Event Week 1 (2012)

LSA BA programme 2011/12 Eileen McGonigal

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LSA BA Event Week 2011

Welcome to the first LSA BA event week 2011.

The event will run from Friday 13 to Friday 20 January 2012 and there are 20 original and creative workshops for you to choose from. The objectives of the LSA event week are - • To foster a strong sense of identity within the BA course with students working in cross year team• To introduce students to specialists working within the field of architecture• To introduce students to skills not necessarily taught within the core curriculum• To create links between LSA and practise

The objective of this week is to introduce you to new skills and ideas within the practise of architecture. The event weeks will also foster the strong studio culture we have here at LSA and reflect our goals to create a studio for the future where we see studio not merely as a place but as a landscape of events.

Each event will comprise of a series of workshops, with the final crit being held within the final workshop session. We encourage students to attend the crits of workshops other than their own. A series of lectures will accompany the workshop events. Students can attend any of these lectures, although priority will be given to those students registered in the workshop.

The event week is a requirement of the studio programme for first, second and third years. Each student will have to sign up for a number of workshops and should keep a record of their event week work in their portfolio in a number of portfolio sheets. This work will be considered during the grading process.

Students will be able to register in the architectural hub and you will be informed of the date. Any student who has not registered by the given time will automatically be assigned a workshop.

The timetable for the event week workshops will be posted by individual staff on blackboard and in the Architecture hub which will act as the centre for the event weeks and will also be emailed to you.

During the event week there are no other classes. University regulations state that a full week requires 40 hours of effort. Therefore we are expecting you to work on the event at least this number of hours.

Attendance will be taken and any student who does not attend will have their final grade for the year adjusted accordingly.

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Queries before and during the event should be directed to –

Programme Leader - Eileen McGonigal – [email protected] Hub manager – Rob Sheen – [email protected]

Following is a list of the events which will be offered, the staff running the events and the number of available places.

We hope you have a really exciting week and look forward to exhibiting the work.

Eileen McGonigalAssociate Head of School

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Events:

1 Painting for Design Projects - Chris Watts

2 Digital Towers - Johan Voordouw & Ian Henderson

3 Architectural Photography - Ian Henderson

4 Studio spies: a 1:1 study - Neil Stacey

5 Live project: design competition - Neil Stacey

6 Literary Space - Johan Voordouw

7 The Architecture of Concrete Poetry - Geraldine Dening

8 Laser Cutting: Solar Topography - Ben Cowd

9 One Minute Film - Sam Causer

10 Concrete Geometries - Tim Ireland

11 Environmental Design - Ahmad Taki & Adrian Robinson

12 Five Architects – Five Postcards - Jamileh Manoocherhi

13 The Life and Death of the Great British Street - Laura Jones

14 Architectural Collage by Hand - Laura Jones

15 Guide to Leicester’s Architecture - Tim Brindley

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Chris Watts

Painting for design projects

This event helps students extend their knowledge and skills for painting in the design process.

It is open to students of any previous experience and responds to individual requirements.

Watercolour and acrylic techniques are considered in the context of design projects and digital tools, including Photoshop.

Practical work investigates painting for:• Response to site (analysis and plan)• Exploring design concepts• Visualising interior spaces

Aspects considered include:• Choosing and preparing painting surfaces• Brushes, sponges and other applicators• Pigments: watercolour, gouache and acrylic• Additives and retarders• Generating line work by hand, CAD, scanning • Colour theory and mixing• Tone and colour studies• Washes, wet-on-dry, wet-in-wet and backruns• Masking techniques• Lifting out, modifications and corrections• Scanning, printing and presentation

Material and equipment requirements are kept to a minimum and can be shared in small groups.

