Graduate Thesis

8/10 is the second to final pin-up for Graduate Thesis. I'm currently helping two. Ron and Sern Hong. The picture is Ron with his growing city. His proposal is freeway-like public spaces that transforms along the changes of a city. He is also taking the CATIA class I'm in. He has CATIA model of "a" freeway-like public space, and many (so many (too many (way too many))) inputs are translated as perimeters to configure multiple different results of public spaces. Interesting. If you happen to be a current grad thesis, and you have hundreds of triangle to glue or something, let me know.












Inspired by him, I'm thinking about a single family residence, or a structure system for small scale projects that fits into any given site. Yes Pre-Fab, but it's not a physical Pre-Fab. It's prefabbed in CATIA to skip Schematic Design and Design Document phase. I'm not saying ALL houses should get build with those short-cut method, but it is for... more like a business plan for small architecture offices that are afraid of jumping into BIM softwares. If I take this direction, the important thing is AFTER a configuration of CATIA model sits on a site. Customization and problem solving !

hmmm... I'm afraid it starts sound like Harold and Sky's INTERFACE, which also impressed me in terms of their point that NOTHING could be made to fit into EVERYTHING. Those kind of perfection just doesn't happen. They insisted that after the certain stage of pre-fabrication, it is architects' role to solve the rest of the problem with client, on site, case-by-case.

Here is another interesting thesis from Mid review, "C.S.H. 22.1". He took the same site and program with Case Study House #22 and presents another proposal with the consideration of current available technology, mainly automobile production. I heard he has already submitted the project to a competition. No wonder his presentation looked so complete.

Radiator

先日運転していたらボンネットから煙が出てきた。窓を開けるとシューシューいっていた。

Sky の車にも以前同じことがあったと聞いていなかったらどうしていただろう。近くのガソリンスタンドへとめ前を開けてみると案の定 Radiator がコトコト沸騰していた。ともかく冷めるまでキャップは開けられないのでスタンドの店で Antifreeze を買おうとしたが売っていなかった。仕方ないので夕飯を一緒に、と約束していた Harold と David に Antifreeze を買って救出に来てもらうことにした。ところが彼らがもって現れたのはペットボトル一杯の水。どうやら水を入れて悪いのは凍ってしまうからなんだそうで、真夏のカリフォルニアでの応急処置としては問題ないとのコト。ふむふむ。念のため近くの店で Antifreeze を買ってから久しぶりに彼らと食事をし、別れて運転していると暫くしてまたシャーシャーいい始めた。やれやれ。

こうなればさっき足した水が漏れているに違いないと判断し、また近くのガソリンスタンドで水を足し、漏れる速度を見てみるとポタポタとでてはくるが私がこぼした分なのか漏れているのか判別ができない。要するにエンジンがオーバーヒートしなければよいわけだから高速にのってLAに帰るよりは Pasadena に向かう方が近くてもちそうだ。ので以前私が住んでいた家にまだいる友達を訪ねて一晩泊めてもらい、朝一で Radiator の修理に行った。ついでにオイルやフィルターの交換をしてもらっていると問題は容器の破損ではないと言われた。どうやら Radiator のキャップの内側についているバネが壊れ、沸騰する Antifreeze のプレッシャーに耐えられずに中身が漏れてオーバーヒートしていたらしい。近所の車備品の店を何軒か探して Integra95 にあうキャップを買い、やっと問題解決となりました。

Artist studio

Neighbor artist in a brewery, also the owner of the backyard.

Backyard Structure

Structure engineers finished their part of the drawing, and the backyard is submitted to the city today. Cannot wait for plan checkers to mark up the set and give it back to me. Bring it on! Plan check correction is a tedious process, but my craftsmanship fires not only for model making but also for C.D. sets. By the end of summer, I might be able to pull building permit for two projects: second floor addition and the backyard.

Also entertained by the engineer's drawings. They didn't seem as intense as I thought before, because I gave architectural drawings to engineers.








architect's drawing








engineer's drawing


プロジェクトが着々と進んでいます。以前 模型の写真 をのせた Deck の Structure Engineer による図面があがってきたのでロサンゼルス市に無事提出しました。お役所はこの釘が３㎝短いだの、敷地境界からもう30cm離さなきゃいけないだの、信じられないくらい煩わしいけど、望むところです。もしかしたら夏休み終わりまでに、２つもプロジェクトの許可をもらえるかもしれない。学生のうちに責任のある仕事をするチャンスがあると自信になる。やっぱり手には職だと思う。

Stapleton Pool House

UrbanRock is working on a Public Art project in Stapleton, Denver. A courtyard decoration at a small public pool house. Using the same technique that an artist, Teresita Fernandez used for her Cloud Cover in Seattle, we are proposing saturated colored images on existing glasses that face the courtyard. A layer of film is laminated between two sheets of 20"x8" glass.







Cloud Cover by Teresita Fernandez


Here I am, supposed to produce nice three images. Those show three different status of water: solid, liquid, and vapor.


















The thing is, since I used downloaded who-knows-whose images for those quick presentation collages, if we get the project, we have to take our own pictures. hmmm... little worried about that.

4th of July

4th of July at Hollywood Bowl. In these family holidays, international students end up getting together. More than the concert itself (good old western music), I was looking forward the fireworks. They saved the excitement 'til the last minutes. A fun night out.

Daniella with kimono

A Photo shoot with Daniella in her backyard.

I knew it red kimono looks great on her! I only wish I had better skill to put it on... took us while to figure it out. You have to leave some room at back of her neck, but the front shouldn't start opening up. A lot of tips you have to follow to make kimono look sexy. Daniella is a good model, but I wasn't a good photographer. I fell in love with her poses too often to keep going.






















Then we went to see Ratatouille with Daniella still in her kimono. Laughed till I cried. I think I enjoyed the movie more, because David and Daniella have been hanging out around me with their pet rats. I keep finding little piles of snacks all over my room since the last time they came over. (Photoshop works by Daniella)