IaaC Blog

The project of Marine Science Park is a part of a new master plan of the Lake of Tunis that provides the capital of Tunisia with 2000 hectares of a new territory to develop a modern part of the city that promises to take a place of business, cultural and educational center of North Africa in a close future.

Very well located right in between the Lake of Tunis and Mediterranian Sea Marine Science Park transforms three hundred hectares of half empty half temporary industry occupied area into an innovative research and preservation district offering modern spaces for the strategic concentration of intensive research, preservation and advanced knowledge-based activities related to the Lake and Sea life.

Marine Science Park is also a new model of city providing a response to the challenges posed by the knowledge-based society. Marine Science Park composes a new compact city, where co-exist companies with different functions but related to research agenda. Here you can find research, training and tech transfer centers, as well as housing, facilities and green public areas.

All the site conditions and the city requirements shaped a main design strategy for the project:

1. CREATING A TERRITORIAL CONNECTION 

2. PROVIDING BALANCED RELATIONSHIPS AND INTERACTIVE SPACE

Easy collaboration across research,  departments, educational centers and collaborating wth them commercial companies provide the design goal for Marine Science Park.

New buildings should be designed the way so they are interactive and flexible, with a lot of open meeting space to provide a social, interactive environment that allows easy collaboration and cooperation.

The goal is to build a physical infrastructure that has an emergent overarching view, Instead of building separated Chemical Engineering Research institute and Engineering Educational Training Center, the Environmental Science & Technology Research and Educational building should appear. Putting professionals, students and business makers together contributes to more creative, interactive and modern ambience that gives birth to new ideas and helps people to become more liberalized solving  emergent problem ms through interaction.

Faculty offices in every building are clustered in a “wedge” to encourage casual conversations. The traditional approach would have put faculty together with their laboratories and space for graduate students. But this approach puts the faculty into interaction with people, regardless of what their degrees happen to be, who are thinking about similar things, but from different perspectives.

3. CREATIND A CHARMING MODERN ARCHITECTURE

4. CREATING A SUSTAINABLE SYSTEM

The idea of the project is to create an experimental live-laboratory center of climate investigation in the center of Barcelona.

The main aim of the project is to activate the place by changing its existing climate conditions. The idea of the project is not to replace the existing architecture with new one but to keep it and add artificial and natural elements. Located in Barcelona, the project interest is the Arc deTriomf neighborhood in which takes place some social life activities. Arc de Triomf neighborhood is well known place in Barcelona. Despite the fact it has very important localization and important role in city life it do not use its´ potential. It is mostly a place to pass by between historical city center and Citadela Park. Situated between two very dense urban tissue – Born district and Poble Nou District, for the inhabitants it is a place “to take breath”.

The intention of the project is to achieve a compromise between what exists -climate condition, architecture and social life activities and between new elements that rearrange the space in order to achieve better environment, spacial and social quality.
From the beginning the project is to intend to behavior as a liquid intervention. The idea of the liquid is to connect what is outside the square with the inside and to bring city into the plaza. Other “liquid” behavior represents the climate processes: air, water and heat circulation. The project evolves from very metamorphic idea to sensual architecture.

In order to understand the climate properties, a series of site condition has been taken into account:
A_01 -  Site analysis:

01_ Urban analysis:
_Existing Program
_ Accessibility
_ Public transport
_ Light/shadow – natural light/artificial light
_ Architectural elements

02_ Social analysis
_ Social life activities
_ Events

03_ Environmental study:
_ weather study for Barcelona (average sunlight hours, temperature, relative humidity, etc.)
_ Solar radiation for Barcelona
_ Shadow simulation for Arc de Triomf neighborhood
_ Solar site exposure

The input time for the project is summer period of 4 months: June, July, August, September, because:
_ it has the  highest discomfort from temperature and humidity.
_ it is a peak of tourist season
_ habitats  takes advantage of sunny days to go out and spend more time outside

The solar radiation map and shadow simulation are the inputs to understand site function, it is the project background. The intervention strategy is following:

A_01 Defining the space of intervention:
_ The hottest spots (temp.map) - the intervention is  both ground (material and topography - pavement, streets etc.) and air  (hanged grid of artificial elements)

A_02 Defining the artificial interventions and artificial elements
_Elements hanged on a grid of 4×4m
_ Defining element function - water “showers”, ventilators, shading devices, solar panels, artifiacial light divacies
_ Defining its localization