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Kenchiku Pers Atelier NOVA / Isao Yoshimura. Japan. Cafe Fukkoen

David Thomas Mayernik. New York. Villa Dedicated to the

Four Seasons

Alistair Lillystone, HOK. London

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Johan Voordouw & Ian Henderson

Digital TowersSan Gimignano

Brief: San Gimignano is a small Tuscan town renowned for its towers. Historically at the height of its wealth its skyline was dotted with 72 towers of varied height that merchant families used to display their wealth and prestige within the confines of such a small urban environment.

However as fortunes changed the town fell in to neglect and slowly the towers were removed. The proposal for this workshop is to rebuild the missing 58 towers and re-establish San Gimignano as the town that is once was.

Objective: To learn the 3D modelling software 3DS Max and use it for a number of different modelling applications. Students will be given tutelage in both a ‘objective’ modelling mode – to build detailed context and realistic urban environments and more expressive poly-modelling techniques, pushing the formal and spatial envelope.

Schedule:Friday – Introduction from Ian Henderson and Johan VoordouwMonday – Workshop Ian Henderson – urban landscapesTuesday – Students model San GimignanoWednesday – Workshop Johan Voordouw – poly-modelled towersThursday – Students model towers

Friday – Workshop Ian and Johan – Lighting and rendering techniques

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Ian Henderson

Architectural Photography

As students of architecture you are learning to observe the world through architects’ eyes. We use many ways of recording our impressions of a city, place or space. Common methods used for documenting our feelings, impressions and understanding of the places we visit are through sketching, drawing, painting and photography.

This event is aimed at exploring the art of photography to document architecture in a creative and unique way by developing the student’s technical and creative skills.

This event will present the student to different technical aspects of photography such as aperture, shutter speed, ISO, depth of field, focal length, etc, whilst encouraging the student to be creative.

During these sessions the students will be encouraged to consider the following:• Composition• Light• Texture• Framing• Detail• Colour• Movement• Perspective

Equipment required:• Digital SLR with variety of lenses• Flash • Memory cards with plenty of storage• Tripod• Warm clothing when photographing outside

Schedule:Friday 13th Jan - Introduction to eventThe weeks schedule will be confirmed on introduction to event.

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Neil Stacey

Studio spies: a 1:1 study

It is the year 2018. Higher Education has changed phenomenally since the introduction of fees. Space has always been precious within Universities; it is now the undisputed premium commodity. Lecturers have been known to undertake painstaking surveys of space usage in teaching spaces they wish to commandeer from others; armed with evidence of low usage rates they are encouraged to ‘grass’ and bid to use the space themselves. Space is power.

Lecturers in the privileged position of managing large spaces for informal study are paranoid about losing them. They also monitor space usage. They do this under the pretence that they are observing and researching teaching and learning activity; but students know that they are monitoring attendance and space usage with a view to ejecting students from the course who are jeopardising their claims to space.

You are to design an elevated tutor work-station for the studio. It will support tutors in their important work ‘researching teaching and learning activity’ within the studio at all hours. Some tutors have expressed their preference to be able to work in the elevated station without being seen – to be able to observe without being seen. Some tutors have expressed their preference to be very visible. Your design must accommodate both preferences.

You / your group will present your final design at 1:1 scale. You will do this by using data projectors to project an image of your 1:20 work onto the studio wall for tracing and development.

Programme:Fri 13th: Morning briefingMon: Presentation of designsTues: 1:20 section model;Weds + Thurs: 1:1 outline section drawing using projected image technique; 1:1 colour, detail, texture; 1:1 making of parts / whole of proposalFriday 20th: Morning ‘pin-up’

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Neil Stacey

Live project: design competition

One week.Design a building.Present your ideas.

This workshop is a design competition exclusively for LSA Event Week.

The winning design will inform the next stage of a project to develop a new sports pavilion at New College, Glenfield Road, Leicester.

There may be opportunities for the winning designers to further develop the design with the client, the Leicester and Rutland Hockey Association, one of the UK’s premier hockey sports associations.

