I thrive in high pressure environments. I love deadlines and the joy of hitting them.
I refuse to let down those who hold me to high expectations, because I hold myself to that same standard. When those in leadership positions above me see my potential and recognize my desire to not only succeed, but succeed at the highest level, it fuels my efforts. I am most productive when I am busy.
As an extrovert, I love to chat with anyone, especially those close to me, spend time with the important people in my life, share a good laugh, and experience life wholeheartedly as myself. This however, does not mean there are not times I feel introverted or small in a room full of people - we are all human.
My diversified background allows me to better understand complex problems and how to derive a solution, as well as taught me a lot about myself in both the professional and social aspects of my life.
Kayla Pyles Architectural designer
Professional Work
02 - 08 Party Barn
09 - 11 Rustic Lakeside Lodge
12 - 15 Luxury Condo
16 - 19 Bits and Pieces
Undergraduate Work
20 - 25 Urban Roots
26 - 30 Illuminating Culture
31 - 36 A commUnity for women
Party Barn
A comprehensive renovation of a horse barn in Traveler’s Rest, SC, to create an exceptional guest suite. The project features a complete interior overhaul, including custom woodwork, exposed beam ceilings, and refined finishes that seamlessly blend rustic charm with sophisticated elegance. An enlarged front porch will be outfitted with a handcrafted window and brick accents, while a newly added copula will enhance the barn’s silhouette and provide additional natural light. The redesign will harmonize traditional elements with modern amenities, ensuring a unique and inviting space for guests.
Project Status : Incomplete
Project Year : 2023
Location : Travelers Rest, SC
Work done under Thomas Felton during employment at Studio 511
Precedent Image
Rear Elevation
Typ. Wall Section at Front Porch Addition
Precedent Image
Precedent Image
Typ. Exterior Wall Section
Copula Section & Details
Front Column Elevation & Section
Enlarged Kitchen Floor Plan
Fireplace Section and Elevation
Laundry Elevations
Banquet Seating Cabinet Details
Island Elevation
Banquet Seating Elevation
Island Elevation
Bathroom Interior Elevations
Chair Rail Details
Casework Details
Rustic Lakeside Lodge
Work done under Thomas Felton during employment at Studio 511
A rustic “barndominium” sits perfectly on a prime lot by Lake Keowee. The central stone structure serves as a foundational element, designed to blend seamlessly with its surroundings as if it had always been there. The extending wings of the home are envisioned as evolving extensions, expanding organically over time. The chosen materials are selected to complement and enhance the natural landscape of the property.
Project Status : Incomplete
Project Year : 2023
Location : Six Mile, SC
Front Elevation
Luxury Condo
Work done under Thomas Felton during employment at Studio 511
Laundry Room Elevations
Laundry Room Door Detail
Precedent Images
Plan section of doors within entry hall and foyer with wood slat design
Bedroom Door
Typ. Door Hardware
Powder Room Door
Bits & Pieces
Work done under Thomas Felton during employment at Studio 511
Project Status : Conceptual
Project Year : 2024
Location : Woodruff, SC
We are currently developing an event space in Woodruff, SC, designed to accommodate both fullscale and remote-controlled aviation equipment. This venue will serve as a central hub for various events throughout the year, capable of hosting thousands of attendees at once. The facility will be a 120,000 sq/ft heavy timber structure, featuring a 40-foot hydraulic door to allow the entry of full-sized aircraft.
Gambrel Roof Design 1
Gambrel Roof Section
Hammer Beam Design
Hammer Beam
Project Status : In Progress
Project Year : 2023-2024
Location : Greenville, SC
Exterior color renders completed for an infill project in the historic West Village of Greenville.
Sketch completed by Thomas Felton, Render by Kayla Pyles
Project Status : In Progress
Project Year : 2023-2024
Location : Greenville, SC
Floor plan for a Hartness Village home
Conceptual house plan for a lake front lot on Lake Keowee, SC.