A_03 Defining materials according to
_ Heat capacity, porosity, surface typology
_ localization (tem.map)

A_04_ Defining micro-climates according to
_ climates study around the world
_ micro-climate study
_ activities in different climatic zones

B_01 Defining a calendar of possibilities of different water-air-temperature configurations
_liquid simulation

To sum up the project is based on climate-environment site condition that changes into micro-climates, what follows they can be formed by the director of plaza climate investigation center or by the users. The users are the ones who chooses the best environmental conditions for themselves in order to create more possibilities of taking advantages of this place.

kkk_-thesis-booklet_05

RESEARCH
As a starting point for my thesis project I closed my Bachelor degree design of family house for blinds which I would like to rethink after my new knowledge in IaaC.

As introduction to my project I was trying to rethought all process of design the house with / and without dealing with the visual aspect of space. The diagram below is showing the difference between understanding the visual and acoustic privacy between us and blind.

During the beginning I was reading a lot about today approach to architecture threw the images of architectural magazines and weakness of going beyond this sense of vision.
After the research of acoustic and vision or temperature installation of Philippe Rahm I decided to focus on one sense – touch – which is one of those which might be developed farther by using the CNC machines available in our school.

The sense of touch was by itself also so complex that I had to decrease my interest from the range of possibilities like pattern, texture, softness, acoustic properties, temperature ect… to one which was the geometry.
Because of my choice – touch – I made a research which surfaces according to our ergonomic we are able to fell – experience, and what we can find today on them.

The most common are the walls and the decorative aspect of perceiving it.
After the research about the decoration which we apply to the vertical surfaces I realized that even if we are using 2D or 3D surfaces as wallpapers, tiles, paints ect. They are always in the level of visual decoration which is unable to understand by the visual handicaps people.
The goal was to use the system of decoration – by not only leaving the visual effect but even increase the beauty of the surfaces – add some layer of information which we might get threw this surfaces.

The wall should be the interface between the building and us showing us by looking at it or touch it by our hands sort of information like today we can see threw the labels or pictogram – flat - system.

PROPOSAL
My proposal is to create new INTERNATIONAL language for reading the surface. Or today way of understanding is always according to the letters – which is also used in Braille fonts or Morse code.
This is unfortunately different in every country and understandable for specific sort of people because of complexity of system.

Threw the easy system of geometry based on one element – cube – we can achieve the new sort of decoration which will be in the same time the information language for normal people, blind and working in any conditions – like darkness, fire or smoky space – as a guide lines.

Texture applied on the height between 1,1 to 2,1 meter which is the range of our arms can threw the different variation of one element give us an information about direction to target point, distance, distance from the external facade, characteristic of the space behind the wall… ect

All those elements can be apply to one surface which in dealing with elements of size between 20 cm and 3mm which are the maximum and minimum size which we are able to feel by hands.

This system open not only the new way of understanding the vertical decoration by giving the information – not threw the LCD panels – but threw the geometry which is today threw CNC technologies again easy to manufacture in industry scale but personalize in the same time.