Outline brief:

• changing facilities and storage;• club house - bar; lounge; kitchen;• outside terrace; covered match viewing area;• small indoor gym; spaces for sports consultants

Programme:

• Fri 13th: Introduction of brief – meet the client• Mon: Site visit• Tues: Review 1• Thurs: Review 2• Friday 20th: Morning ‘pin-up’ at Belmont Hotel, New Walk, Leicester; Presentations and Q+A with client;

Selection of winning design and award of prizes.

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Johan Voordouw

Literary Space

Brief: Architecture has multiple modes of expression. It is either conceived in an image, via text or in model form. Literary Spaces attempts to consolidate these disparate modes into a singular architectural construct. Literary spaces is either constructed from words, newspapers, collaged from magazines or carved into existing books. The overarching idea is to map connections through the narrative and build a conceptual model that evokes a spatial construct. Connections can be carved, stitched, folded or constructed the resultant pages developing architectural space on and through the page.

Objective: To learn how to interpret text and to build a space inspired by literature but not be literal. This is an attempt to create a develop a new mode of making, one that is not connected to any architectural ideal but one that simply attempts to develop a new spatial construct.Using a textual source, whether it is a newspaper, periodical or book attempt to develop an architectural construct that maps the content of the text, one that elicits a concept and develops a self-referential context, this is a project that attempts to develop architecture through play, testing ideas and slowly crafting an idea into an architectural expression. So enjoy, let the text be your architectural guide…

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Geraldine Dening

The Architecture of Concrete Poetry

This workshop will explore the relationships between the ways of thinking about and constructing concrete poetry, and those of architecture, and will investigate the ways in which these ideas might apply to your own architectural design projects.

Concrete poetry is a term which emerged in the 1950s to describe a form of poetry in which the content of the poem is intrinsically linked to its structure and form. Each poem is a system for the generation of the text that forms it, and, like the games of chance and automatist methods devised by the Dadaists and Surrealists, places the making of that poem under the agency of language itself, rather than the subject who speaks it. Each poem is thus both the presentation of that system and the poem which the system creates.

We will briefly explore the historical contexts in which concrete poetry emerged, and the ways in which these ideas might be applied to thinking about architecture and the design process. You will analyse some existing concrete poems, and make your own concrete poem based on the structural principles of a building of your choice.

Programme:Friday 13th – Monday 16th: Gather information on 3 buildings of your choice which interest you, and also include a sheet summarising a design project of your own that you are working on in studio.You should think about the relationships between the materials, structure, environmental strategy, context and content of the building.Monday 16th – All day workshopTuesday 17th + Wednesday 18th – Individual work on poemsThursday 19th – Final presentation

Geraldine Dening is a senior lecturer at DMU, and a sole practitioner based in London.

Simon Elmer is a freelance art historian, critic and writer. He completed his PhD at University College London in 2001, and has lectured at the Universities of London, Manchester, Reading and Roehampton, and was a visiting professor for two years at the University of Michigan. He has published and presented papers on Surrealism and photography, is the editor of the online poetry periodical The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, and has recently completed his book, The Colour of the Sacred: Georges Bataille and the Image of Sacrifice.

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Ben Cowd

Laser Cutting: Solar Topography (1st and 2nd Year students only)

“Building a city that reflects the orderly motion of the stars is civilization’s earliest and most spectacular reach for transcendence.” Yi-Fu-Tuan

History shows us that some of the oldest forms of public space were built as cosmic diagrams, positioned and aligned to the cycle of the sun and stars. Stonehenge at Salisbury is the oldest public meeting place in England that also functions as a clock, dating to 3000BC. In Mexico, the Maya civilisation aligned entire cities to important celestial events and their large stepped pyramids were carefully orientated to act as giant sundials.

During event week we will be constructing a large topographical clock and calendar by mapping light and shadow over time. Working in small groups we will be using computer shadow analysis and precise laser cutting templates to research, draw, model and construct a topography that tells the time and date. The final topography will consist of 52 layers of paper, each representing one week of the solar cycle.

