Amsterdam Realtime

Charlottesville, Va.

Heading to New York City for the weekend. I am currently working on the Nix Fellowship within the Design Research seminar. This means that the paper is shifting continuously and rapidly. Right now I'm paring down on an exploration of the concept that a place's unique urban characteristics can be interpreted into design drivers for new construction through an understanding of the "personality of place". I'm beginning to look at the if and why aspects of the existence of this idea. Theoretically I'll develop a loose methodology of reading "context", which I will then put to the test next semester in a thesis project.

I'm coming to the realization that in order to make a strong case for Personality of Place and its design implications I won't be able to use my original essays as planned. In a way it's okay, since they have been very helpful in forming this idea, but also sad because I won't be able to use them as I had intended. Still, I have plenty of contributions for the Lunch publication in the spring.

A Tale of Two-Cities

There are these beautiful places: beautiful because they are exotic and exotic because they are mysterious. They are famous places and rustic secrets; Paris, Vienna, Rome, Siena, and each brings its own charms to the table, creating a persona either real or imagined, that is portrayed to the world via film, literature, art, music, and spoken tales.

It's possible to visit these places we hear and read about, although our experiences will differ from those of Shakespeare, Moliere, Thoreau, or Charlie Chaplin. But where their stories end our own can begin. When we travel to visit these places we develop our own narratives, create our own characters and plots and are anxious for the day we return to normalcy and relive our own narrations, while adding to the fantasies of others who have not been, and rekindling the fond fires of those who have.

Unfortunately for my kind, these fantasies are but one side of the story. It's in the fiber of my body, like lungs or eyelids, that when I find one of these magical places I want to know why it works, how it's made, why it feels so special, and how I can bring this experience to everyone. This brings a course of analysis and critique. I do what I can to find the source of this enchantment and unfortunately for myself in the very process of understanding its beauty I destroy that which I sought to understand. Paris for me is no longer the city of love and lights; it is a city of sewers and bloody revolution, of immigrant populations in dire social housing. It's graffiti. Venice is no longer the romantic city by the sea where canals run like streets and fresh vegetables are sold by boat side. For me now it is a city fallen from grace, forced to pander to foreign tourists or die. Each city is a tale of two cities, one which is the reality of a living, working city and one that is the facade of what the city would like to be, projected onto other cities so that they might be able to compare their favorable assets. If we wanted to we could stop the charade and present our cities as they actually are. But that wouldn't really change anything, and would leave us all a little depressed.

Charlottesville, Va.

41 Days in Paradise: Considerations of the culture of context in Paris, France.

Thesis abstract:

Contextual attributes exemplified by syntactic, social, political, infrastructural and technological considerations are examined in their physical manifestations in relation to contemporary Parisian architecture. Explored examples reflect the reality of the constructed pre-conditions of any site in the dense urbanism of Paris.

Research Description:

Paris is well known for its grandiose urban schemes and historic architecture, but still fosters intelligent and relevant contemporary architecture rarely seen against its more distinguished forbearers. At the same time, this new architecture is relying heavily on its context to inform and deform its design process. In such dense and architecturally homogenous surroundings, “context” can quickly become limited to urban issues and historic narratives of the neighborhood. Though these aspects are important to the development of the built environment, other issues contribute to the unique definition of place. These issues range from socio-economic conditions to public and urban infrastructure, to the technologies available to solve complex syntactic problems. This definition of context has yet to be defined or categorized, or even analyzed for its relevance and potential, yet it has already been manifested in the physical environment, in some cases, for over a century.

Goals and Aims

The goal of this research is to identify attributes and qualities which, along with historic and built context, contribute to the context of a specific place. Of these attributes, several will be chosen as case studies and explored in greater depth.

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This is where we are right now. I'm falling dangerously behind on my writing because of a design competition I'm working on which finishes later this week. I'm hoping that next week I'll be able to get a solid start on these essays. On that note, I'm having to rewrite or refocus just about all of them because of the subtly shifting sands of my theses. Considering they're each running between 3,000 and 4,000 words this is quite the undertaking, but as I go I may be paring a few of them down to the 1,000 word range, to make them shorter and more concise, and so that it's not page after page of my rambling. Also, it allows me to give priority to the ones that uphold what is now the main thrust of my paper, and letting some of the peripheral essays (those that don't really have anything to do with context or architecture, but are still interesting) fall back a bit. I should have one or two near completion by next week, so be on the lookout.

Charlottesville, Va.

Original Thesis:

Develop a series of patterns that define the architectural interpretation of contemporary built works of the historic urban fabric in Paris, France.

41 Days in Paradise:

6 Memos for any Millenium: The language of architecture can be distilled into a series of elements (structure, light, circulation, proportion, and surface) which, regardless of their aesthetic form, play an important role in the formation of coherent architecture in all styles and time periods.

Souterrain: The role of transportation infrastructures, specifically as they apply underground, continually inform and deform our understanding of the city as a continuous logical landscape, as well as a series of event spaces and flows.

Cities and the Dead: Past creative uses of the intricate latticework of voids underneath Paris can be reinterpreted to find creative solutions to current issues facing Paris, and in doing so can explore the prospect of an inverted city below.

In-Tent-City: Subcultural movements exist within the Parisian homeless community, defined by community cooperation, creative solutions to survival techniques, and nomadic tendencies. These groups challenge contemporary practices of urban living while simultaneously raising awareness for their own plight.

