Charette: Sustainable Home

Thursday I attended the Eastern PA chapter of AIA's design charette for students (and architects) in the area. I served as a "sketchup facilitator," which meant my sole job was to create a sketchup model of whatever design my team of 15+ students and professionals came up with. I wasn't allowed to participate in the designing portion. I will offer that 15+ people in an hour and a half wouldn't have afforded me much opportunity to participate anyway! However, it was still interesting. My only qualm was the communication that seemed to lack between my group and I, for example literally 2 minutes before the models were "due," some of my team members came up to me and said that we needed some skylights on the roof... And of course they weren't just ordinary skylights, they had to be some funky shape. Needless to say, that did not make it into the model.

I will admit it was kind of fun to fiddle in sketchup, and as a bonus I received a Dunkin Donuts gift card as compensation for my services. As another bonus, I can hopefully count the experience as 4 hours towards community service for my IDP.

I have included some screenshots of the model below for your viewing pleasure. To give you a sense of the design challenge, the teams were to design a home for a group of 4 (college students, family members, roommates, etc.) incorporating various sustainable technologies. This challenge was inspired by the Decathlon. The site was an open lot on Hamilton Street in Allentown, PA. My team decided on a mixed-use facility where the family who lived upstairs owned and operated the bike shop/gym downstairs. Part of their design was the implementation of stationary bicycles rigged to generators to produce electricity... I swear I had nothing to do with this concept!






For the record, my team was a "close second." Out of 3 teams we received Gold (as you know, with LEED the ratings are silver, gold and platinum).

Black Sheep Come Home

Sir Norman Foster (Also known as the Baron Foster of Thames Bank), The Mozart of Modernism, was on Charlie Rose tonight. Why do I know that? For the sake of my wallet, sanity and soul, I have decided to stay in on a Friday night for the first time in about 3 months.

http://www.charlierose.com/guest/view/6986

For the most part, the interview was pretty softball, as most interviews of this nature are. It’s not the blatant pandering you get in the New Yorker, but the tone is something more akin to “How I Spent My Summer Vacation”.

That being said, it’s easy to be impressed with the ego-less nature of Foster, and Charlie Rose at least credits this to his roots. The documentary “How Much Does Your Building Weigh Mr. Foster?” paints him as a local boy who makes good, which while both diplomatic and manipulative, is true. You can sense that guile in Foster’s persona and his buildings. This is a man who comes from the school of Hard Knocks, also Yale. Like a much less depressing Jude the Obscure. (pfft. More like Norman the AWESOME)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6N34a8qk0o

A few years ago, I was in London and was lucky enough to stop by the Gherkin.

It’s a building whose simple brilliant design is painfully obvious afterwards. (Like watching The 6th Sense the second time) By using the wind as ventilation, Foster uses the tribulations that come with the development of an urban high-rise (mostly HVAC) to his advantage. The problem becomes the solution.


He pulls the same tactic in the Sperone Westwater scheme


Art Galleries in Elevators. It’s gonna be big.

For my closing – Here’s an excerpt from the Wikipedia page for the SNF.

“A qualified pilot, Foster flies his own private jet and helicopter between his home above the London offices of Foster + Partners, as well to his homes in France and Switzerland”,

Somehow this movie creeped into my head

Edit: This post has been dedicated to David Z. Sucharski, the man, the myth, the legend.

You should give him a job.

that is all.