The model will be exhibited as part of the London Festival of Architecture in June.

Skills

Model making, Laser-cutting, 2 1/2 dimensional drawings and shadow analysis

Timetable

Tuesday - Meet in BArch studio F0.22 at 10am. Wednesday - Prepare AutoCAD fileThursday - Laser CuttingFriday - Construct model

Please bring in a laptop if you have one

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Sam Causer

One Minute Film

Film-maker Sara Muzio and architect Sam Causer will collaborate to help you make a One Minute Film exploring your current studio project.

At an LSA film night the school will vote for the best three to be entered into the One Minute Film & Video Festival.

“The international One Minute Film & Video Festival Aarau was founded in 2003 to offer a pragmatic public platform for this special and interesting film format. A Film of 60 seconds duration is only limited in the dimension of time, because exploration and breadth of experimental possibilities set minimal boundaries. This extreme form of short film is an inspirational platform for very concentrated, creative and extraordinary works.”

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Tim Ireland

Concrete Geometries

Everyday space is remarkable geometry, which as architects we interpret and give physical form. The problem of configuring space is complex but traditional approaches tend to flatten the issue, quantifying it into something manageable. An approach driven by a concern for efficiency. How can we think about and approach the problem of spatial configuration whereby we embrace the complexity and aren’t forced by efficiency.

In this workshop we will explore what it is to live space. Two precedents signifying alternate approaches will be used: The Frankfurt Kitchen by Margrette Schutte Lihotsky epitomises a machine-like approach whereas Frederick Kiesler’s Endless House is more organic – demonstrating how “streamlining becomes […] an organic force as it relates to the dynamic equilibrium of the motion of the body within encompassed space”.

We will think about space as something behavioural, and explore the configuration of space dialectically. In the sense that space affects behaviour – and behaviour affects space. You will develop analyses that approach a synthetic understanding of the ephemeral and imprecise relationships between the events that occur in space, and the physical form of that space. This analysis will then be reinterpreted with theoretical hindsight to generate a spatial formation that illustrates the poly-dimensionality of everyday space.

Programme:Monday: The workshop will kick-off with a lecture, which will present various views on space and outline a number of ways in which space has been thought about and affected architecture.- A number of texts will be made available from which you will select one to review for an open discussion on Wednesday.- You will decide what activity-space to analyse and how to go about recording it.Wednesday: A studio day in which we will discuss your analysis and how you might generate a spatial formation expressing concrete space. You will arrive with your analysis completed and represented in model or drawing form. We will also debate your chosen text and the issues raised in Mondays lecture, and will be presented with a final text for you to review for a final discussion on Friday.Friday: Presentation of your spatial formation and closing discussion on the final text and workshop output.

Output:• You will analyse an activity thereby recording the unfolding patterns of movement a user creates whilst carrying out an activity in space.• You will represent this in model or drawing form.• And then reapproach the configuration of space to express the concrete geometry of lived space in model or drawing form.

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HEALTH WARNING:You will be required to read as well as hypothesis, model and design – a number of texts will be presented and made available which will form the basis of a discussion in the workshop.

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Ahmad Taki & Adrian Robinson

Environmental Design

IntroductionBuildings in the UK consume approx 45% of the total energy to maintain acceptable thermal environmental conditions, and to provide healthy indoor environments. Such energy consumptions, together with its associated gas emissions significantly contribute to global climate change and pollution. The Energy Review of the UK government’s Performance and Innovation Unit set targets for energy savings through increased energy efficiency at 80% by 2050 from 1990 levels. The development of low energy architectural design embracing sustainable characteristics can contribute towards CO2 reduction that would help achieve these targets.

AimsLearning about the key divers for sustainable architecture and creation of a well tempered building environment that is fully integrated with an architectural design concept.

During the event week there will be key talks by specialist in environmental engineering design on key environmental aspects, a building study exercise where you will be guided on improving your skills in developing environmental design strategies, and guidance on detailed methods and analysis of environmental systems, together with an appreciation of energy rating procedures and techniques.

