Jose Cruz | Selected Works

JOSE LUÍS GABRIEL CRUZ M.Arch CANDIDATE

Selected Architecture and Related Projects 1

2 DEFINING AND FOLDING FIELDS

24 DIVERGENT PATHS IN CHARLESTON

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MODULAR CONFIGUR ATIONS

17 CONTEXTUAL TEXTURES

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12 INTER PRETING ITINERARY

26 PLACE MAKING IN THE DESERT

LIGHT CONFIGUR ATIONS

18 CINEMATIC URBANITY

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14 CONSTRUCTED VERNACULAR

30 LOFT INSTALLATION

RHYTHMIC TECTONICS IN SPACE

22 URBAN ADVANCEMENT

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16 THE MAPPING OF FACES

40 AN ARCHIT ECTURE OF DEPENDENCE

“...I have a hard time explaining what I do for a living. I sometimes wish I played the role of inventor: purposefully creative, a wizard with notes and words. But in fact my occupation is much more like an archeologist. Always digging. Always sorting. And occasionally I feel that I stumble across something truly remarkable. Like a hidden city buried in the ground, the notes and words seem to have been there long before me- as though the song would exist without my involvement. Or maybe it’s more like farming. Preparing the soil, planting, watering, pruning and caring for these ideas hoping to see a bumper crop yet knowing that the outcome is almost entirely out of my hands.”

Jon Foreman, Musician

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CRITIC: ALFONSO PEREZ / PARTNER: TIM BEECKEN / YEAR FOUR

MODULAR CONFIGURATIONS RETHINKING THE MANHATTAN HOUSING TOWER

This project addresses the issues of vertical housing within Manhattan by using the housing unit as a generator to rethink the traditional tower typology, that is, “the pancaked section tower.”

So, rather than defaulting to what is known, the project questions what it means to live within a housing tower at several scales: the house unit, amongst neighbors, within a community, and finally within an urban context.

We identified breathability as a missing yet much needed concept within urban housing that is not possible through the stacking of floors. We also identified “density” as an indispensable quality that makes up the urban fabric.

So, in essence, we worked towards a “breathable density,” one that would allow each unit to receive the basic necessities of a comfortable urban home.

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IRREGULAR SYSTEM OF INHABITABLE MODULES DISPERSED TO ENABLE INTERACTION BETWEEN INHABITANTS

VARIETY IN CONFIGURATIONS

INITIAL PLAY OF MODULES EXPLORING SPATIAL FORMATIONS

The concept of the Module as a generator spawned from the study of Le Corbusier’s Unité d’Habitation in which he utilized the L-shaped unit as a strategy to maximize dwelling space. The study of the module, together with the given site, Manhattan, led to exploration of new formless typologies which would seek a new mode of living. That is, incorporating the density of the city together with the breathability of an open home. So, by manipulating the unit within an irregular system of organization, the tower is able to provide a unique living experience for each inhabitant while simultaneously maintaining a sense of neighborhood and community.

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HOUSING TYPOLOGIES: SKY COMMUNITY

HOUSE A Single unit with interlocking capabilities

NEIGHBORS Units come together to form a unified occupiable surface

COMMUNITY Variety in organization optimize possibilities of exchange amongst inhabitants

SKY COMMUNITIES Sections of Communities unite to form an interlocking matrix of private and public spaces throughout the structure.

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CONCEPTUAL MODEL + SECTION DISPLAYS MODULAR UNITS STACKED IN AN ASSORTED SYSTEM TO CREATE ELEVATED CLUSTERS OF UNITS.

URBAN CONTEXT Manhattan, New York

PROGRAM ANALYSIS Retail + Residential

CIRCULATION ARTERIES Park Ave & 58th St

DENSITY FACTOR High-rise zone 7

TOWER OPERATIONS

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MERGE OF PROGRAMMATIC GENERATORS

STRUCTURAL + CIRCULATORY CORE

SEVER TO SITUATE WITHIN URBAN EDGE

ELEVATE UNITS / CLUSTERS OF NEIGHBORHOODS

PULL UNITS OUT / CREATE BREATHABILITY

TYPICAL TOWER ORGANIZATION

HOUSING DISTRIBUTION MATRIX

Prototype A

1600 ft 2

Prototype B

1200 ft 2

Prototype C

2400 ft 2

Prototype D

2000 ft2

PROGRAMMATIC DISTRIBUTION dwelling

retail

recreation

80%

15%

5%

256,512 sq.ft.

