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Architecture & the CityAbstracts

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Colin Baillie

Emily Cavanagh

Ka Yiu Chan

Li Jin

Joe Holmes

Alistair Hudson

Sandy Muirhead

Andrew Ng

Alex Oliver

Craig Sutherland

Greig Williams

Dundee School of Architecture M(Arch) 2013 / 2014

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Masters Unit2013 - 2014

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Architecture & the City‘inside and outside the urban block’

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Contents

Graeme Hutton & Charles Rattray 9

Group Massing 11

Colin Baillie 13

Emily Cavanagh 15

Ka Yiu Chan 17

Li Jin 19

Joe Holmes 21

Alistair Hudson 23

Sandy Muirhead 25

Andrew Ng 27

Alexandra Oliver 29

Craig Sutherland 31

Greig Williams 33

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Introduction

Graeme Hutton & Charles Rattray

Dundee’s Central Waterfront is undergoing a period of dramatic change. Reclaimed dockland which, from the 1960s, had a chaotic infrastructure of carriageways, roundabouts and overhead walkways, has been re-ordered on a grid-pattern, establishing several blocks which form development sites. The vision is further emboldened by the imminent construction of the V&A at Dundee.

Our research examines how Dundee’s existing urban fabric – the background architecture of the city – can be better understood and its qualities extended to create places, streets and buildings which, while modern, show continuity with the past.

We have been particularly concerned with three things: with adaptability and longevity within the urban block (rather than making responses to particular and potentially transient uses); with the development of a generic urban language and architectural grammar; with the role of the specific building within that context.

We contend that the results of these typological enquiries suggest a civic continuity and significance that is appropriate to Dundee.

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The Embedded Typology: Spatial Texture & Urban Grammar

Colin Baillie

William C. Ellis (1978), in his essay “The Spatial Structure of Streets”, makes the distinction between two typologically opposing conceptions of the city. The first, described as a “structure of spaces”, has the characteristics of “a city that appears to have had its streets and open spaces carved out of what was once a solid mass of stuff.” The second, described as a “structure of solids” takes the form of “a city that appears to be open land – a park or a meadow – into which buildings have been introduced as objects sitting on a plane.”

The former conception corresponds to the traditional city, while the latter reflects the utopian urbanism of the Modern Movement. Though described here as distinct entities, most contemporary cities are in fact an amalgamation of both, as Ellis further asserts. In its present state, the

central waterfront area of the city could be categorized as a structure of solids, while the proposed city plan seeks to construct a structure of spaces.

This thesis questions the capacity of the waterfront development to function as a rich and enduring piece of the city. Specifically, this is directed through exploration of a single urban block, examining its capacity to embrace the spatially rich programme of a school, embedded within the contiguous perimeter. Colin Rowe’s notion of built form as poché is adopted, dissolving the institution as an “object”, into the prevailing texture of the urban fabric: creating a “structure of spaces”. The question is then raised, what are the characteristics of an urban grammar that can differentiate the embedded collective typology, from the generic fabric of the street?

Can a new urban block embrace the spatial richness and diversity of inhabitation evident in the existing city?

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Existing BuildingWhitehall Street

Proposed BuildingDundee Waterfront

The Dwelling in the City

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Architecture & the City, Continuity & Invention

Emily Wallace Cavanagh

How can the variety and regularity of the existing city be transcribed in new urban structures?

Continuity does not signify a linear one after the other system, but rather an interpretation of time in which the past continues to exist in the present and the present is therefore determined by it’