The ultimate goal is to identify the factors that shape the environmental performance of a building, to integrate these into the building concept that is efficient and appropriate for future energy use scenarios.

This event will be delivered by a programme of lectures, workshops, and tutorials.

Key presenters will include:Rob Atherton – Practitioner and Building Environment designerDr Ahmad Taki – Building Physicist and Environmental Analyst

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Jamileh Manoocherhi

Five Architects – Five Postcards

In this event, you’ll explore architectural language through the study of the work of five architects of your choice. You’ll analyse the dominant formal language of the architect and produce a ‘portrait’ that expresses your findings. The final images will be presented on separate postcard size drawings. While light-hearted, this exercise aims to distil the visual and formal elements that we identify with each architect and allows for a creative re-telling of your finding in a personal way. You may use colour, black and white images, etchings or photomontages. One restriction is that they should all be postcard size.

Movement and Space

Oskar Schlemmer used ‘the human figure in space, its moving and stationary functions, sitting, lying, walking, standing’ as the main themes of his work. In this workshop we’ll explore the relationship between the human figure and space through understanding its scale and movement. The human scale determines how we experience the physical world around us. In order to highlight its significance, we’ll record and study movement and scale through exaggerating and accentuating their elements in a number of everyday

social activities – dining, walking, etc.

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Archi-tetes series of drawings by the Cartoonist, Louis Hellman

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Laura Jones

The Life and Death of the Great British Street

“Beyond our front door or garden gate begins a world we have little to do with, a world upon which we can exert hardly any influence.... where we feel threatened rather than at home.”

Herman Hertzberger, Lessons for students in Architecture

It seems that British streets and other public spaces are now only used as transitional; once vibrant, community orientated places where people interacted with one another, they are now left empty, frightening or used to get from A to B. Out of town shopping centres and gated communities provide no or little public space and keep strangers firmly out. This event week will explore streets and public spaces from the past and around the world as well as giving consideration to modern thought regarding the importance of public spaces in our cities. Particular focus will be given to streets and public space in Leicester city centre, how it is currently used and how integration between strangers could be encouraged through the design of an intervention/s.

Tuesday 17th January 2012 –

10.30am - Introduction seminar

11.30am - Site Visit- Leicester City Centre

2.00pm - Discussion of observations and ideas.

Thursday 19th January 2012 –

10.30am - Presentation of Intervention.

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Laura Jones

Architectural Collage by Hand

“The movement away from the established systems of references creates in collage the potential for forming a situational space whose controversial identity is more explicit....”

Dalibor Vesely, Architecture in the Age of Divided Representation

Collage was one of the most influential representational techniques of the twentieth century and many architects have used it to explore and communicate designs and ideas since. Collage gives us the capability to bring apparently remote, unrelated elements together to explore materials and other spatial qualities as well as being a useful tool to convey the desired sense of a space. The invention of Photoshop means that it is extremely easy to create a convincing digital collage, however, the word collage means ‘to glue’ therefore this event week will explore the techniques and benefits of collaging by hand to produce an image suggestive of an interior space.

Wednesday 18th January 2012-10.30am - Introduction seminar11.00am - Collage workshop1.30pm - Lunch2.00pm - Collage workshop4.30pm - Collage presentation

All students are required to bring all of the following with them:• A perspective line drawing of an interior space, perhaps from Studio project (an image from a sketchup would be good)• A4 tracing paper• Scalpel with additional blades• Cutting board• Ruler

• Pritt Stick / UHU glue with a cocktail stick• Small scissors• A black, fine felt pen

A large selection of magazines, newspaper, different types of craft paper, old picture books (found in charity shops), photographs of models, previous attempts at collage or other work, anything else you can collage!