48,096 sq.ft.

16,032 sq. ft.

total construction: 320,640 sq. ft.

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CORE An orthogonal grid juxtaposed with an elegant central core form the underlining strength and circulation.

SHELL Overlapping planes unite to form an enclosure protecting occupants and reinforcing the structure.

HOUSING MATRIX A 20’ x 20’ L-module is used to organize and densify the residential units of the building.

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SECTIONAL LIVING The different floors are arranged, not through a repetition of floor plates, but rather through a massing of units, thus giving each floor a unique plan and sectional experience.

URBAN DIALOGUE To enhance the sense of lightness amidst the massing of spaces, the lobby is lifted from the ground plane on slender columns revealing a lobby that welcomes that pedestrian from the street.

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HOUSING IN THE SKY The playful manipulation of units within an irregular system of organization creates tertiary recreational spaces that enable the inhabitant to freely explore within their own community.

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w CRITIC: THOMAS SMITH / YEAR FOUR

LIGHT CONFIGURATIONS

Light Configurations explores the possibilities of configurations within a standard module that results in a flexible and efficient light fixture. In search of this, the center module serves as a housing vessel for the electrical wiring stemming from the secondary, light fixtures. Essentially, the whole fixture becomes a playful exploration of lighting conditions that can be modified for specific lighting needs.

THE FIXTURE IS CONSTRUCTED THROUGH A CAREFUL LAYERING OF TRANSLUSCENT ACETATE AND PLEXIGLASS ALLOWING DIFFUSED LIGHT AND DIRECT LIGHT TO DISPERSE IN VARIOUS DIRECTIONS. 14

THE CORE FIXTURE, HOUSING THE ELECTRICAL WIRING, SERVES AS AN ARMATURE ENABLING THE CUSTOMIZATION OF LIGHTING PREFERANCES

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CRITIC: TONY WHITE / YEAR TWO

RHYTHMIC TECTONICS IN SPACE Inspired by rhythmic visualization diagrams of the perfomances of Johann Sebastian Bach, this project studies architectural elements by understanding them musically.

Order, balance, and a logic of rhythym emerged initially through the translation of these diagrams into architectural drawing seeking to capture spaces within previously defined fields. Further, these drawings spawned the construction of a model which futher questioned how the musicality of points and lines translate into built form. That is, contrasting forms with forms, spaces with spaces, and sequences with other sequences.

RHYTHMIC VISUALIZATION OF BACH PIECES

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CRITIC: BRADLEY WALTERS / YEAR ONE

DEFINING AND FOLDING FIELDS

FIELDS DRAWN AND EXCAVATED BY THE LINES THAT REVEAL THEM

FOLDING THE FIELD IN A MORPHOGENETIC PROCESS TO GENERATE SEQUENTIAL TRANSFORMATIONS 18

CRITIC: ROCKE HILL / YEAR TWO

INTERPRETING ITINERARY

CONSTRUCT EXPLORING THE EDGES, THRESHOLDS, SEQUENCES, AND SPATIAL QUALITIES THAT FORM AN ITINERARY THROUGH THE CITY OF ST. AUGUSTINE 19

CRITIC: MARTHA KOHEN / YEAR THREE

CONSTRUCTED VERNACULAR

27’ ABOVE WATERBED 20’ ABOVE WATERBED

TIDAL ACTIVITY AS GENERATOR Existing tidal patterns generate relation between tectonic boundaries and surrounding natural environment FIVE YEAR TIDAL RANGE

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FIFTY YEAR TIDAL RANGE

15’ ABOVE WATERBED

ONE HUNDRED YEAR TIDAL RANGE

CONTEXTUAL ELEMENTS DEFINING OF TERRITORY

SEQUENTIAL STRATIFICATION

ESTABLISHING MOMENT

CONTORTING LINES AND SPACE

DEFINING TECTONIC EDGES

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MOMENTS IN PATH The pavilion serves as a destination point for visitors traveling along a long continuous walking path. It actively intervenes within the site enabling them to engage in the site’s material and contextual richness by detouring paths into moments of reflection.

