Arch 4012 HD: Tracking Water On GaTech’s Campus

Harris Dimtropoulos heads one of the senior studio (4012) classes this year. As part of their semester project, they have researched and documented water on GaTech’s Campus. Dimitropoulos is pushing exploration of the immediate surroundings and in turn the goal of the class is for the students to create devices that reflect their explorations. The senior year students went as far as observing a model of the campus and carrying out water experiments to see how the campus takes in water. In the experiment, the campus was gradually flooded with water. The pictures below show water accumulation in areas on the site at different stages. //

Architecture in the Age of Uncertainty

In the past two decades, as economic bubbles inflated, architectural spending around the globe reached a fever pitch. In both well-established centers of capital accumulation and far-flung locales heretofore seldom uttered in the same breath as the name of any Pritzker Prize winner, audacious building projects sprang up like mushrooms after a good rain. At the same time, the skyscraper, heretofore more commonly associated with the hurly-burly of American capitalism seemed only a few years ago as if it might pack up and move permanently from Chicago and New York and settle instead in Dubai and Shanghai.

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Inquiry: Sense of Site

We’ve all stood out there, when it’s sunny, rainy, warm, freezing, afternoon, in the dark, crowded, vacant, next-door, across the country, for fifteen minutes, for weeks, with sketchbook tucked under arm and camera slung across shoulder.

What are you looking at?
What does site context mean to you?

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3 Ideas + 3 Projects from an Architect with 3 Names

Trail of Tears. Monster Trucks. X-ray. Seattle. Dallas. Louisville. Hyperational Process. Architectural Obsession of Signature. Compartmentalized Flexibility.  These words, places, and ideas are the jigsaw pieces from a Ted talk articulated by Joshua Prince-Ramus, principle of REX Architecture.  In February of 2006, Prince-Ramus pieced this lecture together in order to reveal how three separate projects with incomparable  ‘bathtubs’ of constraints are resolved with a singular understanding of three concepts derived from a Hyperational Process.

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Vito Acconci: Writing, Following strangers around the city, Designing buildings

City of Words, 1977 Vito Acconci

This week’s search for great things to share with you all began with that six degrees of separation. This is that fun phenomenon I’m sure most of us are familiar with that consists of bouncing from one wildly interesting article to another. What makes it so enjoyable is that it wonderfully suggests that all things are linked to one another in someway.

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Beam Weightlifting: A Mockumentary

Terrance Carter; The First Beam from graymatters on Vimeo.

Take a break and watch this light-hearted presentation about a washed up beam “weightlifter” that falls from grace. You may notice a couple cameos from our faculty!

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Architects’ Homes: Consistency and Contradiction

In his life Louis Kahn built monumental works of architecture that exuded a sense of harmony and spiritual clarity. This oeuvre however, was in stark contrast to a turbulent personal life which included great debts and three different families/wives.  This nomadic lifestyle prompted questions after his death, and the seemingly contradictory nature of his life and work. Are an architect’s creations representative of their principles ? Do the values an architect embodies in his work translate to the values they have for their homes?

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The Decatur Old House Fair

While I was waiting for a table at Tin Lizzy on Memorial Drive, I came upon this poster on the window at the restaurant…

2nd Annual Decatur Old House Fair

I’ve only taken interest in this kind of thing recently, especially when the real estate market has dropped. I feel that renovating older homes are better than buying new homes for many reasons. There is obviously the financial aspect of it. But another reason is that you can have a older house at a GREAT location at a price that fit into people’s budgets. I also think that by renovating older homes around Atlanta, we can beautify the city and ease up on urban sprawl.
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COA students published in Burnaway.org

A few COA students, including myself, have written pieces for the Arts Publication Burnaway.org. It is nice to see our education at work in the local community:
Merica May || Mall education: gloATL’s Bloom at Lenox Square
Jeff Sauser and Josh LeFrancois ||  John Portman: Hand of the genius? +  Chevron: The next Octane?

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