Thesis project PDF

Many of artist quit an traditional art galleries space known as a white cube, the space without windows, painted into bright, white color as an closed art temple and decided to go out with art into the city using the public spaces as an galleries. Many of them are transforming existing galleries spaces into space which is not easy to recognize after theirs interventions to break up also with the white cube idea. What is than contemporary art space? How it could be defined nowadays? Is it possible to create it differently than one huge art hall? The project is a try to answer on coming out questions. Ii is an answer for the question about temporary space for art, implied as an supplementary infrastructure for external artists activities defined as transformable object and is strictly related to the Cargo Transformation competition organized in Warsaw.
Permanent activities around Vistula River banks forced the need to create temporary infrastructure for going on events. The local people don’t want to wait for large investments of riversides redevelopment to be finished and believe that is necessary to use riverside now to break city separation with the river. Vistula – the last this kind of river in Europe which has unregulated banks in the middle part of the country as well totally wild areas on the one of the riversides in the capital has the great potential as an activity zone. It enable to mix developed and natural areas together giving different scenes for several possible actions.
The project has started with mapping of activities which are happening in the district between seven bridges in the center part of the city. It let to understand that the separated riversides are currently used and there is a deep need to improve it by creating permanent infrastructure.
Open program requirements which included exhibitions, workshops, performances, meetings, presentations, installations which main aim is promote art and educate became the basic, much more scenarios was added to make the riversides more attractive.
The idea of reuse transport containers which are using for air and road transport, sea shipping and warehousing with distributions as an alternative art space became the main reference of the project. Analysis of existing containers let to group them into ten main categories. Deep studies of theirs current specifications helped to understand all components and complexity of the construction and became a base for designing process in which unified standard international dimensions important for any possible transport were preserved. Many of existing references in which containers were reused for different applications like for example cafes, restaurants, shops, hotels etc. are popular nowadays, but they are usually used for several activities. The idea of the project is to create transformable structure which could be applied in much more scenarios.
The primary idea is to use programmatic container and unfold it. The original container which consist of six faces give quite simple shape, but the same container in which each face is divided into for example four parts make possible achieve many configurations. Adaptation of the unfolded structure into 3D space allow to get plenty of configurations to create differently defined activity areas.
The secondary idea is related to the assumption: Load plus Structure is equal to Action. Load means specific activity, unfolded Structure is used to create temporary infrastructure and Action [activity with temporary infrastructure] change the point of intervention into Adaptive Public Space. The object is composed from external steel stripes and internal milk glass boxes. In the main stripes many of small components are implemented to complement the object: dj’s stand, exhibition screens, cinema screen, roofs, projector, speakers, lights, fitness and playground elements. In the internal parts there are two zones for movable walls, two stores for any other additional equipment like chairs, tables, sofas and small room with movable cabinet. All boxes are possible to decompose to function as separate boxes. Additionally into milk glass surface solar ink was implemented to create energetically self-sufficient cell for necessary activities which require energy source.
The third idea is to work with ISO 20’ shipping container external dimensions which makes the object universal in the term of international transport and loading. Due to the shape became the container mode. The box was divided into programmatic stripes which after disposition have the precise shape defined for every different program. The proposal shows around twenty different programs defined for which the object can be transformed, but there is also much more scenarios possible to adapt. The project cause possible modularity is strictly related to the Multiscalarity idea. It enable to use the container in the neighborhood, district and city scales depending on the number of objects which can be added to extend kind of use.

Complete presentation is available under link below:
http://www.box.net/shared/bfju24ps38

Pixel Park

 Main interest in the project was, from the beginning, to explore the potentials of more green areas in the city.
For  residents personal meanings are the most important characteristic of a place. Personal experiences can be based on aesthetic, visual, social and cultural characteristics, values and meanings. There are many distinguishes to create perception of city image: harmony, legibility, unity, clarity, understandability and meaningfulness. Nature, openness of spaces and historical continuity are also important for perception and experiences of housing environment.
The social values of green areas are recognized by the local residents. They indicate what kind of local environment is stimulating, restorative, inspiring and attractive in everyday lif

The idea was to create a network of small parks around the city. The places should provide contact with nature and provide to the users spaces to rest and relax .
During working on the project I realized that there are many places with possibility of placing parks and also I found interesting the social aspect of bringing nature to city.
So the naturalization process could start from small inventions in many places in the city. And solution for this could be pixel park which will give people the possibility to understand the nature.

Pixel park will be a public space connected with place of living of habitants.
There are many ecological and economical advantages of placing pixel park.
For example by placing pixel parks we change natural surplus value, temperature insulation, sound insulation, reduction of rainwater run-off, improvement of water quality, improvement of air quality, upgrading the lifespan, calm effect, aesthetic value.
By this project I could give people possibility to learn how nature works, give now attractive space for them, and also now space for  plants.

The proposed  pixel park is placed on sidewalks. The geometry of the landscape created is based on the idea  of creation new spaces within the already existing space [pavement]. In this way, the areas developed are extended between and inner [lower] or outer [higher] new limit. In/ On these new areas the final geometry is configured by the plants that grow on the structure and thus, the proposal aquires its dynamic form.

