its environment and its community. Like a highly-evolved organism, or a tribal nomad, it both enjoys and adapts to its circumstance, enabling it to travel to new locations when needed, or "settle down" for extended periods in a temperate southern climate (its preferred habitat). The dwelling should be a self-reliant SYSTEM - harvesting its own energy, and using its own SKIN to shield, ventilate, illuminate or insulate its "body" as needed in efficient and adaptive ways. Materials for the construction of the dwelling should, likewise, collaborate in the ecology of our environment - drawing upon renewable or locally-harvested materials, re-imagining, or recycling other constructions or materials for new use, or proposing strategies of SITE; "asset-based" design to engage community labor, materials or resources.
As a pre-fabricated prototype, the structure must be portable, and sit lightly on the land, although, as a dwelling, it should convey a sense of permanence, or home to those who dwell within, and a sense of identity for the community in which it resides. As such, designs must provide for flexibility and richness in its experience as well as in its performance, through the careful consideration of landscape, entry, occupation, view, light and material.
Research for this studio is supported by major research grant that has been awarded to the school for participation in the Department of Energy's 2007 Solar Decathlon.
MACRO MODULE MICRO MODULE
The course is founded in collaborative practice, as architecture, interior design, engineering and landscape agendas intersect and intertwine. The Advanced Architecture and Interiors Studios will work together, in partnership with Engineering students, drawing from the strengths of all. The studio will engage in feedback loops, operating at multiple scales:
from the MACRO : community planning, landscape strategies and modules of massing, site + transport...
to the MICRO :assemblies of skins and screens, building sections, structural connections, and prototype lighting assemblies with fiber-optic and LED components....
The studio will conduct physical and conceptual research for the first 6 weeks, and then craft a competition program for the studio, which will also be open to school-wide participation. Ideas from that competition will be refined and evolved within the studio. Prof. Novoselac's CE397 Energy Analysis of Buildings students will run energy simulations and parametrics to further evaluate the different design schemes.
DOUBLE SITE DOUBLE PROGRAM
At the end of the semester, the studios will arrive at a set of full-scale assemblies and one scheme that will be developed into construction and entry into the Solar Decathlon to be held in Washington, DC September 13-30, 2007, a national exhibition known to draw over 100,000 visitors. We will also identify and engage a local site for the house upon its return to Texas after the competition, and further our collaborative strategies by working with the community as we design for both sites simultaneously. This allows the house to develop within a context - a larger ecology, social framework, and urban infrastructure. As a both a demonstration prototype and a dwelling, many questions are open -
is it a guest house? a granny flat? caretaker or community center?
green house? affordable house? smart house? house of the future?
METHODOLOGY
Introductory design assignments will connect sustainable design principles with physical research into their phenomenology. Projects might explore similar models or technologies that mediate between body and environment and serve as possibilities for design innovation — biomimicry, natural systems which self-regulate, transport or transform with shifting conditions, systems of clothing, or camping, for example...
A significant research component of the studio will address materials and evaluation criteria for them, photovoltaics, transport issues (Fuller's famous question: madam, how much does your house weigh?), assembly issues (how much can 1, 2 and 4 people carry), factory fabrication, systems and controls technology within domestic space. Research will be carried through into design of micro::macro assemblies.
Students will develop full-scale mock-ups of innovative wall, roof and floor assemblies for testing construction sequence, material tolerance, weathering, and thermal efficiency; these assemblies will be installed and/or constructed on site for evaluation and community discussion.
We will consider relationships between:
VENTILATION + INSULATION
ENERGY HARVESTING + ENERGY DISTRIBUTION
SITING + SHIPPING
SHADING + LIGHTING
DAY + NIGHT
MATERIALS + METHODS
PRECEDENT + PROGRAM
SCHEDULE
week1 INTRODUCTION: SKINS - BETWEEN INSIDE AND OUT (dual studio)
3 RESEARCH SCENARIOS FOR SMALL PORTABLE DWELLINGS
4 ASSEMBLY #1 : MICRO + MACRO
7 SCHEMATIC DESIGN COMPETITION
10 ROUND 1 SCHEMES + ASSEMBLIES, ENGINEERS ANALYSIS BEGINS
12 ROUND 2 SCHEMES + ASSEMBLIES, ASSEMBLY FINAL PROTOTYPING
OPEN PEDAGOGY :
One of the principles of collaboration is shared work - to co-labor.
To fully collaborate, we must establish tactics to communicate, that is:
an Open Work demands methodologies for exchange:
- weblog: a cross-referenced online research log to facilitate inquiry, documentation and communication internally as well as to the public - an online, organism framed around the possibilities of the project.
- partnerships: with the Solar Decathlon team, faculty leaders and other advisors in all disciplines: architecture, interiors, landscape, planning, structures, material science, energy + systems, construction science, education, marketing...
- advisory groups from SD2002, SD2005 and Design>Build>Texas teams will meet with us regularly to draw on collective intelligence within the school to reflect on past projects
- community meetings: the studio will engage actual clients or client groups in the community, and will meet regularly with them for feedback
- open competition: the wider school community is invited to participate in a competition for schematic design proposals to be due at the end of Spring Break, with schemes exhibited and prizes awarded.