CS - Comments to Final

I'm speachless. You all did a great (quantity and quality) production. It will take me awhile to even get through the 19+ sheets per student. Thanks for the effort and stay tuned.

CS - End of the line

O.K. this is it. Pencil down. Please post what you have by October 1, 2007.

CS - Comment for Felix

CS - comments for Rick

CS - Week 8

It's not over until it is over.
Please read the CS -Week 8 Assignment carefully. To make your portfolio presentation simpler, I do not require you to produce different material for the studio final then is requested for the portfolio review. If any of these requirements are unclear, please ask.
Deadline: End of week. I will accept postings until October 1, 2007.
Good luck.

CS - Week 7

You remember the site? Here are two pics you might want to use for your perspective.

See the Week 7 assignment posted in the CS course assignments.

CS - Post for Tom

AT Office Hours

I hope those of you who took advantage of office hours last week found it helpful. For those of you who have not yet talked to me, I'll offer office hours again this week on Wednesday afternoon. Email me with your time preference - 5:00PM is taken.

Remember that your final deliverables include:

1) Building Services – MEP Plan / Information:
A written description of the mechanical system chosen for the building and an explanation of how this system contributes to the green design strategies for the project.

2) An Environmental Features Drawing:
describes the primary green design features of the building. This drawing usually includes annotated diagrammatic plans or sections showing how green features work at different seasons of the year.

If you are struggling with this, talk to me. If you want me to review what you've done so far, talk to me.

CS - Week 6 - Comments to Detailing:

Details show how different systems come together:

-Foundation and Ground-
-Foundation and Exterior Wall-
-Exterior Wall and Window-
-Exterior Wall and Upper Level Floors-
-Exterior Wall: structure, air barrier, insulation, vapor barrier, flush-mounted devices-
-Exterior Wall and Roof-
-Et cetera

Details answer also the questions such as:

-Material: size and composition, texture, surface, edge, et cetera-
-Geometry: sizes and relative locations-
-Gravity: how does it stand up/how is it fastened-
-Energy: how are the different micro climates separated-
-Water: how do we keep water from penetrating and how do we get water back out, if the system failed-
-Constructability: what is the sequence for putting it together-

Most of these questions can be answered fairly easily:
Materials are a matter of choice and availability, sizes of elements and members follow again availability criteria and structural limitations. The weight (gravity) needs to be carried to a foundation via a system of fasteners and frames of increasing sizes. The insulation needs to be of appropriate thickness and material and ideally make its way uninterrupted from a few feet below grade as well as below the ground floor slab all the way to the roof. Waterproofing is first done by shedding as much as possible: roof overhangs, stacking material to allow water to be brought “down and out”, and then with a secondary plane in the wall (and roof) construction, where water that made it thru the first layer can be collected and guided again “down and out”.
There is certainly a whole other layer of technical questions that need be addressed:
Compatibility of metals, air barrier, vapor barrier, expansion, workman ship tolerances et cetera.

In every detail sketch, at least the four big ones: Material, Gravity, Energy and Water need to be addressed.

CS - Week 6 - Studio Finals Part 1

Please read the assignment for week 6.
We still need the elevations and sketch details posted!
Plan changes need to follow to keep up with the production.

CS - Week 5 - Get ready for the final haul

Please use this image to complete your street elevation

CS- Image for Anne

Natural Ventilation?

For any of you still struggling with passive vs. active space conditioning, here's a helpful flow chart that will assist your decision making process. It comes from a UK publication called " Natural Ventilation in Non-Domestic Buildings".

Incidentally, 30 - 40 W/m2 translates to 2.8 - 3.7 w/sf. Typical internal loads in an office building are 1.5 -2.5 w/sf before any envelope gains are included, so your building has to be pretty efficient to have any chance of making it work.

I will have "office hours" next Wednesday afternoon (9/5) from 2PM to 6PM EDT. If you wish to meet with me via phone, send me an email with your preferred 30 minute block.

CS- Week 4 - the radio silence continues

Sorry folks. I had you give me permission to post to your blogs. Thanks for that. Unfortunately there is some bug in the blogger software; whenever I try to post something on your blogs the software reverts back to my own blog. And I spent way too much time trying to figure out how to make it work. So, I'm trying something else. Stay tuned and please elevate and detail sketch.

