Alexandra Gordon Portfolio 2023

2022 2023 SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY

ARCHITECTURE PORTFOLIO DESIGN PORTFOLIO

ALEX GORDON ALEXANDRA GORDON

Contact Information

Alexandra Ida Gordon agordonvt@gmail.com

CONTENTS

01 Canteliever Connector

02 Urban Cohabitation

03 Aquifer of Hope 04 Urban Utopia 05 Physical Models Table of Contents

06 Edgemere Queens Community

Cantilever Connector|

01 Cantilever Connector This design proposal combines urban infrastructure with the civic program of a field house at the intersection of a green parkway, three automobile roads, and an elevated bikeway (the 606) in Chicago, Illinois. Using a four-story circulation wall connected by a circular ramp to link overlapping, cantilevered spaces of program, this project utilizes unconventional spatial organization to question matters of accessibility, verticality, and semi-private vs public space in an urban setting.

The main ambitions for this project included the integration of a field house (found throughout public parks in Chicago) into a site highly directed by movement (bike, pedestrian, and car movement at different elevations), the revitalization of the beltway into a park more suitable for public use and leisure, accessibility for bikes and wheelchairs at all levels, and overall connection to the larger urban fabric.

With programs such as community rooms, multi-purpose rooms, bike storage, a public gym, and more, this project aims to provide community-strengthening amenities and space and stand boldly as a beacon of neighborhood values in the urban landscape of northern Chicago.

ARC 409: Syracuse University: 2023 In Collaberation with Arpitha Cunigal

| Axon in Context

|Cantilever Connector

Second Floor Plan |

606 Level Perspective |

Cantilever Connector|

| Model Perspective

| Long Section

|Cantilever Connector

Urban Connection

606 Level Connection|

606 Level Structure|

Cantilever Connector|

Ramp/Office Connection|

Matters of Infrastructure

Ramp/Office Structure|

|Cantilever Connector

Urban Connection

Structure Axon |

Circulation Wall |

Cantilever Connector|

| Ground Perspective

Matters of Infrastructure

| Interior Perspective

Urban Cohabitation|

02 Urban Cohabitation This proposal seeks to explore the question of whether it is possible for humans and insects to cohabit in an urban context and whether the connotations of living in proximity to nature and wildlife can be reconsidered.

Having been tasked with a retrofit project, we examined Baynard house in downtown London as our proposed site.

Baynard house, in its current condition, has harsh materiality, lacks pedestrian or public access, and remains only within private use, which blatantly rejects all its surroundings. This site however offers a few opportunities, such as an existing data center that produces heat, along with its proximity to the river Thames, which could be used to promote both social engagements among humans and the encouragement of animal habitats.

Focusing on the facade, we propose a wood and eco-plastic system encouraging bees and pollinators to nest within the proximity of a new proposed program of 65 pre-fabricated housing apartment units, which repurpose the heat created from the existing data center in Baynard.

This new design for living seeks to explore new symbiotic relationships that can potentially even take place in a densely populated city such as London.

ARC 408: Syracuse University: 2022 In Collaberation with Olivia Porrill and Ruqaiyah Bandukwala

| Axon with Detail Callouts

|Urban Cohabitation

Urban Retrofit

| Section-Elevation

| Facade Perspective

Urban Cohabitation|

| Roof Perspective

Matters of Housing

| Interior Perspective

River Thames Section |

Ground Floor Plan |

Urban Cohabitation|

Matters of Housing

| Facade Section Details [Black: existing Blue: added]

|Urban Cohabitation | Facade Axon Details

Urban Retrofit

| Facade Material Research

Urban Cohabitation|

Being a project with a facade meant to be occupied, changed, and rebuilt by its residents both bees and humans, it has many temporal aspirations. To try and represent this effectively, we created an augmented reality experience in which anyone with a smart phone or tablet can interact and move around a 3D animated model of our proposal projected onto a physical foam core scale model. | Augmented Reality using Aero on Foam Core Model

Matters of Housing

|Aquifer of Hope

03 Aquifer of Hope This project portrays a story of an architecture that is deeply inspired by the landscape, and uses technology, built material, and human intervention to enhance the resources of its site with the overall human experience. Based in central Texas, this design strives to rejuvenate the sites’ natural aquifers as a response to the harsh environmental conditions of drought and flooding.

Material intervention is utilized as a means of reactivating the existing resources and connecting human interaction for awareness to the entire process. Despite the specificity of this location, this project displays a broader purpose, responsibility, and potential of architecture that must be adopted in order to revive the eroding relationship between the built and unbuilt landscape and conceivably set forth a better trajectory for our planet.