Ernesto Nathan Rogers, 1957

When Aldo Rossi stated that ‘l’architettura sono le architetture (architecture is the product of past architectures)’ he describes the endurance of an architecture which references the existing built environment as the basis for new form. These built forms persist in the present image of the city whereas the function continues to be modified over time. Permanence is a quality held by buildings and places that have endured but is no longer embodied in many contemporary buildings which pursue the new and the extra ordinary in place of a timeless and banal architecture. This research analyses the enduring elements of the existing city as the basis for developing

a new urban grammar associated with the ordinary, which forms the back ground to the city. It is the aim of this thesis to draw on traditions in order to establish continuity, and a new individuality, in a contemporary urban ensemble. A continued building of the city is proposed, derived from a close study of existing typologies, distinct architectural elements and urban compositions. This thesis explores how buildings should present themselves to the city through the texture, weight, scale and proportion of buildings both inside and outside of the urban block adhering to the statement that, ‘the culture of a city ultimately reveals itself in its details’(Eichinger & Troger, 2011)

The distinct character of the city is examined through its latent themes, found in sequences of open and closed spaces, the rhythm of walls and seriality of façades as the basis to reinvent the tangible and layered surfaces which mediate between the spatial elements of the city. A renewed understanding of

this representational facade, where details begin to address urban space, allows these buildings to become an anchor for our sense of orientation within the city. This hierarchy and variety is also examined at the scale of the individual building. Aldo Rossi described the city as being largely comprised of ordinary connective tissue, such as the individual dwelling, punctuated by larger collective elements. Traditionally, ornament established a readable language which described the variety of these buildings in relationship to one another. It is the aim of this thesis to draw on this tradition to lend a new individuality to the contemporary urban building. A proposal for an urban site at Dundee’s waterfront attempts a continued building of the city which acquires a representational meaning through its adaptation of typology and its assembly, which mediates between the requirements of urban continuity and the reality of construction.

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Urban Connectivity

Ka Yiu Chan

How may architectural infrastructure be employed to facilitate connection between historic and urban expansion?

Given the historical background of Dundee and analysis of how the reclaimed land was formed, one begins to understand and identify the urban blocks/structure of the historical city. Identifying the existing buildings and urban blocks shows a clear contrast of the historical parts of the city and the city’s expansion. With this; one begins to identify a boundary of where the city’s edge once was, which stood as the waterfront’s cityscape.

For many generations the waterfront has been cut off to the city ever since the introduction of the rail road system through the city. The new masterplan proposals with the introduction of boulevards segregates the historical city and the masterplan. This beckons the question to the historical city’s edge conditions; how does the new masterplan or urban expansion connect to the historic city?

The Adelphi (1768-72) in London created by the Adam brothers shows an urban model

utilising different connectivity through the city. The model could be traced back to Leonardo Da Vinci’s (1452-1519) sketch of the ‘ideal city’. Much like Da Vinici’s sketch of ‘the ideal city’ both show an urban man made typography layered under a ‘working’ city where the working class worked underneath the clean streets where the upper class lived away from the polluted streets. The ambitious Adam brothers implemented a series of vaults supporting an upper city thus we see an example of urban expansion utilising infrastructure embedded with architecture creating horizontal and vertical planes of the city through layering.

An initial study of the elevated streets in Edinburgh’s historical urban development begins to inform an understanding of the city’s layering. Studies of George IV Bridge shows a bridge which became an elevated street with direct connections from the bridge into the adjacent buildings. The seamless connection allows for the connection through differential terrain creating small courtyards

and sunken gardens. Victoria Street in Edinburgh also has these conditions of how the lower street connects with the elevated street either embedded within, through or under; buildings or arcades. The urban condition results in high density creating an interesting artificial urban topography.

This thesis challenges the interpretation of architectural infrastructure and focuses on the topic of urban connectivity through architectural infrastructural design.

“The design of infrastructure offers a pathway into the complexity of the urban system where design matters: nobody questions the need to design urban infrastructure. What is required is a new mindsets that might see the design of infrastructure not as simply performing to minimum engineering standards, but as capable of triggering complex and unpredictable urban effects in excess of its design capacity.”

[Stan Allen, 2004]

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Urban Health & Fitness Centre

Joseph Holmes

‘How does a building communicate an urban intent that is in contradiction to the privacy and intimacy of its use?

