Dylan Treleven - Architecture Portfolio

DYLAN TRELEVEN

MIDDLE GROUNDS

Medium Density CLT Housing Prototype

Austin, TX

Partner: Kendall Fleisher

Instructor: Martin Haettasch

Fall 2022

Middle Grounds offers a prototype semi-modular attached housing model that bridges the current gap in the city of Austin, Texas between low-density detached single-family homes and highdensity 5-over-1 apartments or high-rise condominium blocks.

It offers many of the comforts of the traditional suburban house such as individual yards and patios, windows on all sides, and optimized visual and acoustic privacy, with elements of more communal urban living such as shared greenspaces, decks, and playgrounds, a gym, bicycle storage, and close access to public transportation and other public amenities. The complex is intended to function as a co-op with commercial spaces along the southern and eastern edges of the site owned in common and leased to offset residents’ expenses.

The site is approached as a left-over fragmentary object, carved by the infrastructure that facilitated its

industrial past. Middle Grounds intends to reincorporate the site into its surrounding fabric by way of a density gradient between the larger housing blocks and commercial buildings to the north and west, and the granular, dispersed massing of the small residential buildings to the south and east.

The formal strategy for the units utilizes the frontal orientation of a townhouse typology, but shifted and articulated to hinge around social and structural cores that feature the kitchen (the modern hearth) at the center.

Slippery configurations of these semi-modular 2-, 3-, and 4-bedroom units allow for a flexible system in which the social landscape is generated at various interconnected scales using the same easily reproducible components. A range of densities and distributions between individual and communal spaces allows these unit arrangements to create a mesh of mutual dependencies across the site.

SANTA ROSA

SANTA ROSA

OLIVE GROVE

Olive Oil Tasting Room & Community Center

Fiesole, Italy

Partner: Marcos Crane

Instructor: Smilja Milovanovic-Bertram

Spring 2022

Across Tuscany, the hillsides have traditionally been transformed through the sculptural practice of creating stone terraces that allow for the planting of olive groves and vineyards. The earth, trees, and vines here have been cultivated for generations in a symbiotic relationship wherein human needs and natural rhythms have sustained one another through the centuries.The program and site both call for a respect for these traditional agricultural methods, forms, and products, a delicate balance is necessitated between a timid adherence to vernacular morphology, a shallow visual appropriation of related signifiers, or an overzealous dominance of the site by a contemporary “Architectural” monument.

The programmatic needs of an organic olive oil tasting and promotional center with event space, greenhouse, kitchens, and support facilities are organized as a series of pavilions amidst the olive trees on this reclaimed municipal property in the town of Fiesole. A network of paths connects the road at the upper end of the property with its nearby urban fabric to the road at the lower end of the property with a more rural character. Visitors are guided through the site in a narrative sequence of views, each partially obscured by the olive trees, allowing only intriguiging glimpses of the next.

While paths traversing the site might be places of individual discovery or contemplation, the points at which shelter rises above the earth are fundamentally social ones, suggesting the ancient cooking fire and the shared meal. Such moments for gathering evoke a continuity and timelessness drawn from the nearby Etruscan and Roman ruins as well as the cultural centrality of Italian food and drink evident in the phrase “a tavola non s’invecchia” (at the table, one does not age).

The placement of buildings aims to reinforce pre-existing conditions wherein clearings in the trees and old terrace walls already suggest outdoor “rooms,” while establishing a dynamic interplay with between these and the new ones indoors. Ultimately, thin steel framing and glass curtain wall elements were set atop local sandstone to ground the project in tradition while creating flexible spaces that honor present desires and anticipate future needs. Such organizational and material choices seek to distinguish our intervention here as a vibrant contemporary nexus of local cultural activity that celebrates and promotes the commitment to timehonored organic practices in caring for the olive trees and maintaining the important role of olive oil within the culture of Fiesole.

