Blake Shiu

Thesis Project- Studio 5B ‘20

Professor: Teddy Slowik

In response to both environmental and housing needs, my project will incorporate an azolla farm and processing plant integrated with a residential component. Azolla, the fastest growing aquatic plant capable of doubling its biomass in as little as 4 days and has the potential to mitigate multiple environmental needs. Through various processes azolla can become food, thermoelectric energy, biogas, fertilizer, and is efficient at cleaning and filtering air as well as water pollutants.

By combining an azolla facility with micro housing this project will produce a fully self-sustaining architectural hybrid for living that the residents will directly benefit from. The azolla farmed and processed on site will power every unit and provide them with clean water. Due to high yield rates and low growth time excess energy will be created and sent back to the grid to supplement unit cost. The pools and processing area will be shared spaces allowing residents to experience both the natural and manufactured processes on site. The project's concept is a study that reevaluates the concept of sustainability and illustrates a subsistence model to meet environmental and population concerns.

Starting with the Osaka Jo Otemon Hikae Bashira Tsugite-Splice as a precedent. We began with studies of our specific joint. By detailing and describing the joint diagrammatically we were able to conceptualize the characteristics of the joinery. Next, was to replicate the joint by hand to further our understanding of the complexity, as well as the precision required to successfully duplicate.

Phase 2: we expanded on the hands on experience of reconstructing the joints to create a new form based on the interlocking relationships. We chose two opposing materials and through studies and working of those materials we discovered the restraints and opportunities that would effect the overall form in relation to the original joint. We further developed our form by examining the connections of our two materials and the interstitial qualities that could potentially create new and different spatial moments within the form.

Site: The site is at the intersection of several different urban sub‐areas including Downtown, Little Tokyo, and the Arts District, as well as others. Currently the site area is a highly commercial and industrial area with a fast‐expanding dense residential population due to the high demand for housing in Los Angeles. The city is responding to this currently by constructing mixed‐use transit developments in the area to connect it to the rest of the city.

Phase 3: With our new form, site and housing + program in mind, we continue forward to develop an interlocking relationship that will balance all three. My form displays the interlocking nature of the connection between two materials and solid mass vs surface that connects into a single object while retaining their distinct qualities. With that I hope to display the interlocking nature of the areas surrounding the site and develop a building can be a central totem that joins the populating areas. As this site will be a center of public transit both in and out of the area it will be important to be a place that adequately reflects its surroundings for those who are just seeing the area, while also not one that feels obtrusive and out of place for the residents who live there.

Structure, technology, building systems and materiality are explored as design determinants, space makers, and form givers in this synthesis studio. Building typologies, long-span structural systems, environmental systems, and various types of media are analyzed as they relate to design development.

The intention of this studio is to approach the architectural design process as a complex, multi-dimensional problem-solving exercise that incorporates knowledge at many levels informing the final outcome of a given project. Form, program, building technology, accessibility, and environmental systems are all incorporated into the design solutions and their development.

Final Design

The Los Angeles Museum of Architecture (LAMA) showcases the progression of LA architecture, chronicling the movements and trends of building designs that has made this iconic city what it is today. The purpose of this museum is to educate people about the importance, and social impacts that architectural buildings have on its city and society. As well as the cultural influences that define the city and its inhabitants. Los Angeles culture is known worldwide and is defined by many factors, one of the most important of which are the buildings.      

The building itself it a reflection of the site as well as the infrastructure surrounding it, i.e. the historic stack interchange (the first and largest overpass interchange of its time) in which it is situated. Located within the 101 and 110 freeway interchange, it mimics the floating steel and concrete intersecting and stacking masses, while accentuating the contrast between urban infrastructure and the interstitial natural spaces in between.   

Progression through the gallery spaces is a vertical linear circulation moving from one gallery space to the next, in tandem with the freeways, which is also a representation of the progression of Los Angeles architecture through time. Starting with the 1900’s and the first defining buildings of the city, to the newest and advanced buildings of today. Views are also an important part of the experience of progression, in a gallery space in which a building from that specific collection or decade can be seen from the building viewports have been cut out to frame that building. All culminating to the “Present” ever changing and updating gallery displaying current projects as well as where architecture is heading in the future.