If one considers a health centre and its connotations of privacy and intimacy, the idea of a sheltered, enclosed building is one which almost sits hand in hand. However, in a location as affluent and promising as the Dundee Waterfront, a sheltered, well enclosed building could perhaps be deemed inappropriate.

Within the Waterfront Master plan and the location of the individual site, the question must be asked; How does a building communicate and urban intent that is in contradiction to the privacy and intimacy of its use?

The investigation within this question focuses around the building as a gateway to the city. How does this single module sit within it’s distant surroundings and maintain its civic responsibility as this gateway.

This ‘urban intent’ at an intermediate level, places certain requirements on the civic duties performed by both external spaces within the

site, and the street in which it is located. How do these spaces relate to both the proposal internally and the existing fabric of Dundee City Centre. Each of these in conjunction with the internal layout, appearance and strategy of the building, are vital to both it’s operation and it’ urban statement.

The aesthetics of any building within a city fabric are vital to it’s urban intent. The way a building fronts a space, or masks an interior, can alter the experience both inside and out. At an intimate level the investigation will explore the techniques and mechanisms in place to enhance both the juxtaposition between public and private and the civic nature of the site.

The three levels of investigation; Distant, Intermediate and Intimate, work together to explore both the buildings effect on it’s direct surroundings, and the effect placing a building of this nature can have on a somewhat under privileged community.

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Architecture as palimpsest

Li Jin

How to reveal the change of architecture in the city

This essay states the arguments of the relationship between cubism and architecture, analyzes the Kengo Kuma’s space of “flowing time” based on the divergence between Bruno Taut and Le Corbusier. The idea of palimpsest comes out from the comparison of cubist painting and the semitransparent Japanese paper. Palimpsest has the character fuzziness and indeterminacy, which is quite similar to the principle of “anti-object” by Kengo Kuma. In Kengo’s notion, a building is unavoidable an object when it is separated from the surrounding. So an “anti-object” building is a building which both belongs to environment and architecture, which both belongs to inside and outside, which both belongs to natural and man-made things. Then a characteristic of space was trying to be given to the site of Dundee waterfront ---- An building both belongs to the City and the

water, a building when you look outside you can also see the inside, a building without boundary or is not limited by boundary. In this way, the feeling of in a building will be replaced by the feeling of in a landscape. The existence of a “object” will be dispelled.

A new marina museum was proposed on a public space at the edge of the waterfront, which once was a part of the dock. The existing public space by the waterfront is more like a barren and underutilized area while the new museum will introducing memory of place, programme and fragmentation into it. This new building / public-space will incorporate past and become a sediment of the city’s memory by uncovering the past archaeologies.

As Kengo said “modernism all started with separating architecture from environment”.

This “anti-object” building needs more reference in a earlier stage. So a study on evolution of plan making is done to support it. Claypotts castle in Dundee play such an important role in the architectural history. As the marina museum is supposed to be taken as a resource for forgotten communities, it is meaningful for the waterfront marina museum to combine itself with pre-existing notion of typological.

Section of is also studied for exploring the integration of the inside/outside and building/environment. These sections could be taken as a kind of palimpsest which overlapped building and environment. So indeterminacy between building / environment emerge on the overlapped part which could be taken as an exploration of “anti-object”.

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Industrial Architecture and the Public Realm.

Alistair Hudson

The Industrial Revolution altered and developed power, infrastructure and energy supply on a global scale. This investigation aims to explore how the expansion of industry that emerged within the city influenced the fundamental structure of the urban fabric. The analysis will consider the architectural expression and contribution of the industrial form to the urban context and how this building typology can integrate within a city centre. The thesis will seek to create a dialogue between the public realm and an industrial process through the architectural language of a new industrial building. In this current climate, the energy sources that power cities are shifting from the stereotypical ‘dirty’ and ‘grimy’ image of the coal, gas and oil industry towards a cleaner, more innovative renewable energy supply.

