UCL MArch Urban Design Portfolio - Carol El Farraji

PORTFOLIO 24164008 Carol El Farraji Selected Work 2018-2023

10

01 Tangible Mirage Amid extreme climatic conditions and dramatic temperature fluctuations lingers a tangible mirage. Flowing between the expanses of dunes in the Mauritanian desert, this project is ensconced in the embrace of thermochromic and photochromic materials that perform a play of their own with every rising and setting sun.

Their ability to absorb and reflect light by changing color under different conditions is accompanied by a kinetic ability that allows the porous skin of the building to open and close in response to wind, light, and water stimuli. It is an ode to nature’s ability to form-shift, camouflage, adapt, and evolve. The muse for this design proposal was the core aspect of two unrelated natural phenomena: the chameleon’s skin color-changing ability and the process of formation of dunes. Wired with detectors, the chameleon’s multilayered skin composition enables it to change colors, a characteristic critical to its survival. On the other hand, reinterpreting, reiterating, and reflecting the exterior landscape, the skin thermoregulates the body by changing to light, heat-reflecting colors during the day and dark, heat-absorbing colors during the night.

The Tangible Mirage serves as a bridging zone between the two incompatible realities of a dry harsh desert and a cool soft botanical space. On the inside, the building utilizes an oases system for recycling water from the sea and underground sources to ensure its ecological self-sufficiency. The building itself houses a cultural center with a library, workshops, and exhibition spaces that educate visitors about environmental topics. It is a public space that welcomes people into a comfortable ambiance within a building that directs and performs a new play with every rising and setting sun. A project that is embraced by the dunes differently at every moment and in turn embraces its users uniquely with every light photon it receives.

PROJECT DETAILS

Team work submission for AI x Biomimicry competition Organized by Never Enough Architecture platform Duration: September to November 2023 In Collaboration with: Rim Badawi and Lina Hijjawi Role included: concept development, Midjourney work, and diagram production This project received an Honorable Mention and is exhibited on Never Enough Architecture website 04

50

02 THE MESO-LIMINAL apparatus The northern bed of Beirut’s river that spreads from Bourj Hammoud to Sin El Fil constitutes a knotting node for boundaries of physical and mental complexion. Amid perpetual snowballing of national and international crises, individuals, coming from extremely diverse backgrounds with a luggage of a traumatic past, an unestablished future, and an abusive present, are forced to coexist in a neglected peripheral suburb of Beirut. For that, a Meso-Liminal Apparatus was devised on two polar sites by the river; along with several satellite bodies within the urban area of intervention that serve as urban prostheses feeding into the needs of their surrounding clusters. The two main apparatuses however, introduce a mechanism of mental therapy based on different forms of production, thus, portraying mental health as a basic need among other humanitarian needs such as clean air, clean water, and efficient energy production which are accommodated for in two air purifying towers and water sourcing, energy producing, aquatic extensions. It is vital to point out that these functions work together in a machine-like structure within a postapocalyptic regenerative scene of greenery that gives public access to most corners of the project and reclaims the region neighboring the river while experimenting with what a boundary really means.

PROJECT DETAILS Individual Academic Project carried

at the Lebanese American University

Duration: September 2022 to May 2023

Location: Bourj Hamoud, Matn, Lebanon Role: Fully Inclusive

Instructor: Professor David Aouad This project is exhibited at the DAID Exhibition 06

70

08

90

THE MESO-LIMINAL APPARATUS & ITS URBAN PROSTHESES 1:First Tentacle specialized in basic needs and therapeutic productive crafts 2:Second Tentacle specialized in basic needs and therapeutic mind and body connections 3:The Essential Prosthesis - Parking 4:The Transportational Prosthesis - Bus Stop 5:The Engulfing Prosthesis - Kids Playground

10

11

12

31

14

51

03 THE PALIMPSEST Located in the vibrant neighborhood of Pilsen, Chicago, this mixed-use project consists of 70 housing units and a library. The library is fluidly designed to take the visitors on an ascending journey through the building’s various layers that overlook one another and present the users with continuously changing perspectives. The housing units, on the other hand, are centered around modular flexibility, providing the residents with adaptable spaces to follow their needs. Moreover, even the boundary between the residential pole and the public one is carefully crafted to allow visual connections while maintaining the needed privacy. Yet, the building’s massing and façade aim to clearly accentuate the different functions by creating a clear contrast between the triple-glazed facade of the library that interlocks with the recycled metal panels of the housing units, emphasizing the contrast. Through the immersive experience that this project provides for its residents and visitors alike, a harmonious and complementary journey is created reflecting the dynamic, diversified, and ever-changing spirit of the area. An interdependent structure is designed through interweaving the different layers of the spaces to create an interpolated matrix resembling the palimpsest like character of the project.