I created parametric model which gives the possibility to be adjusted depended on the different dimensions of the tiles. Simultaneously the fabrication drawings are adjusted.
The geometry of the proposal is based on the vertical move of the  tiles in this way so as to transform the horizontal pavement into a more organic shaped landscape that could function as sitting place, sound barrier etc parallel with  giving  space for plantation.
Every component work as a self supporting construction system.

link to download booklet

booklet-konstanty-stajniak

Starting point of my thesis was my previous project in Term 3, the Compact Patio House in Hammamet Tunisia, in which I tested different ways of controlling the behavior of solid filled fabric. With Josiah Barnes in the project Muscular Synergy we examined a new technique of fabric weaving, which was projected to be solidified by the act of bacteria. My experience and motivation was not enough to know how to continue my already ongoing instigation. It was difficult to find the end of my previous work. So the field of the subject had to be widen up like every project should find a new beginning. After having worked for 5 weeks, my work resulted as a non-linear investigation. I learned to accept this for me new way of processing a problem. There are 2 main fields in my study; an analysis of potential of fabric as a construction technique and a development of a modular system.

Compact is a research project about examining the potential of fabric as a construction technique and developing a modular system, in which material properties and environmental aspects are involved.

Fabric is a flexible and adaptable material with a soft appearance. In combination with a fill in material, the properties change from supple to hard, gaining structural and thermal qualities. The hardened material turns to have a soft appearance in reverse. This is where the ambiguity and discrepancy from solid fabric to elastic stone becomes interesting. And in that process of changing condition is where new possibilities of design can arise.

Using fabric as construction system has the advantage of its lightness to be transported, unrolled and filled. The assembly of the pre-sewed sacks is a process that can be easy and quickly executed by non- or semi-professional workers. This low-cost fabrication method uses materials facile to find and obtain. With this the reduction of embodied energy and a no-waste production are achieved to gain sustainable construction.
The sacks can be filled with sand or another material like soil, clay or grass for insulation. Filled with an additional binder like cement, plaster or the use of bacteria, the structure can be hydrated to get a final solidification.
Developing a cloth brick system involves many parameters which not only should respond to technical requirements, but also address the virtue of beauty.

Gravity
I came across the subject of gravity in my previous work, where I tried to control the behavior of the deforming textile. I put more strings as resistant to the natural bulge of the heavy inside material.

Unpredictability, High Complexity
To achieve a fully control of your model you have to perform many physical tests. Many parameters are part of its own complex behavior like: Cloth elasticity, Filling material and its compression, Time frame, Air pressure and humidity.

Quickness
Filling Fabric bags is a fast construction method, because of the forehand preparations of the formwork and a no-waste production.

Leightweight Formwork
Not only is the easier transport an important advantage of Lightness, but also the ability of lifting and locate the sacks before getting them filled.

Process

The question of mass customization versus repetition becomes important when you focus on the digital fabrication of a specific material like fabric. How much can be digitally produced or digitally designed? Which benefits have a customized unit, each element different, against a singular component with few exceptions? The scale of a component is in relation with the adaptability of the site. Small units are more adaptable than a large scale element.
After studying different models I decided to work with a single middle size component instead of a large element like a wall. With the large element you loose the flexibility in the system. A system based on small components (like a hand size brick) need more time for the erection of a wall. So I focused on a large brick-like component.

The inner city areas of Mumbai, developed as the indigenous parts of a larger colonial apparatus in conjunction with the Fort area to the south and the port to the east. These became areas for ‘native’ settlers, which doubled as spaces for living and working. Characterised by a dense built fabric, these places became vibrant peripheries of the British town. These precincts are occupied with a building typology called as Chawls (‘Chawls’ are the type of buildings that were constructed in Mumbai during 1800 for the migrated working class in Mumbai) and were later put in a category called as ‘CESS’(‘CESS’ is the term used for the buildings that were built before 1940). These buildings occupy a crucial space and lie in  the heart of the city of Mumbai and are currently in a dilapidated state. Since there is currently no vacant land available to build in the city of Mumbai, these precincts are the only possible plots for redevelopments. Currently these buildings are the prime focus of the real estate groups resulting in a high exploitation of these lands. New  Commercial Developments are completely ignoring  the strong cultural patterns that exists in ‘Chawls’ and is resulting in  a Piecemeal development  that do not  address the problems of infrastructure at the level of the city & has no vision for the master plan of the neighborhood. High maintenance of these new high rises becomes unaffordable for the local inhabitants and manifests in the subtle eviction of the locals and inclusion of the elites. The last decade has seen a surreal schizophrenic landscape emerging; which seems extremely haphazard and speculative in nature. It is important that these forces be understood and controlled for equitable growth among the various stakeholders.

