Final Committee Meeting: Today Only!

I have my last meeting today before the big presentation May-5th-or-6th. I've been awake for too long and haven't exercised properly since Saturday night, so am both sleepy and jittery. Hooray!

I'm pretty happy with most of what I've put together since the last meeting, but there are a couple of holes that concern me. The massing for most of the site should be fine because I'm not going to get too detailed and have some parameters that take care of most of the decisions. The same is true for the structure: there are only so many options, so I just need to pick one and see it through. The issue that concerns me most, however, is weather protection.

The Flame has been concerned about weather protection from the get-go. While I agree that in Vancouver it makes sense to have covered seating areas, I'm not sure if the auditorium (the only area that I plan to really resolve) is the best place for it. The reason? Sightlines. I've been trying to organize the whole site so that you can see the stage part from pretty much anywhere so that it can act as a small stage, an auditorium, or as a huge demonstration/gathering space. I want people looking from their windows able to participate in the stage: I want the whole plaza able to focus on this space.

How do you fit shelter into this? Any roof-ish structure is going to ruin the sightlines from somewhere. There are two walls, it's true, but they are only 3' above grade, and so won't be suitable for hanging any shelter from. I also want to make it possible for people to hang over the edge of them to listen/watch, and any shelter would really detract from that.

Something moveable might be the answer, but it seems so late to be introducing a new element. If I leave it the way it is, I can argue that in this instance there is no shelter because the way the auditorium functions precludes it, but there are lots of other opportunities for shelter in other collections of ambiguous spatial conditions around the square that I have not resolved. If I do add something I run the risk of it becoming the focus of my presentation because it doesn't fit or evolve naturally from these ideas. Yes, there should be shelter. But is it right in this case?

It's funny: I'm usually the most pragmatic of designers. I focus on stairs, shelter, envelope: all the boring stuff we are taught not to care about. But for this project I've thrown the existing program out the window, created a hugely dangerous site, spec'ed some suspicious details.... all in the name of design. If this were to be built, would the design be worth the hassles? That's my working theory, but I don't know.

I'm at T minus one month, one day. I'm going to take it easy this weekend (woo hoo! LONG weekend) and try to keep it down to 20 hours total at school. I'm going to talk about some of my presentation stuff with my committee this afternoon so I can get a better idea of what I should be getting done.... and Tuesday I'm going to send out an e-mail to all the people I've discussed thesis work with so I can figure out who is doing what and when. There are a couple of major players...

Mr. Clean: lightening fast with ACAD, Mr. Clean is best known for his work with physical models, but is now banned from the shop due to his advanced age. Mr. Clean will be tapped to draw and tidy sections.

The Vegan: The Vegan owes me one (1) flash movie, as a direct swap for work done on his thesis. He's going to be producing something very much like what I did for him: an animation that shows how use of the site varies throughout the day/week. He's going to be including shadow patterns as well, so I think it could be a great movie. His mayan expertise will also be required to help with renders.

Team: Team is going home for a week between April 21st and May5/6, but his tofu-powered precision should be put to good use on a mid-sized model of the auditorium with some structural details. I'm not sure how big it will be, but the intent is to show the structure and the relationship between the auditorium and the underground bus loop.

The DBA: I've been in talks with the DBA to build a full size model of some furniture for my reviewers to sit on. This needs to be approved by my committee, as Thesis Advisor M has suggested it may not be a good use of my resources (AKA, money and DBA) so he may end up working on a site model.

Short Bus: The only girl on the A team, Short Bus will be photoshopping and illustrating renders. I would prefer to only have people I know in my images, but we'll see if that happens.

I'm hoping to force sArs, AL, Orphan Annie and possibly some others to give a hand, but too many people is more of an issue at this point than not enough. Orphan Annie has said she might be able to cater, which is great for The Vegan and Team.

I'm stoked about the reformation of Team Fun as a kick off to summer. Go Team Fun!