Project Statement

Please send a project title and a very short (3 sentence) project statement (call it -narrative, proposal, concept, or process) to b.rex@ttu.edu. We'll use it to help grade tomorrow.

Second Grade

We will begin the second grading process Monday morning. Please pin up and have your work up on the wall before 09h00 that day. Below is the list of exactly what we will be assessing.

1 :: 3 sets of Planimetric drawings and 3 Projection drawings of your final three study models :: 15 POINTS

2 :: 3 Paper Models / 3 Foam Models (final three) :: 15 POINTS

3 :: Site Catalog :: 10 POINTS

4 :: 1 Paper Model / 1 Foam Model (final one) :: 20 POINTS

5 :: Event Catalog :: 5 POINTS

6 :: 1/16" Plan Projection drawing :: 35 POINTS

We have a new pin up location roster. Please pin up as if you were exhibiting your final work. We have only one week left here so let's impress. The way things are most often pinned up now is not thoughtful. Line up your work with your neighbors work. Be methodical with how you pin up your work. Think of your project and how you would present it to a jury....this is the way you should always pin up.

1st FLOOR ::
Mike
Micah
Jeff
Chelsea

3rd FLOOR HALLWAY ::
Luis
Cameron
Katie

3rd FLOOR in STUDIO ::
Ryan
Andy
Frank
Eddie
Cynthia
Christina
Jordan
Phil

5th FLOOR ::
Brittney
Nichole
Edgar
John

The Rest of the Week / Notes on the past Tuesday

For Thursday let's meet first at 10h30 (not 10). I'll give a presentation about drawing. Drawing class people must be there. "Outsiders" are welcome too. It will take about an hour. Then we'd like to have a discussion about the ideas presented and then head off to lunch at 12h00.

Thursday afternoon at 14h00 both Marti and Brian will be in studio. We'll start with a short demonstration and discussion of some drawing techniques and then we'll do desk crits until 18h00 while you all work on these plan projections.

On Tuesday:
We talked about the two sorts of comprehensiveness- a) to figure out something in its totality and b) to make something thoroughly understood by others.

We also discussed the value of a narrative to the project- how a narrative attracts and gives "style" to a project but also how it gives the design decisions you've made a standard or plausibility to be measured and weighed against. A narrative is analogous to a rationale you set up to define what's rational. It can be a "World", like Italo Calvino's INVISIBLE CITIES (That's what John's "Centre d'Etudes du Monstres Urbain" is.). It can be a "Process", like the first ten houses of Peter Eisenman (That's what Micah's "Traitements de Fenêtres Existant" is.) It can be "Uses", like both Koolhaas' and Tschumi's La VIllette. (That's what Chelsea's "Bureau de Villes Divisées" is.) And there are a number of other ways narrative (a rhetorical device) can generate and support a project. We'll point them out as you deliver them to the discussion and we'll help where we can to find it with you.

The main thing you need to do is keep drawing and exploring decisions. Figure out how you'd do everything in three different ways and then see which choices "fit" as a plausible project. Very nice projects will fall out of this work if you'll make speculations about things and relationships and such in drawing the project.

stories shape drawings shape stories shape drawings (loop)

I will be in studio on Friday afternoon to do some old grading and to help when asked.

Exercise : Plan Oblique

On a 36" by 36" sheet of trace or vellum, with your project at the centre of the sheet and its context filling the sheet, construct the project at 1/16" = 1'-0" in plan oblique. The choice of angle is yours.

First you will gently lay out the drawing starting with the most important lines, edges, forms, and vectors that shape and demarcate the work, then you will gently layout your project in the space of the sheet and its influences. Build up layers of lines and make the drawing transparent (or at least translucent) with layers and depth of lines through which you will bring new information into the project.
This is due Tuesday at 14h00. We'll be in for a short time tomorrow (monday) but the day is a work day. All of these projects are in sink or swim mode right now. The projects are preggers but you are not yet showing. This exercise will be the last one before the next (2/3rds done) assessment.

Sunday Ride

Today is supposed to be the best day for the next few days. I'd like to take people around the mountain to UdeM and l'Ecole Polytechnique. Meet me at the Church of St-Michael and St-Anthony at the corner of St-Viateur and St-Urbain at 11h00. It will be a fast trip.
If you want to meet us over there then it is easy to meet up. The Université de Montréal subway station is near by on the blue line.
We'll be at the Faculté de Amenagement (the architecture school) at 11h30. We'll go up the magic carpet to the upper campus (where the art deco tower is at) and we'll be at the Bombardier Research Centre at 12h15. Then we'll go to the Ecole Polytechnique's Lassonde Pavilions at 12h30 and we'll wrap up there. Its all on one campus.

All that is within a 1/2 mile of the subway station Edouard Montpetit, if you want to meet us out there. You can bring your bike on the métro, if you want. It is not a real hard ride. You should be on your way home before 13h30.

Winter on McGill Street at Place d'Youville

Something to think about and imagine as you consider how the Place is used across the seasons.

Surfing a River When the Wave Doesn’t Move

The NYTimes today features an article about the cult of surfing the wave in Montréal at Habitat.