Studio 2A- Fall '16

Professor: Anali Gharakhani

Curves are not simply loose figures but rather precise sets of geometric relationships that are intentionally defined through a careful process of description.  The selection of a curve type and its deployment in the production of an architectural project engenders specific formal relationships both interior and exterior to proposed project.   Unlike a straight line, a curve offers difference between one side and the other.  One side is convex, while the other is concave.  Furthermore a curved line within rectilinear site boundary structures a relationship of difference and distinction between the object of the building and the site boundaries that contains it.  In lieu of sameness it asserts its limits and distinctness from the surrounding territory. 

This studio will use curvature to introduce students to the architectural discourse of geometry as a means of engaging form, interiority, and the city.   Issues of circulation, building mass, frame, enclosure, and ground will be studied through the development of architectural proposals that use the description of curvature as it primary means of formal development.  The studio will begin with a study of two- and three-dimensional methods of curve description and quickly shift into the development of architectural objects with interior conditions.

The existing pattern of urbanization in the Central Valley tends to follow a linear trend with dense central nodes being the main cities, such as, Bakersfield, Fresno, Sacramento, up to Redding with smaller centers in between and a gradation of density that connect each urban center. The linear form uses the 99 Highway as a backbone with most of the urbanism occurring on or to the East side of the highway with more agricultural farmland or grazing land to the west. At the current time the population density of the Central Valley is 286 people per square mile over 22,500 square miles. While land dedicated to agriculture is about 15% of total land, 14.5 million acres of farmland and grazing land. Being contained within the two mountain ranges, the Central Valley is a unique area that is in between being a rural and urban metropolitan area. The infrastructure is reminiscent of Midwest agricultural areas and suburban communities, while becoming progressively more industrial because of it position within the state.

Considering the importance of the agricultural land in terms of food production for California, as well as, much of the United States, the goal of this proposal is to manage future urban growth to mitigate the problem of losing valuable agricultural land. Latest projections show that if current trends continue 1.3 million acres of agricultural land, including 670,000 acres of prime unique farmland will be lost to urbanization by 2050. (California Farm Bureau Federation)

The future proposed growth continues the linear pattern of urbanization and restricts it to follow the path of the 99 Highway more exclusively while allowing the dispersion of urbanization to become more uniform, becoming a band of uniform density of 2516 people per square mile (Bakersfield level of density). Extending from the south up north to the Sacramento river, leaving the northern section of the valley exclusively for agricultural lands with little urbanization. Allowing more of the West side of the 99 Highway be dedicated to agriculture, reducing the loss of valuable land that is used to produce food for much of the state, as well as, the United States.

The intention behind the design was to produce a simple form that was very minimal in every aspect from construction to orientation, while adding unique accents. It is a form that can be transformed to any use, using industrial designs as inspiration. Each face is specifically designed for its orientation allowing for the building to be easily rotated depending on need. implementing extra thick walls on the south and west sides that allows for thermal mass during the hot daytime hours and using many inset windows and louvers for indirect natural lighting.

Materials and color palettes were chosen to be natural and warm to more reflect the Central Valley. A Base of locally sourced rammed earth is used for the main construction of the form with the accents of wood, concrete, and blue aluminum panels.

The program of the 1-story prototype is a veterinarian hospital and the 3-story prototype contains the vet hospital, as well as, a facility for the study of infrastructure, and an atmospheric monitoring station.

The Central Valley is split into 3 zones, one for each of the material palettes. The zones were chosen mainly on economic regions and follow the same logic as the defining of the Central Valley in the previous stage.

Zone A being the northern region, encompassing Sacramento and Redding uses the wood palette, due to the more agricultural, natural, and wildlands in the area.

Zone B being the central region encompassing Fresno and Stockton uses the concrete palette, because of the more industrial nature of the economic area.

Zone C being the Southern region, which includes mainly Bakersfield uses the blue aluminum palette.

The dispersion of the buildings follows simple rules. The one-story veterinarian hospital will be specializing in livestock, so will be evenly distributed through agricultural areas, grouping in grazing and livestock areas. The three-story prototypes will be distributed in more urbanized areas, being drawn to universities and airports due to the facility for the study of infrastructure and atmospheric

monitoring station.

About two thirds of all developable land in Los Angeles is zoned for residential construction. of that more than 75% is set aside strictly for single-family residences and duplexes, but not for apartments or any other forms of multifamily residences. Los Angeles’ devotion to the ‘American Dream’ of owning a single-family home is the leading contributor to urban sprawl and increased traffic from commuters that cannot afford to live within a reasonable distance from their place of employment.