16

PROJECT DETAILS Academic group work project carried at Kent State University Duration: January to May 2022 Location: Pilsen, Chicago, Illinois, USA In Collaboration with: Andira Khanafer Role included: Concept development, 2D drawings, 3D digital modelling, 3D printing, physical modelling, and renderings Instructor: Professor Danny Wills This project is exhibited at the KSU CAED X-Gallery

71

18

91

20

12

22

32

04 The Epilobium The Epilobium is a type of widely distributed flowering plant that blooms in neglected areas, and Beit Chabeb, just like many other Lebanese villages that were prosperous for what they have, was a victim of time. With most of its old buildings – two of which present on site

– handcrafts, and productions left for neglect, Beit Chabeb was left as a prey for change. Thus, from these two dilapidating structures, a prototype blossoms, one that is open for change, just like an Epilobium, allowing growth and prosperity in the graveyard of time. It is based on a trilateral relation between Intellect, Production, and Exchange such that, as these two buildings transform into the main centers

of production, the living spaces become integrated as spaces in between, inhabiting the floating truss system that is totally dependent on

the wellbeing of the production spaces, structurally and theoretically; thus, reaching a common ground between a Marxist system of living and a capitalist result in production, growth, and development that aims for the wellbeing of its inhabitants who are part of the production, exchange and intellectual processes taking place in this new prototype; The Epilobium.

PROJECT DETAILS Individual Academic Project carried at the Lebanese American University Duration: September to December 2021 Location: Beit Chabeb, Matn, Lebanon Role: Fully Inclusive Instructor: Professor Hicham Abou Akl This project is exhibited at the DAID Exhibition

24

52

26

72

28

92

05 AN ACTION RESEARCH PROJECT - BAAKLINE, AL SHOUF, LEBANON This action research project was dependent on research, site visits, in-situ mappings, urban analysis, critical reasoning, and major collaboration with municipalities and ministries in order to understand and analyze a Lebanese city of choice through its urban development and environmental planning. The city/village of choice was Baakline, Al Chouf. This project was carried over several phases and came down to a hundred fourteen page report from which a few pages were selected and displayed in this portfolio. the city’s image was explored through delving into its history, morphology, typologies, demographics, forms, elements of urban design, natural and cultural resources, etc. A critical assessment was carried for each aspect in order to propose urban interventions and projects that could aid the city’s development while helping maintain its character. On-site interviews with locals, photographic documentations, and contextual analysis were carried out in parallel to the information gathered from official sources.

PROJECT DETAILS

Academic group work project carried at the Lebanese American University Duration: November to December 2021 Location: Baakline, Shouf, Lebanon In Collaboration with: Jad Saab, Jana Karnib, Lina Hijjawi Role included: site visits, mapping, interviews, meetings with authorities, site photographing, and visual representation of findings Instructor: Professor Pio Ibrahim

30

13

32

Geography Terrain

Urbanism Zoning

Geography Greenery and Vegetation

Infrastructure Roads Network

Urbanism Urban Morphology

Urbanism History of Growth and Planning

Economy Touristic Zones and Establishments

Infrastructure Traffic Mapping

Infrastructure Roads Network

Infrastructure Rehabilitation of Stormwater Canals in

33

06 Juxtaposition of Parallels

What if our existential givens were rewired; how will our preconceived notions of design and space differ? Will one design solution be able to address various realities? “Juxtaposition of Parallels” is a theoretical architectural project that responds to a self-designed extreme case scenario about a collision between three parallel universes while space is occupied with particle accelerators during a war over the monopoly of energy production. This results in ripping the temporal and spatial membranes of the universe causing a disturbance in the metaverse where the consequences end up being the collision of three parallel universes: our own, a second with our flying replicas, and a third that is a duplication of the second, but following an opposing sense of gravity. Our only choice is adapting our world to accommodate for all three realities which will in turn defy our standard understanding of space to welcome two new ones.

The design solution presented in this project, consists of a single modular unit that was rotated and flipped to create both the sections and the plans through manual aggregation of multiple units creating a flexible configuration that could be perceived differently following each spatial principle.

PROJECT DETAILS

Individual Academic Project carried at the Lebanese American University Duration: January to May 2020 Role: Fully Inclusive Instructor: Professor Roula Khoury This project is exhibited at the DAID Exhibition 2020

34

53

07 Abstracted Cities These two abstracted woodworks were designed over two separate semesters.

While the one to the left is an interpretation of Beirut through unclaimed portraits found following the Lebanese civil war, the one to the right is an interpretation of DIOMIRA a city of memory described by Italo Calvino in his book “Invisible Cities”. Through these expeditions, a novel understanding of: cities, their elements, spirit, tangibles, and intangibles was built.

PROJECT DETAILS Two Different Individual Academic Project carried at the Lebanese American University Duration: September 2018 to May 2019 Role: Fully Inclusive Instructor: Professor Silia Abou Arbid These projects were exhibited at three different exhibition The National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB) exhibition The National Association of Schools of Art and Design exhibition The End of Term: One-Day Student Show

36

73

TO MANY MORE...

38

93