Hence our thesis intends to deal with this real crisis that exists today in the city of Mumbai. Our laboratory for investigation is a neighborhood called ‘Borabazar’ that is trapped in between the central business district of Mumbai. The intention of the thesis is to first critically investigate the several nuances of the neighborhood and then demonstrating directions for the possible urban growth at an individual as well as neighborhood scale. Initially we focused on testing several complexities on the site in terms of its morphology, density patterns, issues of sustainability, calculations for future growth etc.  Understanding the various complexities and practical problems that occur during the process of redevelopment, we carried several strategies for development that could allow people to develop their plots in multiple manners depending on what is suitable to them. We intended to formulate few smaller rules that have the ability to create a varying urban growth and resolve several crises of the neighborhood. The models for development also dealt with the issues of self sufficiency where we have speculated scenarios indicating the efficiency the neighborhood. Later stage of the thesis intends to conceptually deal with a scale of a building where we have demonstrated ideas of an alternative typology for housing and infrastructure. Eventually the intention of this thesis to create strategies for urban renewal that admits negotiation and involves uncertain urbanism.

Site / Context

Testing Strategies for Re-Development

Simple Rules for Typlologies

Speculating Energy Capacites for the Neighbourhood

Proposal 1 - TRANSIT INFRASTRUCTURE

Proposal 2 - HOUSING  A SYMBIOTIC URBAN COMMUNE

The Project is a new skin for the existing buildings in Istanbul to improve their energy performance and increase the quality of living inside & outside the building.

Problem definition:

The Istanbul municipality is carrying out a project for the rehabilitation of the facades for aesthetics. The project is about setting up regulations about the signboards and advertisements, and painting the facades whose coating is damaged.
However those facades have other problems than aesthetics, which are:

-lack of illumination
-heat loss from windows and walls
-direct radiation
-pollution and dust
-damage on the coating due to external forces
-humidity & mildew

Those problems result in discomfort and higher amount of energy consumption.
The new skin aims to decrease the effects of those problems with a system focusing on three aspects:

-providing natural light
-providing shading
-introducing vegetation
, which can be a solution for many of the problems above. It is additionally supported by solar energy production and rainwater collection to provide efficiency.

In order to provide those aspects both traditional and latest techniques and technologies are used. Those technologies are combined in a modular system that can be adapted to different buildings. The modules are in the form of plates out of recycled materials, which are to be covered with selected materials. The project has two stages:
1- Defining a catalogue of modules with different materials and orientation that can provide certain advantages.
2- Choosing the modules that are best suitable for the specific building and creating a different organization for each building, considering its context, use and environmental conditions.
The system can be applied at once or in phases. The catalogue is additive and can be enriched with newer technologies.

here you can download the presentation pdf

After the torrential landslides and debris flows of 1999 and 2005 at the valley of Caracas and over the Caribbean coast line (litoral central) the tragedy and the risk were increasing when the main services and networks starts to collapse. The aim of this proposal is concerned about solving the emergency assistance in case of those natural disasters were repeated, providing a light infrastructure which could harvest and store rain water. In the case of Los Naranjos de La Vega (as an example of application) this community is located at the confluence of multiple flooding hazards and keeps growing exactly over the paths of the water, using this way as the main access to the neighborhood that represents one of the main problems of this informal settlement.
The project consists in a reduction of the vulnerability and to reinforce the response capabilities of the inhabitants with a water purifying system which is integrated with the structure. The challenge of the transport demands flexibility and lightness, so the ‘machine’ will be foldable, built of polyethylene bars, ropes and a plastic cloak that keeps the structural tension and distributes the rain water to the receptors or ‘cups’ to be purified through the filters made of perforated PVC pipes filled with sox and sand; then it will be stored in a water bladder placed underneath with a capacity of 2.500 liters, the equivalent to 2,50 m³.
The annual average of precipitations in the valley of Caracas varies between 900 mm and 1300 mm (amount reached in 2 weeks in 1999) and the rainfall average is around the 105 days per year. Evaluating the monthly average (76,625 mm) with the proposed device (roof surface = 29,40 m²) is possible to harvest and purify 2.252,77 liters of potable water per month. The recommended volume of potable water to be consummate by 1 person per day is 2 liters. If with this structure is possible to provide 75 liters per day; it can assists around 36 people per month (around 6 families) in state of emergency.

to download the A1 panel click here