This proposal is to mitigate this problem of sprawl and traffic congestion while allowing for a piece of that ‘American Dream’ for middle income Angelenos that cannot afford the increasing prices for the typical single-family home. By moving the attributes of a single-family residence to an apartment complex typology in an attempt to retain the feeling of privacy and personal space while creating a more efficiency and higher density.

Studio 3B- Spring '18

Professor: Melissa Peter

This studio is a process-driven design studio. This means we will approach the architectural design process as a complex, multi-dimensional problem-solving exercise that incorporates knowledge at many levels informing the final outcome of a given project. Form, program, building technology, accessibility, and environmental systems are all incorporated into the design solutions and their development.

This studio will also place great emphasis on design communication. The language and tools of the design process are directly linked to the ideas and outcomes of any exercise in architecture. One can only design as well as one represents that design. A vast array of media will be explored; including digital and analog media in its various forms. This studio will discourage the use of any one media or design tool as an exclusive design media: Students will be expected to build analog models and alongside digital imaging and 3D modeling applications, finding a critical and focused use for each media as it relates to the content of the work and it’s appropriateness for a given the stage of development in the design process. 

The core focus of the studio is the Design Process: The iterative, layered and skills-based process that is required in order to develop an architectural project. The projects themselves will deal directly with the relationship between form and structure, understanding structure as both a material and abstract construct that employs building technology, physics and geometry to resolve issues of programmatic, cultural and environmental nature, among others.

Studio 3A- Fall '17

Professor: Berenika Boberska

Studio 3A situates architecture at the confluence of discrete building systems. The studio asserts that robust architecture emerges out of the negotiation between competing systems and not through binary causal thinking. Space, form, structure, program, site, fenestration, and envelope will all be modulated towards the production of compelling environments for living and working. It should be
understood that these systems are not listed in order of importance, rather, they are considered equally viable concerns for directing the development of a studio project. It is the responsibility of each student to propose the systems’ hierarchies and hybridity of the work.

The semester will begin with a close look at an iconic, but rather uncanny, building: Boston City Hall. In the early 1960s a young architecture professor made a deal with a recently graduated student to enter into a series of architectural competitions together. They decided that, if they were to win a competition, they would begin an office in the city of that project. A few months passed and a competition was announced for the Boston City Hall, which was seen as the centerpiece to massive
urban redevelopment in that city. The pair entered the competition and, to the delight and dismay of many, won. The project was built almost exactly as had been proposed. Critics praised the building and the architects’ careers were begun.
From its inception, the building has elicited extreme responses. Upon the unveiling of the model, a well-ranking city official was heard to have gasped, “What the fuck is that!?” Just a few years later the building was considered (in a poll conducted by the AIA) to be one of the most important buildings in the United States, ever. Only a few years later, the building was widely derided as an eyesore and the previous mayor has made a series of proposals to move all of the city’s operations into a new building and to demolish the existing building. Opinions aside, the Boston City Hall offers a wealth of interesting architectural (and perhaps political) lessons; the use of materials’ inherent properties; complex spatial and formal relationships; understanding of structural patterning; integration and exposure of HVAC systems; a non-nostalgic understanding and use of history; and the intentionally not direct relationship of an architectural expression to program.

Studio 2B- Spring '17

Professor: Stephen Marshall

“The Difficult Whole presents a radical strategy for architecture in a world without rooted physical or cultural contexts… a self sustaining idea of context: an architectonic composition where each element depends on the other through inflection, a universe on itself, potent enough to survive as an independent settlement.” Kersten Geers (The Difficult Whole – A Reference Book on Robert Venturi, John Rauch and Denise Scott Brown)

Through rigorous analysis and manipulation, students will explore the tectonics and qualities of as found generic building types as a point of departure in speculating on new programmatic relationships. Critical readings of a number of influential projects from an alternative canon of architecture, will allow contemporary notions of program, organization, context, and content to be addressed. Subsequently, a final design provocation will exploit the difficult dichotomy of the generic and specific, and the potentiality of the complex relationship between function and form, in a highly articulated and vital whole; a new educational & cultural Exploratorium for Los Angeles.