CS - Week 4 - next steps

Hi all, sorry for the radio silence. google shut me out of my own blog for awhile...
I hope this doesn't happen for any of you.
Everybody has a slightly different path from here on. I need a bit more time to put together individual requests. But in the meantime we all should be pushing elevations, material and the beginnings of key details. Even if the plan changes, these elements will stay the same. I would like you to elevate at least the north and the south facing elevations, annotate for materials and rough sketch material transitions at ground, at a window, at the roof. The more the marrier. Posting a plus.

CS - Week 4

Hello everyone. I hope you all had a great trip home and caught up on some sleep. I know I haven't yet.

Please read the Final Blog Requirements under Course Documents and give Chris and I permission to post on your blog (see attached image; it should look similar). Thanks

AT - Lecture

Yesterday's Lecture is posted at:

www.greenengineer.com/lecture%202.pdf

AT Office Hours

Sorry to bug out early last night. If anyone needs some of my time, I will have office hours from 11:30 - 1:oo today.

solar chimney + wind generation

Here's a "real" version of the solar chimney + wind power I was describing last night. It's a project in Australia.

You can find out more at: http://www.enviromission.com.au/index.htm

CS - Week 3: Parti (2)

A successful parti would answer a most of the following questions:

Site: - Access: Main Entry. Service Entry. Parking
- Topography: Main Elevation, how to make up drop on site
- Open Space: Leftover. Main feature

Geometry: - City Grid
- Transit Route
- Free standing / attached
- Object / Part of row

Program: - How many levels --- Footprint
- Expressed / Imbedded
- Where on site are major program elements
- How do major program elements relate to each other

Reactions to site influences:
- Transit, movement and noise
- Pedestrian movement
- Neighborhood qualities (grid, mass, materials, texture, etc)

My ecological footprint

Here's my ecological footprint

Despite my hybrid car, all those plane flights and the big house in the suburbs take their toll.

Of course the quiz doesn't asking me questions like: "What kind of electricity do you buy?","Is your house air conditioned?", "Do you recycle?", "How much insulation do you have".

In fact, the quiz makes many assumptions, and uses national averages in many places (try changing your location, and nothing else), so recognize it for what it is - A crude tool, designed to get our conversation started.

CS – Week 3: Parti

If you would have to design a user guide for a surfboard, this would be the parti.

The parti organizes the program on the site, arranges the major geometries, establishes hierarchies, assigns major materials, locates main elements.
Choose goals from your vision statements, weigh them in importance and put together sketches to develop a parti. By changing the goals and the assigned weight, you will be able to develop different parties. Several parties will be required. Use plans, sections, models to best represent the essence of the parti.

CS – Week 3: Vision

You already developed three+ environmental goals, you had an introduction to structural design considerations, and you visited the site. You know your program: living working, exhibiting for the intensive portion of a long distance learning program.
Now it is time to develop a vision for your project.
Determine three goals each for:
- the site.
- the program
---- livning quarters
---- working environment
---- exhibit / connection to community
- the neighborhood / community
- the "world" community
- the time we live in.
Discuss in small groups, determine goals (if you can’t agree on a common gaol, define your own), find images and/or descriptions to document your goals, document.
This vision will be the thesis of your project. It will be the benchmark for the rest of your semester.

CS - Week 3: Site

The site for the remainder of the semester is near the BAC in Boston: Walk up Newbury Street, take a right at Massachusetts Avenue and cross it, at the intersection with Boylston Street is our site.
It is bound by the MBTA commuter line next to the Massachusetts Turn Pike, Massachusetts Avenue, Boylston Street and a parking lot in the adjacent lot.
The site is currently occupied by a vacant, fenced-in parking lot and numerous wild growing trees. A gentle slope follows Boylston Street and across the site to a sudden drop down to the rail line.
The portion of the lot we will be working with is ca. 19,400 sf.