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CONTEXTUAL [A]TECTONICS

CONNECTIONS The intervention laces the woodlands and river together by crossing juxtaposing paths creating interlocking itineraries.

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CRITIC: MARTIN GUNDERSEN / YEAR FOUR

THE MAPPING OF FACES

DIGITAL CONSTRUCT ON WATERCOLOR PAPER, 9” X 36”

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“Our walls cannot speak, but their muteness bears witness to what we need to know: how we came to be and where we are now.�

- Architecture Must Burn

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CRITIC: TONY WHITE / YEAR THREE

CONTEXTUAL TEXTURES Gottfried Semper, the late 19th century German art historian, once compared architecture to weaving saying that it spins available material into temporary shelters, which coalesced into what we think of today as buildings. Thus, a building should display its fabric.

In doing so, it can dissolve into the materials from which it was created.

The aim of this study is to excavate existing textures within a site in search for a rich woven architecture that assembles itself into an overall pattern that births a rich variety of components.

DEFINITION OF VIRTUAL BOUNDARIES THROUGH THE VARYING INTENSITIES OF LIGHT

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CRITIC: MARTIN GUNDERSEN / YEAR THREE

CINEMATIC URBANITY

SERIES OF VOLUMETRIC OPERATIONS

RELOCATION OF MAIN STREET AS REQUESTED BY CITY OF GAINESVILLE

Liberating the Edge | Directly across the proposed site along 1st Avenue, both of the corners of the street are rigid, inhabited with constructed opaque walls that disable pedestrians from traversing or seeing around them. The Urban Cinema will rather echo the openness of the civic center that lies in front of it.

The idea is to lift the space, allowing the pedestrian datum that runs along the ground floor to be free from obstructions of view or path.

Exhibiting Activity | The tectonics in

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downtown that enclose most buildings are mostly opaque with only small apertures or windows hinting at inside activity.

This should not be. There is a missing link between what one experiences inside the clubs, bars, restaurants, and performance centers and what he or she sees outside. By exhibiting the activity that happens inside, the pedestrian will not only perceive a clearer understanding of what is going on in the interior, but the operation takes into account the necessity of people to be around other people.

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CINEMATIC PROGRAMMING Spaces are shifted sectionally and constructed of translucent materials to enable participants to establish visual connections with others in separate spaces. Thus, each space becomes an exhibition of activity.

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CRITIC: ALFONSO PEREZ / PARTNER: TIM BEECKEN / YEAR FOUR

URBAN ADVANCEMENT: HIGHER LEARNING + SOCIAL HOUSING CREATING PUBLIC OASIS Other than the High Line, minimal public spaces are offerred to the residents of the immediate residential areas.

SITUATING WITHIN THE MANHATTAN BLOCK The site, situated within an industrial area of Chelsea, is two blocks from the Hudson Yards and the Hudson River.

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Manhattan is a place of exchange, an exchange between commercial and residential, public and private, and varying populations within the socioeconomic strata. Further, amongst these corporal transactions, the urban fabric has become an seamless integration of programs in which one feeds of its counterpart.

In our urban proposal, we aim to merge three major programmatic elements which collaborate in attempts to integrate the influences of higher education, its ability to provide an all-around living and learning experience, with that of social housing.

These elements are: a university campus, social housing towers, and a public interstitial plaza.

MASSES ARE SEVERED TO ENHANCE VIEWS AND CIRCULATORY ROUTES 33

OPEN PARK

TYPICAL URBAN FOOTPRINT

THE SHOPPING STRIP

THE BLOCK INCORPORATES THE PREVIOUS THREE URBAN TYPOLOGIES WITHIN A HYBRID PROPOSAL

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A LOBBY/STUDENT EXHIBIT B COMMON GROUNDS C ATRIUM D CLASS ROOMS E AUDITORIUM / MIXED USED F PUBLIC LIBRARY G RETAIL / RECREATION H EDUCATIONAL SPACES I HIGHLINE MUSEUM