HVERFJALL LIGHT

Volcanic Crater Hiking Trail Lookout

Hverfjall, Iceland

Instructor: Elizabeth Danze

Fall 2021

Hverfjall Crater

View Point Site

Lake Mývatn

Dimmuborgir Lava Field

Over the past decade or so, Iceland has become a popular destination for those wishing to experience its ‘mystical’ and ‘other-worldly’ landscapes. Fueled by cheap trans-Atlantic air fares and a weakened currency in the wake of the late-aughts financial crisis, the desire to experience the island’s remote hinterlands, has— perhaps ironically—been cultivated and realized through hyper-globalized networks of transportation, finance, and technology. Thus, a hiker’s visit to the crest of the Hverfjall volcanic crater to take in the panoramic views and engage in serene communion with nature, becomes possible only by way of interconnected “light” modern technologies such as commercial air travel, global positioning systems, and high-performance outdoor attire. Such a visit is further shaped by the expectations created by social media’s extreme emphasis on twodimensional visual space, with only certain views implicitly deemed valuable enough for its consumption.

Consequently, Hverfjall Light seeks to enhance the visitor’s experience of the crater, not merely by appealing to our visual culture, but by emphasizing a fuller sensory experience of wind, sound, and the passage of time at this unique location, in addition to that of the “light,” in regard both to material weight and to solar phenomena. The work does so by utilizing the same language of technology that abets the global traveler, not cynically, but in recognition that it might provide genuine means to facilitate visitors while preserving what lures them to this landscape. Constructing a look-out point at a popular tourist destination, if at all successful, is bound to encourage greater traffic to the area. Hverfjall Light therefore anticipates an increased human presence in this delicate ecosystem by treading as lightly as possible upon it, and by emphasizing a material vocabulary that encourages visitors to follow a similarly respectful approach.

The shelter is oriented roughly 10 degrees east of north, facing across the center of the crater from its location on the south rim. This angle aligns its long axis with sunrise on the summer solstice, in keeping with the Viking longhouses that are the forebears of traditional Icelandic turf houses. While these early Nordic structures

were likely built so for spiritual and agricultural reasons, Hverfjall Light’s solar orientation nods to the secular religion of scientific naturalism and to summer as the height of tourist season; visitor presence being its own raison d’être. Its gabled roof invokes a near-universal signifier of shelter, as well as a sensible design for the region’s weather, while its proportions again point to the Icelandic vernacular dwelling.

The exterior platforms and benches provide a simple resting place with a slightly elevated vantage over the path to the south and the curving trails to the east and west. The interior floor and its rows of seating are angled as if in a theater toward the fully glazed north wall. This arrangement frames a view of the center of the crater, arguably the locus of visitor attention, and acknowledges our complicity in constructing the ‘spectacle’ of nature. We revere its power and marvel at our own relative insignificance, and yet paradoxically attempt to exert our own will upon it by drawing boundaries and adjudicating which parts ought or ought not to be ‘preserved’ or ‘protected.’

Beyond this tension however, the enclosed interior, while only nominally insulated and without electric service, nevertheless shelters visitors from the bite of the crater’s winds and their constant, dull roar. In stark contrast to the sonic properties of the open exterior landscape, the smooth panels that give presence to the structure’s physical form also create an acoustically reverberant space within. Not unlike a museum, this chamber brings a heightened awareness to one’s own physical presence, the weight of a footfall or pattern of breath, in an atmosphere of aesthetic contemplation.

Further, Hverfjall Light’s walls, ceiling, and floor— composed of translucent micro-cell polycarbonate panels—reward the visitor’s presence at different times of day or season by registering the shifting character of daylight atop the crater. Whether the oranges and pinks of sunrise and sunset, the grays and pale blues of an overcast afternoon, or the greens and purples of the Aurora Borealis, these panels act simultaneously as a diffuser and a screen to amplify the colors of the sky.

and engage in serene communion with nature, becomes possible only by way of interconnected “light” modern technologies such as commercial air travel, global positioning systems, and highperformance outdoor attire. Such a visit is further shaped by the expectations created by social media’s extreme emphasis on two-dimensional visual space, with only certain views implicitly deemed valuable enough for its consumption.

landscape. Constructing a look-out point at a popular tourist destination, if at all successful, is bound to encourage greater traffic to the area. Hverfjall Light therefore anticipates an increased human presence in this delicate ecosystem by treading as lightly as possible upon the land, and by emphasizing a material vocabulary that encourages visitors to follow a similarly respectful approach.