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Tim Brindley

Guide to Leicester’s Architecture

StaffTim Brindley (co-ordinator), Ian Henderson (photography)

BriefThe Leicester School of Architecture is keen to promote the architectural heritage of Leicester, from historic monuments to the latest prize-winning schemes. In this Event you will be compiling a guide to some of the city’s architecture, in a compact and useable format. The aim is for the School to publish the best guides, for use by other students, applicants to the courses, visitors and the general public. They will also be added to a database of facts and photos, to provide a continuous record of architecture in our locality.

A guide to local architecture needs to be accurate and informative, short and succinct, convenient to carry and use, and attractively presented. A guide is something to be carried around while you look at the architecture – it could take the form of a leaflet, a fold-out map, a pocket-sized book, a website (with printable material), or even a smart phone app – so research good examples to get some inspiring design ideas. Your guide can take any suitable format, and can focus on any aspect of Leicester’s architecture that interests you.

Tasks1. Work on your own, or in twos or threes – no more2. Choose your guide theme – some examples might be: a. Leicester’s Top Twenty b. 21st Century City c. Victorian Splendour d. Best of the 60s e. Civic Pride f. Famous Architects g. House and Home h. Industry and Commerce3. Research the sources, create lists and maps, source plans and drawings4. Plan your guide format5. Photograph the buildings6. Design, compile and produce your guide for distribution on Friday

SourcesBooks and pamphlets on Leicester’s architecture will be made available in the Kimberlin Library during the Events week, including some of the following:

Bennett, J D. Leicestershire Architects 1700 – 1850. Leicester: Leicester Museums, 1968.Brandwood, Geoffrey. The Anglican Churches of Leicester. Leicester: Leicestershire

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Museums Service, 1984.Boynton, Helen & Grant Pitches. Desirable Locations: Leicester’s Middle Class Suburbs 1880 - 1920. Leicester: Leicester City Council, 1996.Elliott, Malcolm. In the Steps of Edward Burgess (1847 to 1929), Civic Architect of Victorian Leicester. Ellis, Isabelle C. Records of Nineteenth Century Leicester. Available at Leicester Central Reference Library.Gill, Richard. The Book of Leicester. Buckingham: Barracuda Books, 1985.Keene, R J B. Architecture in Leicestershire, 1834 – 1984. Leicester: LRSA, 1984.Leicester City Council. Leicester’s Architectural Heritage. Leicester: LCC, 1975.Lloyd Smith, L & R J B Keene. 1872 – 1972: the first hundred years of the Leicestershire and Rutland Society of Architects. Leicester: LRSA, 1972.Lyons, Arthur. The Architecture of the Universities of Leicester. Syston: AnchorPrint, 2010.Mitchell, Tony. ‘Newtown’ Trail. Leicester: Leicester Urban Studies Centre, 1982.Nash, David & David Reeder (ed.). Leicester in the Twentieth Century. Stroud: Alan Sutton/LCC, 1993.Pevsner, Niklaus and Elizabeth Williamson. Buildings of England: Leicestershire and Rutland. 2nd rev ed. Penguin, 1984.Roenisch, Rowan. Ernest Gimson: historical walking trail in Leicester. Leicester: LCC, n.d.Smigielski, W Konrad. Leicester Today and Tomorrow. London: Pyramid Press/LCC, 1968.Taylor, Michael. The Quality of Leicester. Leicester: LCC, 1993.

You will find other published architecture guides in the Library, in bookshops, and on the internet.

It is essential that all text and photographs used in your guide must be original (i.e. not copyright).

Schedule (provisional)Friday Issue of brief on Blackboard Form working teams Research examples Develop concepts

Saturday – Sunday Read, discuss, think, imagine Prepare a slide show

Monday 9:30 Review meeting 1 Each team to present their concept and work plan 2:00 Photography workshop – how to photograph architecture, with Ian Henderson

Tuesday Desk and field research continues

Wednesday 9:30 Review meeting 3 Present draft design 2:00 Review meeting 4

Thursday Production of your guide

Friday Publication of guides

Documents

Event Week 1 (2012)