UNDERGROUND 36

5TH FLOOR

11TH FLOOR

MID RISE RESIDENTIAL 61,660 TOTAL FT 2 DENSITY OF 1 PERSON PER 405 FT 2

CONCEPTUAL ELEMENTS

ANCHORS

ENVELOPING SKIN PROGRAMMATIC UNITS

HIGH RISE RESIDENTIAL 114,364 TOTAL FT 2 DENSITY OF 1 PERSON PER 345 FT 2

MANIPULATED GROUND

SITE CONTEXT

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PLAZA Interstitial plaza ties the street with the academic, commercial, and residential zones

INTERIOR UNIVERSITY COURT Exterior plaza f lows inside to the university court where students are both connected to the urban street and urban campus

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VERTICAL OCCUPATION

PUBLIC FIELDS

TECTONIC ENCLOSURE

MATRIX OF PROGRAM

SITE CONDITION

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THE STREET The vessel that houses the university is constructed with layers of tectonics while simultaneously exhibiting people inside thereby activating the street edge through transparency.

WEST

EAST

NORTH

SOUTH

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CRITIC: GUY PETERSON, MARTIN GUNDERSEN / YEAR THREE

DIVERGENT PATHS IN CHARLESTON INSTITUTE OF MARITIME DESIGN

UNIQUE SPATIAL TYPOLOGY OF THE ALLEYWAY WITHIN CHARLESTON

GENERATIVE STREET DATUM HYBRID ANALYSIS SITE DIAGRAM OF STREET EDGE AND ITINERARY 42

PROGRAM Charleston’s unique urban fabric tells a story of its cultural past. Rows of houses line the streets creating a peculiar rhythm of mass to void relationships.

Both work in tandem, characterizing Charleston’s pedestrian experience, one that encourages exploration and discovery. Narrow alley-ways stem off main streets generating a sub-system of circulation paths which then lead to the discovery of other streams of circulation or hidden courtyards.

With this understood, the proposed

intervention takes into account Charleston’s social and existing urban fabric within the architecture.

The Institute of Maritime Design is a pedagogical-driven concept intended to echo the city’s founding economic strategies based on maritime trade and cultural exchange. The Institute creates a stronger, more meaningful tie between the inland and the water, as well as the people and their harbor along with its historical significance.

It compliments the Port of Charleston which is a few blocks north from the Institute as well as establishes a secondary satellite site.

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OVERHEAD PLANE

INSOLATION CONTROL SKIN

TRANSPARENT GLAZING

BRACING + SUPPORT

PLATFORM

MANIPULATED GROUND

VERTICAL CIRCULATION

REVELATION OF ITS MAKING Spaces are organized around the spectacle of the boats within transparent containers exhibiting their making. Thus, the process of making the vessel becomes as important as the finished thing itself.

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FOUNDATION

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2 3 4

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ASSEMBLY

1 9

7

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1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Entry Reception Sales Room Offices Restrooms Assembly Hall Lounge Tool Storage Exhibition Platform

Amidst its making, boats are assembled in various stages. First, the hull arrives on site. Then, the parts, pieces, and sail are added afterward.

Within this process, spatial formations and organizations have the opportunity to cater to each individual stage enhancing the making process.

Some stages may require more vertical space, others might require an abundance of natural light, and yet others may be best suited within small workshops.

5 9 5

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CRITIC: ROCKE HILL / YEAR TWO

PLACEMAKING WITHIN THE DESERT

The desert landscape offers freedom in the interpretation of contextual operations. That is, rather than generate formal concepts from existing surrounding elements, the desert frees itself from formal restraints. The intervention defines its own language amidst the barren plains by responding to phenomenological factors such as sunlight, shade, and climate.

This intervention seeks to become a place-marker, a beacon, within the vast tabula-rasa of the desert.

Tectonic and formal gestures stem out of the ground rather than simply sit on top of it to firmly anchor itself.

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CONVERGE

ANCHOR

CHANNEL

REDIRECT

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INVESTIGATION OF OVERHEADS AND SHADE

GENERATIVE SECTION

FORMAL JUXTAPOSITIONS Contrasting nodes accommodate contrasting programs. The tower stands as a beacon within the desert landscape whereas its counterpart serves as a critical point of intersection around which all interior itineraries lead to.

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CRITIC: RUTH RON / YEAR THREE

LOFT INSTALLATION

Exoskeleton The loft exposes its structural system, as an exoskelton, thereby contrasting the fluid gestures of the inhabitable resin.

