Committee Prep III: The Prepening (One of Three)

I've assembled a series of slides that should adequately describe both the microarchitectural articulations (MA's) and the site for the presentation this evening. They're all fancy with a nice font, title pages and citations.



Welcome to this committee meeting. I'm really glad to have everyone here together.

I wrote my Directed Studies about the dichotomy between articulated and flexible space. For a space to be really flexible, it should be able to support a lot of different functions, but in many cases this diminishes the potential for uses not imagined by the designers. I spent some time last semester looking at articulations that can support many different kinds of use.





Vernor Panton's Living Environments from the 1970's are one example how spaces can be articulated and scaled to the human body without regulating how the space is used. Because the shapes all use the same vocabulary the group of different elements work as a single unit composed of many small parts. The result of these articulations is an environment that is ambiguous. Use of the projections is unclear: while they are scaled to the body the lack of definition between floor, ceiling and walls allow users to invent new uses for the landscape. People can lean, sit and lie down: they can sit far apart or close together.

This kind of ambiguity is important for creating a space that is articulated and unprogrammed.

The Weitere Projecktbeteilgte is another example of how ambiguity can create many use possibilities. These pink blocks are made of foam rubber and can be assembled in different ways. They activate a large plaza between two galleries by creating inhabitation spaces in an otherwise empty space. Because of their material they are both comfortable to occupy, and because they are not shaped as benches or chairs users feel free to use them in many different ways.

Joel Sanders' 24/7 Hotel Room Prototype uses ambiguous surfaces in a different way. Because hotel rooms need to be compact, but much of the room is not used for a significant portion of the day, the 24/7 Hotel allows spaces to change from private to public with the deployment of a wall. The articulated surfaces are designed to meet more than one need and so their use can shift as user requirements vary during the day.