Conrad Lau's Architecture Portfolio (09/18/2024)

A Story: Academic Portfolio of Conrad Lau

of Bespoke Spaces

(E) Co-Living

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(B3) Biomimetic Building Block

Mass Timber High-ri

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A Co-Living housing development centered around a shared passion and interest of nature.

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Sea sponges are used as inspiration to create a building block facade that mimics squirrel dreys for urban rewilding.

Located in Chinatown, LA high-rise creates a social s tectonics and practicality.

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Table of Contents

Minimal Dwelling

Ecological Resurgence

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A, this mass-timber space while focusing on

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Maximizing minimal space, this dynamic room can rapidly adapt itself into various spaces. Sleep, Work, Relax? It has all of them.

An observation tower isn’t a monument, but rather a compliment to the nature around it.

Residential

(E)Co-Living

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Fall ‘22

Info

The Narrative

University of Southern California School

The project takes a typical LA street and transforms it into a community of interconnected living pods, densifying the block while maintaining a sense of neighborhood. Six unique pod forms are created through merging and stretching of building blocks, each catering to the program needs of a co-living project.

Minimal dwelling units offer residents freedom for customization and direct interaction with nature through window planters. Each pod accommodates 8 to 9 residents, fostering a familial atmosphere with symbiotic programmatic spaces encouraging interaction. Exterior spaces include individual backyards for crop cultivation and community gardens addressing ecological concerns like the decline of monarch butterflies. The street serves as a circulation point and informal market, facilitating interaction between residents and neighboring projects.

Throughout the site (Hillcrest Golf Course), outposts maintained by residents offer opportunities for sustainable food production and community engagement.

Dedicated spaces for endangered species and ecological features contribute to a visually appealing and educational environment, fostering connections among residents and raising awareness of local ecological issues.

Housing Studio Course Hadrian Predock Instructor

Individual To keep a feeling of individualism within a co-living environment, each room offers a blank space for residents to display their personality. This is further emphasized formally with gabled roofs on the exterior highlighting each room.

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Interaction Interaction between residents is still encouraged through the distribution of bedrooms and programmed spaces.

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Pod to Pod Interaction between pods is also considered, with dedicated spaces for intermingled program, such as a monarch butterfly garden distributed between two pods.

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Facade

(B3) Biomimetic Building Block

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Fall ‘23

Info

The Narrative

University of Southern California School

The Biomimetic Building Block is a response to rewilding in urban areas through architecture and biomimicry. The intention was to have us think abstractly, influencing our ability to pull inspiration from diverse areas to create a facade for urban rewilding. The project started with thorough research into sea sponges, examining their physical features, requirements for life, cellular structure, and general habitat. This project is centered around the Orange Puff Ball Sponge (Tethya aurantium) for its flagellum that influences current, tiny pores called ostia that absorb nutrients, its complex interior of channels that flow water throughout, and its spicules that resemble the cylindrical shape of toothpicks.

Topic Studio Course Eveyln Tickle Instructor

Next, a species local to NYC was chosen as a stakeholder to occupy the block. Like the preface with the sponge, intense research was conducted into the requirements for habitat, diet, hibernation cycles, reproduction and mating, and influence of humans. The animal chosen for this was an eastern gray squirrel.

When it came to designing the block, the physical features of the sponge and the conditions required of the species drove the design. This step was both iterative and nonlinear, exploring a wide variety of options and physical features govern from the sponge.

Ultimately, the spicule shape drove the design, as the combination of these elements allowed fluidity in the shape of the block, allowing it to better mimic the qualities of the sponge, and artificially resemble the needs of the species.

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(Orange Puffball Sponge)

West Coast of North America 0-1460ft Where (Macro)

Leuconoid Type

The surface consists of Ostia Surface Features (Micro)

7. Tethya aurantium

Research The process started with intensive research into sea sponges. Observing and analyzing their physical traits at both macro and micro levels.

Up to 8in in diameter Size Lives in Kelp Forests Where (Micro)

Flageullm creates a current around the sponge to keep water moving Surface Features (Macro)

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Flagellum The orange puffball gets its name from its exterior surface. Apart from visuals, the flagellum’s purpose is to allow for current flow around the sponge.

Leuconoid The interior of an orange puffball consists of a series of channels and chambers that circulate water and absorb nutrients. This is known as a leuconoid sponge.

Spicules

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The structural element of this specific sponge is made up of toothpick-shaped spicules. Millions of these bind together to create a whole.

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Mold & Cast A mold was created to produce the individual “bricks” that make up the block. The four channels have various depths for different-sized “bricks.”

Materials Local natural materials can be embedded into the blocks for added texture and to provide resources for animals to create nests.

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Use & Application The parametric nature of these blocks allows them to create dynamic shapes that can address environmental concerns and unique spaces/lighting within buildings.