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RESIN FORMATIONS MORPH CREATING A VARIETY OF INTERACTIVE SPACES

Located outside the administration offices of the School of Architecture at the University of Florida, the Loft Installation creates a semi-private space, one that allows presentations, meetings, and other small gatherings to take place within the complex of the school. The Loft is constructed through a plastic resin that shapes a dynamic yet comfortable space that participants could enjoy. The A-tectonic resin is then merged with a rhythmic structural support system that solidifies the installation thereby creating a new kind of spatial environment.

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AN ARCHITECTURE OF DEPENDENCE Architecture has never been solely about itself but rather a hybrid of accumulated knowledge from diverse fields.

The notable Roman architect and writer, Marcus Vitruvius Pollio, opined that the well-educated architect should be “skillful with the pencil, instructed in geometry, know much history, have followed the philosophers with attention, understand music, have some knowledge of medicine, know the opinions of the jurists, and be acquainted with astronomy and the theory of the heavens.”1 Architecture, then, must be sensible to the intricacies of design, which entail the cohesion of seemingly separate fields. The process of creating space is as much an anthropological analysis as it is formulaic, artistic, and political. Thus, architecture is not an autonomous discipline.

That is, it relies on the universal principles of all of these fields in order to have meaning within itself.

Meaning, within the context of the Clas54

sical era, was pursued not in the architectural elements themselves but within their relation with separate phenomena. The Greeks, for example, believed that beauty was achieved through a proportional and formulaic consideration of the Golden Ratio, a form of the 1.618 rectangle. Further, discoveries of the divine were thought to be searchable through the use of these proportions to create Order and Symmetry.2 Nonetheless, it was not the architecture itself (i.e. the columns, the ornamental carvings, the materials, the pieces) that created meaning. Meaning was always there within the mindset of the epoch.

Yet, the architecture depended on these architectural elements to relay their story, their understanding of meaning.

The Modern movement of the 20th century saw a departure from the explicit representation of the divine into a, self-claimed, honest portrayal of “functionalism.” It was an abstraction, or a search for the essentials, that resulted in

a reduction of the superficiality that most Modern architects believed to be oppressing all that was Classical.3 That is, nothing was assumed to be true. Truth, then, was no longer with a capital “T.” So in an attempt to liberate themselves with the divine and absolute, the moderns sought out another justification for their architectural conclusions. Philip Johnson later described these justifications as the “seven crutches” of modern architecture: History, Pretty Drawing, Utility, Comfort, Cheapness, Serving the Client, and Structure.4 Thus, meaning within this epoch was not disproven but simply reinterpreted based on a dependent rational framework that would lead to “pure architecture.”

Peter Eisenman, most recently, critiqued both epochs, Classical and Modern, for their misguided understanding of the processes of architecture. Michael Hays, in his book Architectural Theory Since 1968 proclaims Eisenman as an advocate for decomposition saying that “an anti-anthropological, anti-humanist

architecture must manage the conflict between the need for a systemic, verifiable geometry and the desire for a random organization of form.”5 Eisenman argues that the existential realities of a beginning and end are no longer relevant in architecture and that “timelessness” is a superficial desire of the past. “There is now merely a landscape of objects” that no longer signify meaning or hope but rather provide the bare conditions of survival. Ironically, while he is, on one hand, negating the relevance of history on architecture, he is, on the other, proposing that we now return to the primitivism of understanding objects within a field.

Nonetheless, the latter three architectural perspectives are threaded with a common string of dependence. Classical architecture depended on the divine nature of Proportion, Order, and Symmetry within their edifices. Modern architecture depended on the honesty of abstraction and the understanding of functional, economical practice.6 Eisenman depended on the diagrammatic nature of textural objects within fields. Common ground lies within each philosophy’s interdependence with fields and subjects outside of architecture to arrive at a meaningful conclusion within the built environment.

Architecture, alone, cannot express ideas.

While Eisenman may argue that “pure architecture” survives on its own, it is not clearly understood what this means. Two

columns in juxtaposition with themselves do not create ideas. On the contrary, the study of proportion, dimension, and aesthetics will lead to a conclusion on whether the two columns create effective space.