Monu-Mentality: The Grands Projets serve as monuments spread across Paris and present a paradox in contemporary Parisian architecture of scale; the monumental size of the Projets seems to defy the largely human scale of historic Paris, but at the same time draws from a long line of larger-than-life monuments found in French architecture for the last 400 years.

Old Ideas, New Constructions: Haussmann was able to apply earlier urban concepts in new ways to transform Paris to what we know today. Likewise, many contemporary architects are using old concepts and applying them in ways that appear innovative, but are in fact deeply rooted in practices developed in earlier periods.

The Francophone Candidates: Many of the contemporary projects around Paris are not within the historic confines of the city. Instead of seeking interpretation of the surrounding historic context, these contemporary works focus on technological and social considerations when designing new projects.

Interview with Christophe Lab: Designing contemporary works in forgotten places, and the role of context in Paris’ outer arrondissements.

The thesis for "41 days in Paradise" will be the overarching thesis which ties each of these disparate essays into a coherent string of thought. Given that enormous task, I am not sure just what that thesis is. I do think that it is not so far from my original plan, in that it draws significantly from the contextual, cultural, and infrastructural zeitgeists surrounding contemporary Paris, instead referencing these as the starting points for architectural conception. The other problem is, and this one I never really defined, is whether "architectural conception" is aesthetic, functional, social, etc., in nature. This is something I will need to address in "41 days".

Charlottesville, Va.

After a nice month long hiatus from studies, things are expected to begin picking up here. Last week I met with Bill Morrish and Phoebe Crisman to add them to my Nix team. Phoebe has a background in architecture and the urban environment, which is of great interest to me, and Bill's expertise is in infrastructural issues and the bigger picture. Both had extensive knowledge outside their field. Coupled with Ed Ford and Judy Kinnard, I should have enough input to keep this thing from ever crystalising. This week, that will be my main focus. Now that I am back and have more or less 8 essays and one long ass interview to compile, I will need to rework my thesis to be sure that readers have a clue what I'm trying to get across. Seeing as I don't even know just how I'm going to pull it off, it could be pretty demanding. I am, however, rather confident that despite turning my original proposal on its head, I'm still more or less ending up with a similar thesis, albeit a very different approach to the subject. I will come up with two theses: One sentence, which sums up the gist of my research in a handful of words, which is preferable during conversation about my research. The second will be a paragraph, in the neighborhood of 200 words, that captures with some level of detail just what I hope to ellicit from this research.

The second thing I would like to do is to make up a revisable schedule. I say revisable because my on the ground schedule was obsolete within 9 days, and I don't think this will be much different. Still, with studio, exams, papers, research, and the occasional free moment, and with a tentative final presentation circa mid-october, I will need something to keep me on track. Piggy-backing this research with my design research class ought to help, but to what extent, I'm not sure.

So stay tuned. I'll begin posting writings as they near completion and/or reflection points. Comments/critiques are most vividly welcomed in all cases.

Paris, France

In what may very well be the last entry from Paris, I'll try and reflect on the experience as much as possible. My original idea was to have this webslite as a document of my journey, so as to avoid having to do some end-of-trip retrospective. With the internet as it was, that was sadly unfortunate. But I'll do my best anyway.

The trip has evolved just as much as my project. I came here and was surprised by what I was finding. I chose to embrace that, and I think some of my early thoughs about what I would accomplish were in a sense jaded. As I got back into the groove of the city things started making more sense. I was able to think clearer, and understand the city better. I never did come up with a step by step plan on how to read Paris, but that may not even be possible. There is no one certain way to interact with the city. Once can come to see the sites. One can come and work alongside the sites and never visit them, or at least not often. Others may live in the suburbs and commute to the outer arrondissements, never casting a glance at beaux-arts architecture. Others may only choose to live in Paris as a fantasy, through books or movies or television, in lieu of visiting themselves. So I, as a student, as a traveller, cannot say that I have found the way to view Paris. What I have found is A way. One. And it has shaped my understanding.

I'm not going to place a project in Paris. It will be too hard, too difficult to even begin the process. I never found a suitable site, I cannot find measurable maps or documents, and if I forget a photo, I'm screwed. What looks to be a better possibility is a project based in a reachable US city, Washington DC perhaps, and giving the project some French link, so that I can focus on my interpretations of Paris and tie them into the project. This will accompany the document I will make this fall.

The weather just sucked. Today was a fitting memorial for my time here, as it would rain for a few minutes, then be sunny, then another storm would roll in, and so on, throughout the day. It seemed the entire time I was here I was ducking raindrops or getting rained out of a drawing. Last time I was here it was sunny and hot, the entire trip, save for maybe 2 rainy days. This time, it downpoured three weeks ago and hasn't let up since. The dry days are cloudy, and the wet ones are cold and windy. I blame global warming.

In the end, if I had to call it a good or bad trip (because we must always summarize the events of our lives, especially those drawn out over several weeks, with a host of complex emotions interspersed) I would say it was a good trip. It was a good trip because I've packed a lot of experience, a lot of thoughts, of visions, of memories, of concepts, and abstractions into the last 40-odd days. It's helped me understand the built environment and has at least helped me contemplate architectures role within that environment. That, and it is Paris.

For being the supposed heavy time of keeping this journal of my travels, the next step is to keep it up on some sort of semi-regular basis. Of course I'll have a few weeks off, maybe won't work on it much during the first few weeks of school. It will pick up again sporadically, between the lecture and pieceing together some sort of book, to talking to Peter's students, to what will hopefully be a thesis project in the fall. But that's a long way away. For now I'm going to go enjoy the last of 41 days in PARadISe.