The shelter is oriented roughly 10 degrees east of north, facing across the center of the crater from its location on the south rim. This angle aligns its long axis with sunrise on the summer solstice, in keeping with the Viking longhouses that are the forebears of traditional Icelandic turf houses. While these early Nordic structures were likely built so for spiritual and agricultural reasons, Hverfjall Light’s solar orientation nods to the secular religion of scientific naturalism and to summer as the height of tourist season; visitor presence being its own raison d’être. Its gabled roof invokes a near-universal signifier

exert our own will upon it by drawing boundaries and adjudicating which parts ought or ought not to be ‘preserved’ or ‘protected.’

Beyond this tension however, the enclosed interior, while only nominally insulated and without electric service, nevertheless shelters visitors from the bite of the crater’s winds and their constant, dull roar. In stark contrast to the sonic properties of the open exterior landscape, the smooth panels that give presence to the structure’s physical form also create an acoustically reverberant space within. Not unlike a museum, this chamber brings

GROWING A HOUSE (BY ADDITION)

Greenhouse & Gym for a Secluded Postmodern Retreat Copake, NY

Original House Designer: Schwartz/Silver Architects

Instructor: Michael Benedikt

Spring 2021

Growing a House (by Addition) proposes a design for an addition to the “Lazarus House,” designed by Schwartz/Silver Architects, and built in 1992 near the town of Copake, NY.

With its bold emphasis on form and exterior dematerialization, this country getaway for a theatrical older couple and their three creative adult sons appears as a hierarchical cluster of masses (described as a “hen with chicks”) set on a large, sparse lot in a striking rural landscape. The program for the additions specified an indoor gym of roughly 300 sq ft, a deck of similar area with hot tub, and a greenhouse of roughly 200 sq ft.

The internal geometry of the rooms in plan, derived from golden and root-2 rectangles, along with the angles at which they intersect the original topographical grading lines were utilized to place and orient the additions in keeping with the original guiding principles of the house.

As the upper guest entrance was left undeveloped in the original design, this area was refined. The topographical lines around that portion of the house were also extruded to create terraces and an entrance patio for a new formal entry set between the greenhouse and gym.

Greenhouse

Landscape Terraces

GARDEN PRIMARY

Outdoor Focused K-4 Community School

Austin, TX

Instructor: Elizabeth Danze

Fall 2021

This K-4 community primary school is designed for roughly 160 students and 25 staff with two home classrooms for each grade. Based on the Reggio Emiliainspired understanding of the child as a researcher and the Montessori-inspired belief that the outdoor environment is a natural extension of the classroom, Lake Austin Garden Primary seeks to encourage and cultivate the child’s inherent inclination toward exploration and learning through play.

The basic classroom unit, each with its own private back garden, is meant to function much as an individual family home within the larger community of the school. Each back garden is designed as an extension of the indoor “homeroom” learning space, as a meeting place for group work, and as an opportunity for biological and ecological study. Specialty classrooms, common spaces, the gym, and the library all offer variously greater degrees of communal space to allow the child a full range of environments for activities from personal projects through large group exercises.

The connection between indoors and out, enhanced by a building massing and glazing design that utilizes solar orientation for daylighting and passive environmental control, along with organic finishes and textures and open-air circulation throughout the campus, is intended to immerse the child in a dynamic learning environment grounded in the natural world. Outside of typical recess and after-school activities, students are invited to enjoy working outside on the lawns, benches, picnic tables, and reading nooks in addition to taking in fresh air on nature walks around the campus.

Garden beds and planter boxes allow students to grow flowers, fruits, vegetables and herbs from seed which are then harvested and used for community meals and projects. The gardens also serve as a learning environment for soil testing, composting, crop rotation, and plant fertility. The heritage trees and wooded areas provide a resource for further scientific study and as inspiration for writing, music and visual art exercises.