Dundee has the potential to become a new renewable energy ‘hub’ of Scotland due to its key location in relation to the expanding and developing renewable energy infrastructure. The exploration will use the opportunity of a transforming industry with the aim of introducing a renewable energy testing facility into Dundee’s city centre as part of the waterfront masterplan development.

‘The problem arises, it is argued, essentially out of the city’s physical and political homogenization following the rise of industrialism. Industry, the source of every evil and every good, becomes the true protagonist in the transformation of the city.’

[Rossi, The Architecture of the City]

How can a large scale industrial building type integrate and contribute to the urban fabric and public realm?

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Relationship of formal and informal public space

Sandy Muirhead

How can a public building amplify the drama of formal and informal public spaces and allow existing infrastructure to be integrated into the public realm?

use that allows the aspect of formal/ informal public space to be explored. This can be examined with regard to creating formal and informal performance spaces, examining how these spaces interact with the wider public use of the building, while looking at how each controlled area can activate and interact with the foyer space.

The location of the site adjacent to the Tay Road Bridge allows for the interaction of the public spaces within the building to relate to the existing infrastructure of the off ramps, in an attempt to integrate this area into the urban realm, creating public spaces with a more informal, gritty atmosphere. Creating such a facility that links between the large proposed public square, seen as the ‘Front Lawn’ of the city and the less formal public spaces around the underpass of the Tay Road Bridge.

Public buildings can act as an extension of the street they lie on, with foyers continuing the public space from outside into the heart of the building. From this central point of reference within a building, areas of programme can be accessed through varying levels of thresholds for the areas of public access. A series of thresholds allow for varying levels of formality to be created within the public space, in contrast with large expanses of public space externally.

Taking into account the social needs of the city, a brief was developed to allow these issues of architectural discussion to be explored in a public building that would have a positive impact on the city and community as a whole. Creating a concert hall and children’s music school, to accommodate a Sistema Scotland- Big Noise Project in Dundee, provides a programme of varied

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Architecture and the order of the urban block

Andrew Ng

How has the city evolved as a result of digital infrastructure? How can this change contribute to the resilience and growth of the city today and in the future?

How can the typology of the urban block, responding to multiple architectural issues with a functional adaptability that contributes to the longevity, and hence sustainability, of the block be interpreted to contribute to the changing context of the city today (‘the digital context’) and in the future?

Research Context

Colquhoun (1981) notes that since the Industrial Revolution the external pressures on architecture have increased and ‘necessitated a change in architectural rules’. These changes led to the creation of new architectures, influenced by the machine age and the technological context of the time; and a new type of city with a focus on vehicular infrastructure – the car not the pedestrian. But ‘context is neither permanent nor passive’ (Scott Brown, 2011) and the flexibility of digital infrastructure is replacing the rigidity of physical road networks, changing how people live and work, and how communities are formed (Barth, 2011).

The urban block, an organising element within the city (Panerai et al., 2004), is a prevalent form that is subjected to these shifts in context. Balancing the continuity and change that the city must accommodate results in ‘structures [that] can devote their exteriors only to formalism and their interiors only to functionalism’ (Koolhaas, 1994). How the urban block can be designed to be most adaptable to these shifts in context is the focus of this thesis.

Research Methods / Summary

Mapping a digitally connected city – exploring shift from the ‘pedestrian city’ (Nolli’s map of Rome) to the ‘vehicular city’ (Niemeyer’s Brazilia), and speculations on the future, digital city. Drawing relationships between the urban block and the city and how digital infrastructure can enhance this relationship.

Based on research from Steadman (1983), Balmond (2002), and data from the Metric Handbook (Littlefield, 2011), drawings and models to generate an ‘ultra-rational’ urban block exploring spatial layout, ventilation and daylight penetration, structure, and cores and servicing; with functional adaptability based on research from Alexander, et al (1977) and Yamamoto (2013) to house interchangeable modular spaces.

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Architecture in Between

Alexandra Oliver

How can architecture activate the connection in the liminal space between city and water?

