Tuesday, February 23, 2016 2:00 pm
-
2:00 pm
EST (GMT -05:00)
Of
the
thesis
entitled: Learning
from the
Commonplace
| designing
diversity
Abstract:
The
commonplace
is
the
realm
that
directly
exists within
the
ordinary
user’s
reach
and
is
the
everyday
lived
in experience
of
the
city.
Margaret
Crawford,
the
author
of Everyday
Urbanism, expresses
that
“an
amazing
number
of
social,
spatial
and
aesthetic meanings
can be
found
in
the
repeated
activities
and
conditions
that
constitute
our
daily, weekly
and
yearly
routines.
The
utterly
ordinary
reveals
a
fabric
of
space
and time
defined
by
a
complex
realm
of
social
practices-
a
conjuncture
of
accident, desire
and
habit”[1]. Similarly
the
study
of
the
spatial
qualities
of
the
everyday urban
fabric
have
been
studied
through
diagrams
and
mapping
in
Robert
Venturi’s Learning from
Las
Vegas and
Atelier
Bow
Wow’s Pet
Architecture.
Both address
bringing
awareness
to
an
informal
urban landscape
that
is
not conventionally
considered
beautiful
or
is
an
aesthetic
that
practices
aspire
to achieve.
Venturi
and
Atelier
Bow
Wow
chose
to
take
on
a
light
hearted
view
of the
phenomenon
by
drawing
on
popular
culture
so
that
it
may
be
more
easily accepted.
This
is hinted
in
the
terminology
that
they
have
coined
such
as
“the duck”,
“the
decorated
shed”
and
“pet
architecture”.
However,
in
doing
so
they have
diminished
its
significance
to
current
architectural
practice.
In
Koolhas‘ vision
of
the Metropolitan
Condition he
acknowledges that
informal
urban conditions
such
as
the
commonplace
remains
“largely
outside
the
field
of
vision of
official
architecture
and
criticism“[2].
This thesis asserts that an informal bottom-up urban setting has substantial value to formal architecture. In reality, top-down and bottom-up phenomena are not two distinct systems but a weighted system with opposing levels of control and freedom influencing the same elements. This thesis seeks to extract the genetic code of the commonplace as a design instrument. It aims to uncover the underlying design principles within the urban environment and redeploy them as operative design strategies. Although a systematic design approach that inherently suggests regularity and order seems like the antithesis of the bottom-up driven commonplace, the generic rules implied by top-down design are nevertheless part of the same spectrum which emphasizes the properties of the commonplace by becoming the key counterpoint.
Drawing from precedents, research begins from pure documentation and analysis of the existing but goes one step further to discover the genetic armature of the commonplace. Analysis must therefore shift from the singular element to understanding multiple elements that act as interconnected layers so that one may discover the overall quantitative and qualitative characteristics of the commonplace. The genetics of the commonplace are comprised of complex layers of building fabric, signage, occupation and culture.
The design portion of the thesis envisions the potential to merge the properties of top-down and bottom-up as a design strategy. In particular, the thesis embraces a new methodology of design through scripting. Parametric coding creates an active rule set that is able to work through complex iterations at a global and local scale. By coding flexibility into a system with defined spatial, programmatic and other context specific limits, the results will push opposing characteristics to their full capacity to discover the unrealized power of architecture to embody both emergent and hierarchical relationships.
This thesis asserts that an informal bottom-up urban setting has substantial value to formal architecture. In reality, top-down and bottom-up phenomena are not two distinct systems but a weighted system with opposing levels of control and freedom influencing the same elements. This thesis seeks to extract the genetic code of the commonplace as a design instrument. It aims to uncover the underlying design principles within the urban environment and redeploy them as operative design strategies. Although a systematic design approach that inherently suggests regularity and order seems like the antithesis of the bottom-up driven commonplace, the generic rules implied by top-down design are nevertheless part of the same spectrum which emphasizes the properties of the commonplace by becoming the key counterpoint.
Drawing from precedents, research begins from pure documentation and analysis of the existing but goes one step further to discover the genetic armature of the commonplace. Analysis must therefore shift from the singular element to understanding multiple elements that act as interconnected layers so that one may discover the overall quantitative and qualitative characteristics of the commonplace. The genetics of the commonplace are comprised of complex layers of building fabric, signage, occupation and culture.
The design portion of the thesis envisions the potential to merge the properties of top-down and bottom-up as a design strategy. In particular, the thesis embraces a new methodology of design through scripting. Parametric coding creates an active rule set that is able to work through complex iterations at a global and local scale. By coding flexibility into a system with defined spatial, programmatic and other context specific limits, the results will push opposing characteristics to their full capacity to discover the unrealized power of architecture to embody both emergent and hierarchical relationships.
[1] Mehrotra,
Rahul.
Everyday
Urbanism: Margaret
Crawford
vs.
Michael
Speaks.
Ann
Arbor,
Mich.:
Univ.
of
Michigan, Taubman
College
of
Architecture,
2005.
[2] Koolhaas, Rem. Delirious New York: A Retroactive Manifesto for Manhattan. New ed. New York: Monacelli Press, 1994.
The examining committee is as follows:
[2] Koolhaas, Rem. Delirious New York: A Retroactive Manifesto for Manhattan. New ed. New York: Monacelli Press, 1994.
The examining committee is as follows:
Co-Supervisors:
Mona El Khafif, University of Waterloo
Ila Berman, University of Waterloo
Committee Member:
Ryszard
Sliwka,
University of
Waterloo
External Reader:
Michael Piper, University of Toronto
The
committee
has
been
approved
as
authorized
by
the
Graduate
Studies
Committee.
The
Defence
Examination
will
take
place:
Tuesday
February
23,
2016
2:00PM
ARC
2026
A
copy
of
the
thesis
is
available
for
perusal
in
ARC
2106A.