Design Communications 2- Spring '16

Professor: Jason King

The Great Wall will introduce students to the parametric software grasshopper and to digital fabrication tools such as milling, vacuum forming, and 3D printing. Grasshopper will be introduced in a series of ‘definition tutorials’ where instructors will present completed definitions and students will be expected to customize the definitions for their use. The result of these computer generated exercises will be output using a range of digital fabrication tools.  

The digital modeling techniques introduced methods of operating on primitives. The drawing techniques introduced conventions of two-dimensional architectural representation. Emphasis was placed on slicing objects and extracting information. Design Communication 2 will further the skills of first year students by introducing them to techniques for modeling and drawing surfaces and frames. The shift from primitives (cube) to surfaces will be marked by a shift from Rhino to Grasshopper as the primary means of design generation and from drawing to model making as the primary means of design output.

Design Communications 1- Summer '16

Professor: Heather Flood

 By and large, we traffic in representations of architecture, and this is our medium… drawings, renderings, photographs, models, constructs, films, animations, text/writing, and hybrid objects. In this course we will focus primarily on the range of forms and types which constitute the architectural drawing, and on how architectural drawings assume generative, developmental, and anticipatory responsibilities within the discipline of architecture and the broader cultural landscape. 

Arch 162 - Fall '12

Professor: Wayne Chiu (LACC)

Students design a simple residence
and prepare a complete set of design and technical drawings
of the residence. Creative, conceptual and analytical skills are
developed through the exploration of mass and void spaces. Fundamental architectural drawing techniques
as well as 3-D computer modeling methods are introduced.
Some basic architectural principles, theories, order and
methodologies are explored and incorporated into student
projects.

Materials and Methods- Fall 16'

Professor: Eric Olsen

This course seeks to place the primary materials - wood, masonry, steel, concrete and glass - within the fundamental context of physical properties, historical evolution, structural behavior, sustainable design, contemporary methods of construction and detailing, building envelope systems, and new and future products.  The materials’ influence on design with respect to durability, building cost, life-cycle cost, and scheduling is evaluated.

The goals of the course are manifold and include: 

-       To learn to make informed choices about the use of building materials, taking into account intrinsic factors such as physical, mechanical, thermal and optical and deteriorative properties, and extrinsic factors such as economic, environmental, social and cultural factors.

-       To learn how to use materials in imaginative and creative ways, while exploring sound and durable construction principles that give structural support, control weather, fire, heat and light, and provide attractive finishes.

-       To reinforce the students' skills in research, drawing, fabrication and teamwork. 

The course begins with a discussion of the range of available materials, their qualities, and the mechanisms by which we perceive and understand materials. Critical frameworks for evaluating construction materials such as technology, regionalism and sustainability are introduced. Materials and their detailing are then reviewed within a framework of structural and thermal performance, fire resistance, durability, cost, and their influence on design and construction scheduling.

Studio 1B- Spring '16

Professor: Heather Flood

The aim of this assignment is to establish overall building mass in response to basic site and program variables. We began with specific parameters for defining mass. We are working with bar buildings. Each student began with a bar that measures 30’W x 300’L x 20’H. This bar should be understood as a single story mass with a floor area of 9,000 square feet. Using simple modeling techniques in Rhino, each student transformed the original bar into a new mass that organized both site and program in a thoughtful manner. The new mass had to retain bar-like proportions (long and narrow) and must retain the 9,000 square foot floor area.

The site for the studio is located in Frogtown, one of the smallest neighborhoods in Los Angeles with an emerging cultural presence. Geographically, Frogtown is an island that’s bound by the 110 fwy to the south, the 2 fwy to the north, I-5 to the west, and the LA River to the east. The neighborhood is a mix of small single-family residences, manufacturing facilities, and under-the-radar art communes. The redevelopment of the LA River has had a major influence on the shifting demographics of the area. The site for this studio is located on Denby Avenue between Blake Avenue and the Los Angeles River Greenway Trail. It can be accessed via automobile from Blake Avenue, via foot from Denby Avenue, and via bike from the Greenway Trail. The massing strategies should be responsive to the different edge condition of the site and should consider the negative space as well as the positive space. 

The program for the studio is a Bike Station that aims to provide a link between the Greenway Trail and the surrounding community. The LA River is very active in the Frogtown neighborhood and the Greenway Trail is used by bicyclist year-around. Recently a number of establishments have been opened in Frogtown that orient themselves towards the river. The Bike Station will house three micro programs that are 2,000 square feet each.