Section A

Section B

Standard Classroom

Circulation

Major Trees: Live Oak

Science/Art & Admin

Building Unit Typology

Typical Structural Unit Gymnasium & Library

Geometry

Major Trees: Pecan

LIVE / WORK / DESIGN / BUILD

Historic Duplex Renovation

Tacoma, WA

Design & Construction: Dylan Treleven Studio, LLC

Photos: Mitch Olsen

Completed: 2018

When I first toured this house, the property was in extremely rough shape. It had endured decades of hard use as a college rental duplex and tea parlor followed by an aborted remodel and ten years of vacancy.

Built in 1900 in a folksy lateVictorian vernacular style, the house had originally contained some lovely details, but much of its character had been stripped away by the previous owner, who had sold almost all of the original doors and windows and taken most of the walls back to the studs.

The quality of the construction was evident however in the stability of the original balloonframed Douglas fir framing members, full 1” thick cedar v-groove siding, and remarkably sound post and pier foundation which had been shored up with a concrete block perimeter in the 1980’s. A dormer, ridge beam, and supplemental framing had been added for a planned remodel in 2008, just as the housing market crashed. The house had been left unfinished since.

In order to make the most of the site’s location on a bustling street with mixed-use zoning, I was able to modify the existing duplex format for

an open-plan commercial unit in the front portion of the ground floor and a residential unit encompassing the rear portion of the ground floor and entire second floor.

The owners planned to use the commercial unit as a home office and art studio, but we retained a kitchenette and full bathroom there in case of the need for guest accommodations. For the residential unit, I reconfigured the layout of the upper level for two bedrooms and utilized the newer dormer area for a master bathroom and den.

A little archeology work between the walls turned up missing examples of the original doors and millwork. Consequently, I was able to set about sourcing matching doors and hardware from nearby architectural salvage yards to restore as many historical details as resources would allow.

With a tight budget, I worked hands-on in every phase of this project including architectural and interior design, project management, material sourcing, interior and exterior framing and finish carpentry, and door, window, flooring, stair system, and cabinetry modification and installation.

Derelict north facade (top), sourcing old doors (bottom)

Proposed north facade re-design sketch (above)

This small project entailed the design and construction of a 64 sq ft garden shed and chicken coop with an additional 64 sq ft covered patio to match the decorative archiectural details of the folk Victorian house featured above.

Doors, windows, and hardware were sourced from salvage yards while siding, casing and lumber were leftovers from other projects. Besides the design, I also executed the framing and finish carpentry myself and procured all of the re-purposed materials.

FIELD BAR & BOTTLE SHOP

Cocktail Bar & Wine Shop Build-Out

Tacoma, WA

Design & Construction: Dylan Treleven Studio, LLC

Photos: Trista Peck

Completed: 2020

When Seattle service industry veteran and natural wine enthusiast Brian Hibbard first visited Tacoma, WA, he fell in love with the city’s unassuming charm. With Seattle’s inflated prices and hip restaurants reaching the saturation point, Hibbard realized that Tacoma could be the perfect place to realize his dream of opening an unpretentious wine and cocktail bar.

He planned to serve downto-earth food and drinks with a price point and atmosphere that welcomed a diverse clientelle. Hibbard and I had met briefly a

couple of years ago at the wedding of some mutual friends. So when he moved to Tacoma and signed a lease on a dusty former barbershop in a 1930’s storefront, he called me up to see if I could help turn it into a restaurant.

I managed the project for Hibbard, designed and fabricated the bar and storage shelving, and executed the finish carpentry needed to bring his vision to life. He and I worked closely to strip the space back to its bare essentials and build out the front and back of house facilities he would need to run his business.

We finished just in time for the opening Hibbard had planned in early Spring of 2020. Needless to say, the global pandemic put a serious damper on his plans. He rolled with the punches however, and managed to open as a retail wine shop just as restaurants were shutting down across the state.

In late 2021 however, Hibbard was finally able to shift his wine retail business to a primarily online sales model and opened to rave reviews as the full service restaurant and cocktail bar he originally envisioned.

Proposed bar design sketch (above), Hibbard outside of the front entrance (opposite top)

SHIPSHAPE

Beach House Remodel

Maury Island, WA

Design: Tim Pfeiffer / Hoedemaker Pfeiffer

Carpentry: Dylan Treleven Studio, LLC

Featured In: Sunset Magazine, Remodelista, Dexigner, Floornature, Beach Cottage Chronicles

Photos: Thomas J. Story

Completed: 2017

The objective for this project was converting a rundown 1920’s fisherman’s cottage into a contemporary vacation home while retaining vestiges of the site’s rich history.