Architecture in Formation

AWARDS: 2021 One Drawing Challenge by Architizer Project “Aquifer of Hope” in collaboration with Ruqaiyah Bandukwala selected in Top 100 Finalists ARC 208: Syracuse University: 2021

Porosity Studies|

Aquifer of Hope|

Long Section|

Architecture in Formation

|Aquifer of Hope

Concept Study Section |

Aquifer of Hope|

| Drone Map

| Plan

Matters of Site

| Site Plan

Architecture in Formation

|Aquifer of Hope

First Floor Plan |

Aquifer of Hope|

| Perspectives

Matters of Site

|Urban Utopia

04 Urban Utopia These images show a sequential study of historical urban spaces cumulating in an urban project derived from a utopic manifesto. Relationship to context, to the site and the street, is key with an interest of public v private space showing up in every project.

The final project influenced by these studies and diagrams is a utopic community of my own imagination. The manifesto for this community is highly influenced by the existing intentional community by the name of The Esalen Institute. Where Esalen is located on a remote, scenic pacific shore site in California, my utopia is located in Washinton DC on what is currently Stead Park. This design utilizes the beauty of the surrounding urban fabric to best suit the needs of the community proposed in my manifesto.

ARC 307: Syracuse University: 2021

Architecture in the City

Bramante Study|

Urban Utopia| |Studies of the Palais Burbon

Matters of Urbanity

|Studies of DC Site Derived from the Nolli Map

Letchworth Garden City Study|

Architecture in the City

Long Section|

Site Plan|

MANIFESTO

Urban Utopia|

This utopia, a utopia of human potentiality, creates an environment where psychological and moral experiments can take place in an effort to allow individuals to work towards self actualization. Many of these practices and experiments are countercultural as they go against ascetic forms of spirituality and religion that are so prominent and influential in Western culture. Instead, indulgence, exploration and immediate experience are greatly encouraged as a means to gain better understanding of the desires and potentials of the mind and body as well as the ways in which they are interrelated and how they interact with the exterior environment.

The ordinary circumstances of daily life for most Americans are conducive of isolation, emotional and intimate repression, and indulgence in distracting, dehumanizing media. A level of detachment from emotion is necessary to function effectively in modern society however when these afformented conditions are the only one humans live in, the potentialities of the mind (mind as self) remain unmanifested.

Matters of Urbanity

|First Floor Plan

Matters of Aesthetics

Elevation showing housing semi-private entrance |

Physical Models|

05 Physical Models This first set of images is of a 1/4 scale model created for Daisy Ames of a proposed retrofit housing project/community center (Housing Project, Poughkeepsie, NY, Unbuilt. 2020 - 2022 by Studio Ames). This model was based on schematic plans and sections provided by Daisy and is made of foam core, colored Strathmore, trace paper, fine metal mesh, and metallic paint. More info about this project can be found at studio-ames. com The following set of images is a Strathmore sectional study of Peter Zumthor’s Therme Vals created for studio at Syracuse University (2020).

Full model showing roofscape and facade strategy |

Matters of Craft

Matters of Aesthetics |Physical Models

Physical Models|

|Sectional Study Model of Peter Zumthor’s Therme Vals, Switzerland Matters of Craft

|Edgemere Community

06 Edgemere Queens Community When tasked with creating an urban-scale project for the neighborhood of Edgemere Queens, in the Far Rockaways, my studio partner Jeanelle Cho and I discovered a community of engaged, resourceful, and resilient people trying to preserve their community and way of life after the devastating effects of hurricane sandy and as well numerous other challenges including lack of certain amenities and infrastructure.

When conducting our research, we first examined ideas of mobility, proximity, and accessibility. We considered these aspects through the lens of existing built amenities, public transportation, and their relationship to one another. Further examining the spatial conditions of Edgemere, we were drawn to the high percentage of vacant land and space between buildings as potential for creating environments for shared experience and exchange of ideas, culture, and art.

Architecture of the People

ARC 308: Syracuse University: 2022

| Egdemere Collage

www.riserockaway.org/rise/

Online interviews of community leaders affiliated with RISE (Rockaway Initiative for Sustainability and Equity) helped determine values, aspirations, worries, existing resources and community goals

Prospective Sites |

Site Research |

Areas of interest/potential including vacant sites caused by hurricane Sandy as well as sites intersecting with the often overlooked NYCHA housing

|Edgemere Community

We were lucky enough to find a study that revealed that regarding places in which people participate in arts and culture in Edgemere, an overwhelming majority answered that they do so outdoors, in streets and parks. This revealed to us an existing culture of outdoor gathering and participation in Edgemere.

Inspired by this culture as well as a strong existing structure of community leadership, we decided that a kit of parts proposal presented as a design catalog of possible outdoor arts and culture promoting interventions would be most fitting. Shown are two of many different proposed interventions.

Edgemere Community |

Matters of Community