The concept of liminality, which can be understood as existing in a threshold state, was first applied to human development by Victor Turner [1967] but the idea of ‘betwixt and between’ can also be applied to physical space. In identifying the boundary between city and water, an analysis of the type of building that inhabits this space can be carried out.

What is it about the location, use and aesthetic that are interesting and unique?

Analysing five differing locations where the transition from city to water creates opposing conditions was a starting point for the research. The building that occupies the ‘threshold’ or ‘liminal zone’ must cater for both city and water.

How can a building with many functions sit on this boundary and have one identity?

‘Concerning the positions of the parts, for instance, such an architecture encourages

complex and contrapuntal rhythms over simple and single ones. The ‘difficult whole’ can include a diversity of directions as well.’ [pg88, Venturi, Complexity and Contradiction]

Venturi’s analogy, ‘the duck’ & the ‘decorated shed’, categorises buildings into two groups. He states that the duck is a ‘building – becoming – sculpture’ [pg87, Learning from Las Vegas], whereas the decorated shed uses the symbolism of the ordinary over that of the ‘heroic and original’ [pg101, Learning from Las Vegas]. Through this a question of whether the building becomes a piece of architecture and if it takes on the attributes of ‘a duck’ or ‘decorated shed’ are asked.

The thesis design component explores the building as a ‘difficult whole’ combining several functions. These functions do not need to have a relationship with each other except through necessity for location. The resulting building should be a united form masking the functions within.

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Adaptability as a design principle

Craig Sutherland

There is a tension between form and function that can be seen throughout the modern movement. Functionalism brought the principle of designing a building that should express aesthetically the function through its distinct typology, creating a rationality of types and principles, giving specific order to the plan. In the development of formal systems there should be clarity and comprehensibility in the transmission of the idea that buildings should reflect the external conditions and the internal requirements, with an aim to extending its life cycle. Buildings designed for a specific purpose may have a shorter life cycle than that of a building with a generic order. Now in an age of technological advances and an ever growing dynamic society we find a sustainability that is focussed on the short term of carbon reduction through intelligent design

choices. However, how do we know what the right choices are? It is important that we understand the broader characteristics that make places adaptable to future changes. Predicting future needs is an exercise in speculation. I aim to test these characteristics through a comparative analysis of adaptable building types. It is important to explore the dominant aspects and relationships of the modern urban society and how flexible or adaptable architecture compare within the city fabric. In this paper the focus is on ‘design for adaptability’ through an in-depth investigation of the different characteristics and strategies.

“To what extent does prevision clash with the idea of prediction, which is the central content of the architectural project, the authentic form of diversification”. (Gregotti)

Questioning whether we can pre-determine the characteristics of an adaptable architecture through a critical analysis of the holistic definition?

How does this compare with previous notions or ideas of flexibility?

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Density in the Urban Block

Greig Williams

What are the implications of accommodating historic levels of urban density in the modern city?

The wynd is a distinctive feature of Dundee, however it has been neglected in recent years. Historically, buildings were packed close together with wynds and closes providing access to deep plots. This provided shelter from the elements but also created a rich urbanism which accommodated a variety of activity and encouraged movement. Use was mixed, with people living, working and socialising all on the same wynd. Small industries grouped together, giving names to places like “Butcher Row” and “Bucklemaker Wynd”. With such dense plots, there is an interesting hierarchy of buildings with wynds housing the backs of some buildings and the fronts of others. This typology is rare today, with large plots occupied by individual buildings. Cities are disconnected with little permeability or pedestrian routes.

Various architects in the past have proposed modern solutions which integrate elements of the historic city. This ranges from a Picturesque approach, directly recreating historic forms, to creating rational systems which can accommodate a rich variety of familiar spaces. Others have developed frameworks for diverse mixed use neighbourhoods which recall a historic level of pedestrian activity. This thesis aims to develop an urbanism for Dundee which can accommodate the spaces and activity historically found in the city. This must adhere to current building regulations and propose a viable model which can be developed within the real context of the Dundee Waterfront Development.

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