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Office / High-rise

Mass Timber High-rise

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Spring ‘23

Info

The Narrative

University of Southern California School

Located in Chinatown, Los Angeles, this high-rise utilizes the rapidly growing use of mass timber to create a USC Social Justice Center. Offering office space for research, justice, meeting rooms, therapy rooms, and an event hall, this building creates a safe environment for residents of Chinatown and students of USC. Other than the foundation, core, and secondary facade, the entire building utilizes a combination of CLT and GLT panels and columns, embracing the use of wood throughout the structure. The program is also considered within the structure. There are 3 cutaways in the building that create outdoor spaces, physically aligned with historic events from Chinatown’s history, further emphasized by paths on the ground level. Rather than condense the staircases into the core, they’re moved to the outside as a sign of openness and to reduce core space. The facade features lightweight ETFE panels that show a soft appearance, and emphasize the 3 outdoor spaces throughout the building.

Comprehensive Studio Course M. Alejandra Lillo Instructor

This project was further used in a Professional Practice class centered around Revit. Using the base of this project as a foundation to learn the program, a set of documents was created to simulate a plan check with a city.

Sheets from that class are featured throughout this project spread.

Hako Tsugi Wood Joint

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The studio started with the reconstruction of traditional Japanese wood joinery. Concepts were derived from the wood joints to inform the massing of the high rise. In this case, the connection piece used in the Hako Tsugi wood joint influenced the structure and program.

1. Joint Connection Piece

2. Carve Massing

3. Distribute for Program

4. Add Egress

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Residential

Minimal Dwelling

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Fall ‘22

Info

The Narrative

University of Southern California School

The minimal dwelling project was an investigation into maximizing minimal space. The prompt introduced a 10’ x 10’ x 10’ room that would serve as an individual dwelling within a co-living environment. You can assume that kitchens, bathrooms, and other necessary spaces would be provided for the collective.

Housing Studio Course Hadrian Predock Instructor

An important consideration when approaching this problem is that humans are naturally social creatures, yet still value privacy and space to accommodate that. While living, working, and relaxation spaces can and often do have social programs, they can also be highly sought as private spaces. To achieve this within such a small area, it needed to be adaptable to conform to a variety of programs without requiring the mass reorganization of furniture and physical effort. While a possible solution to this is to simply add a desk, bed, and small chair or sofa, its also important to consider the mental attitude a single space can develop.

The solution to this was a dynamic space that can rapidly be transformed into 4 different programs: Sleeping, Working, Relaxing, and Blank. The different programs are achieved by thickening the floor plane with embedded collapsable furniture that could be lifted or concealed to easily transform the space. The result is various types of programs that can be achieved within a small context without mass effort involved, maximizing a minimal dwelling.

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1. Start

2. Floor

A blank 10’ x 10’ x 10’ room.

The floor is thickened by 6” to fit the furniture that folds out of it.

3. Wall

4. Function

The wall is thickened by 2’ to include function and storage.

A desk, folding chair, and table is added to the floor. The wall gets transformed into cabinets, drawers, and a murphy bed.

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Work / Study

Living

A table / desk that unfolds from the floor combined with a folding chair converts the space into a office.

A section under the Murphy a couch while a coffee table floor.

Blank bed unfolds to reval unfolds from the

Blank is an empty canvas. It can serve as a mere transition or as a yoga studio, meditation space, or a swing that drops from the ceiling.

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Public Space

Ecological Resurgence

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Spring ‘21

Info

The Narrative

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee School

As you turn the corner of the dirt path worn through the forest, the tower noted on the plaque at the beginning of the hike emerges. The sounds of birds chirping, a stream flowing, and the faint voices of people become more apparent the closer you get. As you walk under the pavilion, shadows are cast and sun rays shine through the aluminum canopy above, creating a dynamic contrast that changes the longer you stay. The ambiguous path invites you to choose your adventure, feeling the sun’s warmth with one step and the cool wind under the shade with the next, the gravel path crunching below you remaining the only constant. Upon finding the entrance you see a spiral stair with no apparent end, enticing you to look up to the top of the tower, reminding you of the commitment you chose when beginning the hike, a path whose end is known but whose journey is full of surprise.

Walking up the spiral stairs, holes within the structure cast circular light you alter as you peer out, feeling the wind on your face, getting a glimpse of what’s to come.

Near the top, you begin to hear faint voices and see a large glow of light getting brighter with each step. Finally, you reach the top and are presented with the beauty of the landscape. The philosophy of an observation tower should not be to create a monument within a natural context, but rather an area that compliments the beauty of its surroundings.

Parametric Studio Course Kyle Tablott Instructor

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Thank you. fin.

Contact

Conrad Lau 630.725.8611 conraddlau@gmail.com Linkedin.com/in/conraddlau