This is true for all architectural philosophy. While there may be disagreement as to the “why” of architecture, the “how” will consistently dependent upon uncontrollable external parameters.

These parameters, while limitless, are important for the architect to be keenly aware of because it is his repertoire.

They are the tools and words necessary to clearly communicate with the dweller and his surroundings. The universality of these parameters are what, in fact, enable readability in architecture for an international audience. They are in essence the ingredients to cook a meal. Ingredients such as form, skin, layers, and structure are the architectural legos an architect has to tell whatever story may be relevant.

It is through the experimentation within these parameters that we operate on an architectural scale.7 While there may be many variations of the aesthetic outcome, these will remain constant. So rather than negating their reality, we should focus on developing the tools we have. This, in turn, signifies the expanding education of the architect, the dissolving of the label, and the reinterpretation of what one does.

The recent trends within the profession and academia has led architec-

ture into a specialized bubble, focusing only within itself forgetting that architecture is not, indeed, autonomous.8 It requires the understanding that structure, for example, is fundamental to many more areas than simply architecture and that principles such as framing and composition span more than it’s adopted owners would suggest (photography and graphic design.) Architecture falls under a universal umbrella called design. It adheres and responds to the parameters set by these principles, regardless of the story or philosophy. We, then, must take into greater consideration the importance of reaching beyond the label of architecture to potentially foreign areas within design that will further develop the spectrum of architecture.

1. Vitruvius, The Ten Books On Architecture (1914) (New York: Kessinger Publishing, LLC), 2010. 2. William Lidwell, Universal Principles of Design (Gloucester, Mass.: Rockport Publishers), 2003. 3. Denise Scott Brown, Having Words. (London: Architectural Association London), 2009 4. Charles Jencks, Theories and Manifestoes of Contemporary Architecture. (NJ: Academy Press), 2006 5. K. Michael Hays, ed., Architecture Theory Since 1968 (Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press), 2000 6. Kent Bloomer, The Nature of Ornament (New York: WW Norton and Company), 2000 7. Paul Virllio, The Overexposed City. (New York: Urzone), 1986 8. Alberto Perez-Gomez, Architecture and the Crisis of 55

UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA, SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE

STUDENT INVOLVEMENT

THE FALL PREMIERE, HOSTED BY THE STUDIO CULTURE COMMITTEE, WAS AN EVENT WE ORGANIZED IN ATTEMPTS TO PROMOTE STUDENT INVOLVEMENT.

THE STUDIO CULTURE COMMITTEE INITIATED A BUILDING RENOVATION PROJECT THAT INCLUDED REPAINTING THE HALLWAYS OUTSIDE THE STUDIOS.

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ARCHITRAVE MAGAZINE, HELD A FALL EXHIBIT TO SHOWCASE THE MAKING OF THE PUBLICATION (DUE IN SPRING) AND ENCOURAGE STUDENT PARTICIPATION.

I have been fortunate to have served as President of two student organizations in the School of Architecture at the University of Florida. Both, the Studio Culture Committee and Architrave Magazine, have been learning experiences, not only architecturally, but also in lessons of leadership, collaboration, and organization. I seek to continue as an advocate for the education of the architect as a student and a citizen.

THE STUDIO CULTURE COMMITTEE HELD A SUCCESSFUL AND PEACEFUL STUDENT-RALLY IN RESPONSE TO THE ADMINISTRATIVE PROPOSAL TO CLOSE THE FINE ARTS LIBRARY.

During my time as President, I emphasized the importance of becoming a self-motivated student.

My peers and I organized numerous faculty lectures, social events, and design exhibitions as a way to provide the student-body the opportunity to become informed of current architectural, communal, and global issues.

Further, we encouraged the wellbeing of the student himself. That is, we provided safety and health-kits to all studios, monitored recycling initiatives, and even repainted the halls of the studios. Thereby motivating the younger students to carry-on these initiatives in the future.

STUDENTS + FACULTY DISCUSS TOPICS OF DIGITAL ARCHITECTURE AND FABRICATION AFTER A LECTURE HOSTED BY THE SCC.

ALL POSTERS WERE DESIGNED BY JOSE LUIS GABRIEL CRUZ 57

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Dedicated to my mother and father. I am forever grateful.

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