Sinking Swiftly

I decided to take a single night off after the past few weeks of non-stop studio or other course related work and, after enjoying 3 hours of TV shows that I had missed in the past week, I immediately regret my decision. I sat down at my desk to do minor homework assignments and quickly realized how much I have to do and get done in the next couple of weeks. We were informed today that instead of getting midterms over in one day, we have to drag out the process by using an entire week of studio time to hear EVERY SINGLE PRESENTATION FROM EACH AFTERNOON STUDIO. I'm pretty sure every student can relate to the fact that none of us wants to take part in this. I understand there are benefits to reap, but I don't know that this is the best way to go about doing things. I obviously don't make the decisions though.

 We had a small concept board presentation in class today that involved showing our first concept massing. I think Greg and I are in a good spot thus far, but I wonder how much our building will change in the near future. I hate feeling overwhelmed before I need to, but I never fail to stress myself out in advance. So here is my last effort at calm because I think my attitude will be changing soon.

Service the Core, Core the Service

Greg's handiwork, I take no credit

I always wish that I was able to come up with clever blog titles, but I'm pretty sure it is an epic fail 9 times out of 10. 

So this week, in sticking with conceptual masses, we worked on service core locations. Greg and I both worked toward figuring out an ideal core layout that will work with the mandatory uses for our building. I stuck to tracing paper while Greg knocked it out of the park with 24 Revit models. I had a measly 10 sketches, but one of them I look forward to expanding on in this next week as we move to concept sketches and masses. Up to this point we haven't really taken design into our own hands, rather let code show us the way as we tagged along for the ride. I am ready to begin making this project our own and seeing how everyone begins to develop their concepts. I kind of feel like we are behind in the design process considering that mid term review is in a couple of weeks, but I'm trying not to stress about it because I am assuming James has a plan. That being said though, you know what happens to people when they assume.

Week 2 of blogging, 3 of school

The IBC is taking over my life. It feels like it dictates every architectural move even though I know I still have some control of aesthetic design. On the bright side, I now understand building occupancy types as well as types of construction so I have gained some knowledge from this process. I am ready to move past this conceptual massing stage, but I know that it will be beneficial in the larger scope of things. We worked toward creating some boards with masses to describe visually and contextually the aspects of each construction type. I was the dummy who made 9 small boards instead of 1 large one, but it worked out in the end. I still conveyed the same information as everyone else and hearing each presentation really clarified and drilled the information into my brain. After saying all of this, I hope I don't get any future building construction type questions wrong.

Start of Something New

Not so great diagram, promise there will be better

It's a new school year, new semester, and a newly refreshed state of mind. Being away from the school environment for eight months has had its downsides thus far. I forgot how tiring it is to walk from Lot 50 to my classes and I definitely forgot the feeling of homework stress in addition to every other stress I make up and force upon myself. I miss being able work full time and I will definitely miss my full time paychecks. Thankfully though, those eight months equipped me with some serious Revit knowledge that I will be able to apply to our integrated studio project. The first two weeks have been a crash course in understanding building code and how it will effect the route we choose for our project. I'm glad that we are applying real life issues, such as code, to studio considering we are in the final year of our undergrad, we should be thinking about what it means to design with guidelines and standards. Our code diagramming process is coming along and will obviously be stellar by the time we need to present on Wednesday.