AT - Week 2 Assignment is posted

CS - Model making material for Boston

Some of the instructional courses will build models. Bring your tools. Sketch models are always an additional tool to drawings to proof to yourself and communicate with others. As much as I'm not requiring
Models, by now in your career you probably know if you benefit from the use of it. The quality models you created in the first semester might be very handy. Materials are available a block away from the BAC.

CS - Week 2 - Sample Program Documents

The first image shows excerpts of a verbal description of a program for a dorm we received from the client. The second one is a sample of an office program report, showing department, type space, quantitiy.

The third is a sample from a building program, listing type, space and area, as well as a total. The combination of the three is what you will need to have a good program document: a brief description of the spaces and uses the facility will need, area assignments and adjacencies, as well as a grand total, so we can start with the massing.

comment to karrick

red flag (pole and banner) overlaps blue flag. right angled wall creates transitional spaces. The space (highlighted in red) is particularly interesting: The large space 1A & 1B is defined with the wall sitting out in the outside (?). The exterior space with little definition (only the corners are marked) is stopped by the row of columns near the red "pole". In between a space that is trully transitional: part in space 1, inside, part exterior, outside.

comment to rick's

CS -Week 2

As we are starting week 2 you should be wrapping up the week 1 assignment. To signal that you came to an end, format it on a product sheet, as outlined in the “deliverables”. Don’t forget the narrative.
The assignment for week 2 is now published.

CS - WEEK 1 - End in sight?

So far terrific work.

Let's tweak it some more and make it concrete.

Don't forget to check your classmate's blogs; it counts.

AT - Introduction

Greetings.

As you may know this is not one class, but two.

I am Chris Schaffner, the instructor for the Architectural Technology portion of the course. My role, and goal, is to help you bring an integrated approach to your design projects. Good architecture is about function as well as form, and must include a consideration for the building occupant's comfort and well being, along with an appreciation for environmental stewardship. That's what where going to try to do.

But enough hoo-haw. If you want to learn more about me, check out my company's website - www.greenengineer.com.

I have posted your first assignment (it's there in the upper right). Have fun.

Chris

CS - WEEK 1 - TRANSITIONS

Judging from the first postings on your blogs, I think I need to add an additional explanation:
Compare to the images in the assignment sheet.
The abrupt transition between two spaces happens without forewarning: somewhere in a space defining element there is an opening that leads to the next space.
The lead transition introduces a space defining element common to both spaces.
The gradual transition uses a space to make the transition. Being in the transition space, there I is a moment when you are in two spaces at the same time, space “A” and the transition space. Steps later you are in two different spaces, space “B” and transition space.
Compare to the transitions you created in your models.

CS - Week 1 - View of Sketch-up model

CS - Week 1

Please read the Course Documents and the Week 1 Assignment.
Most everybody inthe class is familiar with AutoCAD and/or sketchup; if needed, I will keep using these programs.
Find in your email four files:
- Course templete sheets (psd, jpg)
- Week 1 geometry (dwg, skp)
Post often, check your classmate's

As architects we are interested in space, the volume, the void, the container of activities.
To allow for an intended use we plan the transitions between these spaces and determine all physical aspects of the spaces and the surfaces that define them: light, color, material, texture, sound, smell, temperature. To realize the surfaces of these spaces in our current world, we determine the structural components to hold them up, we configure the assembly to separate and protect from the elements; we create a building.
We study the daily and seasonal interplay of this building with the environment and add the necessary mechanical systems. We integrate the building into the fabric of human activity woven from existing infrastructures and codes.
In the short 8 week semester (2 on-line, 1 intensive, 5 on-line) on a site in Boston we will develop a facility to house the intensive portion of a distance learning program. We will analyze site and context, develop a program, a vision, a concept, a parti. We will analyze the applicable codes, incorporate mechanical systems and augment the design with the most appropriate structural system. We will focus on small details and paint a broad brush perspective both to explain the essence of our composition.
We will try to understand “integrative design” by experiencing a design process where key technical variables are integrated into design thinking at an early stage. We will
exercise “multi-layered thinking” by focusing on individual aspects of the building while keeping the whole building in mind to develop quickly from vision to product, from general to specific and where each part will influence all other.

The blog is up and running.
Check out the Course Documents.