The building had originally been two separate bunk houses that were tied together in the 1960’s. The final design thus worked to incorporate elegantly rustic elements that would span the decades and draw further nautical inspiration from an 1890’s fishing net shed still standing on the adjacent lot.

A garage with storage loft and carport were added for functionality. New decking, walking paths and gardens were also introduced to soften the landscape and further tie the home back into its site.

I contributed interior and exterior carpentry, installing siding, paneling, doors, windows, casing, flooring and decking as well as framing and finish work on the new garage.

DYLAN TRELEVEN AIAS, WELL AP

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Architectural Intern

May 2022 – August 2022

Clayton Korte Austin, TX

Provided digital and analog design, drafting, and modeling work for hospitality, office, and single-family projects in all phases. Took digital scans and field measurements to create as-built drawings and 3D model for adaptive reuse restaurant project. Conducted zoning and historical landmark research for developer feasibility studies.

Architectural Intern

May 2021 – August 2021

STG Design Austin, TX

Served as a fully integrated team member on feasibility studies, schematic design, and design development for high-rise and master planning projects with multifamily, office, and mixed-use programs. Contributed conceptual hand drawings and digital design work for presentation graphics, renderings, and fly-through videos. Helped redesign the firm’s detail library, and organized and archived final drawing sets for completed works.

Owner, Project Manager

Dylan Treleven Studio, LLC

August 2016 – August 2020

Tacoma, WA

Worked as a licensed general contractor that successfully managed subcontractors, clients, and budgets for projects each worth up to $2 million. Provided custom interior fabrication, fine woodworking, interior design, and organizational services for residential and light commercial jobs in the Puget Sound region of Washington State. Focused on detailed renovation and restoration of distinctive historic homes, but also engaged in custom new home construction, contemporary remodeling, and retail and restaurant build-outs.

Carpenter

Enabler, LLC

March 2015 – December 2015

Austin, TX

Developed refined finish carpentry skills for a high-end Texas modernist aesthetic. Carpentry team member on new construction and renovation projects, including works by Max Levy and Mell Lawrence. Also completed small, intricate finish work for longtime clients.

Carpenter, Art Fabricator

Wolfgang & Hite

November 2014 – March 2015

New York, NY

Worked with a team of fellow carpenters, fabricators, and art-handlers to construct and dismantle large-scale art installations and shows at Red Bull Arts NYC. Built furniture, walls and other environmental features in lumber, drywall, acrylic, steel, and plywood. Hung and installed art in diverse media made of traditional and experimental materials.

dylantreleven@utexas.edu

253.222.2872

EDUCATION

Master of Architecture I 2023 (anticipated) University of Texas at Austin Austin, TX

BA – Modern Culture & Media 2012

Brown University Providence, RI

TRADE:

Single-family construction sequencing and project management, finish carpentry, framing carpentry

ARCHITECTURAL:

Rhino, Revit, AutoCAD, Lumion, Enscape, Revu

GRAPHIC:

Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign

AUDIO / VISUAL:

35mm, Final Cut, Premier, After Effects, Logic, Pro Tools

OFFICE:

Word, Excel, PowerPoint

SKILLS & SOFTWARE RECOGNITION

4.0 Graduate GPA, 2020 - present

UTSOA Graduate Continuing Fellowship, 2022-2023

TAF AIA Austin Chapter Scholarship, 2022-2023

Design Excellence Nomination, Integrative Studio, Fall 2022

Tau Sigma Delta Membership, Spring 2022

Design Excellence Nomination, Advanced Studio, Spring 2022

WELL Accredited Professional Credential, 2021

Design Excellence Nomination, Vertical Studio, Fall 2021

Design Excellence Nomination, Vertical Studio, Spring 2021

UTSOA Drawing Show Prize, Vertical Studio, Spring 2021

Phi Kappa Phi Membership, 2021

AIAS Membership, 2021 - present

UTSOA Graduate Recruitment Fellowship, 2020