Project Status : Conceptual
Project Year : 2024
Location : Six Mile, SC
Urban Roots: An Extension of the Cuitadella
ARCH
3540 - Spring 2022: Professor Miguel Roldan & Zana Bosnic I Partner: Abigail Spears TAMU
When recognizing the relationships between the green spaces around our site and the public activity they foster, we were prompted with the question of how to simultaneously create a space that facilitates these urban connections while also housing an archive. Through studying the abstracted anatomy of a tree, we discovered the elements of roots, trunk, and cWanopy which have beneficial organizational rules in both the natural and human environments. By blending these natural biologies with architecture, we were able to create a vertical park to serve as an extension of the Ciutadella. This vertical garden references the appearance of a tree through its structure and functionality. The natural processes of a tree define the program and circulation of both people and services. The archive is placed underground as the main root system where it absorbs both people and artifacts before they are dispersed through the trunk and canopy. Through this system of circulation, the artifacts enter and are stored in a central location, but have the ability to move throughout the trunk freely to the offices, classrooms, photo rooms, workshops and exhibitions that fill the canopy space above. There are three main points of connectivity that connect people from the metro, the UPF campus buildings, and the elevated park across the street, which connects the city with the sea. Using our building’s ramps which act as reaching branches and an extension of our ground plaza, these entry points are fed into the building to the first floor where the main doors are.
Each floor has its own ring shaped truss system with radial beams that allows for a free floor plan which can be adapted depending on the special needs of the program assigned to that floor. Barcelona’s density creates a desire for open space which our building creates through doubling the ground using expansive ramps and placing the archive underground. Our project does not express itself as an intervention to the site, but a compliment of it, as it accents the organic theme of the surrounding Ciutadella Park area.
When abstracting the body of a tree, I used the archive as the roots, two strong structural cores as the trunk, a series of platforms acting as the offices above as the canopy, and expansive ramps as reaching branches. All together, these components provide a working system for absorbing the outside into the building and dispersing people and artifacts to the layers of platforms above. The ramps provide substantial spaces to our site, creating an additional 60% of ground coverage for recreational activities.
By Robert William
Through the section and elevation, we can get a better look at below ground floor, where we have the first floor of the archive, where artifacts are delivered and processed to be stored below. The relationship with the gardens and bridge and the building that provides the connection. Looking inside, there is the stacking of horizontal platforms, or grounds, and how the program assigned to each floor changes how closed off or open that floor presents itself. We can also see the different types of terraces provided and how they adapt to the activity on each level, whether that be private or public. The very top floor which acts as the event space provides substantial views of the city, including the nearby parks and the beach.
Photographed
Illuminating Culture: Bronzeville, IL
Our building is designed as a hub of connections that bridges the fragmentation present around Bronzeville. We wanted to encourage interaction among the public through our circulation while also addressing the desire for cultural spaces that will be managed and run by the community. The proposal not only physically bridges the neighborhood together, but also socio-culturally. By grafting “the Stroll” which was a prominent block of jazz clubs during the 20th century in the Bronzeville neighborhood, we have regenerated a safe, inclusive space for the community of Bronzeville, as well as the rest of the south side. Our proposal creates a ground scraper rather than a skyscraper to validate the storefront experience of the many jazz clubs historically placed along the Stroll which ran from 26-39th street. With this in mind, we kept a central circulation route throughout our site which mimics continuity of the archived Stroll. In order to develop a massing, we considered aspects like scale, building heights, surrounding attractions, existing grids, indoor/outdoor spatial relationships, and public transportation accessibility.
ARCH 3510 - Fall 2022: Professor Tim Brown I Partners: Brianna Ogburn & Samantha Mount
Our program is arranged to generate curiosity and to bridge all of these community-driven spaces together. We have created overlapping massings that connect the programs to each other, and a program that is based off of the size of the massing, to allow for the community to drive the use of our cultural hub. The relationship between the interior and exterior can allow visitors to choose if they’d like to stay inside and explore the building, or explore along the exterior. Our proposal aims to be an inclusive project with the community. When it comes to the operation of our groundscraper, our intentions lie with allowing the community to manage the spaces upon opening. This allows for the community to immediately support itself and its neighbors by employing one another to create a successful, energetic environment.
A commUnity for women: Los Angeles, CA
ARCH 4520 -
Spring 2023: Professor David Franco I Partner: Samantha Garland
If we had to single out an issue related to architecture and the built environment as causing social distress in the US, the lack of access to adequate housing would arguably be one of the strongest candidates from any reasonable perspective. Some of the most dramatic societal problems in American cities from homelessness or gentrification to inequalities of opportunity in education and healthcare—are, at least partially, caused by the current housing affordability crisis and the displacements it creates. However, very little of the innovative drive of architecture, as an academic discipline and a profession, is used to imagine alternatives to the current situation. While plenty of policy think-thanks, urban planners, and social science scholars are proposing strategies, plans and ideas to combat the housing affordbility crisis, the dominant architectural discourse largely ignores this issue. In my exit studio for undergraduate, my partner and I chose to combat this Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles is a national hub for homlessness, where women especially are at a disadvantage as they try and re-enter society.
Women experiencing homelessness are more vulnerable to the dangers of homelessness. By partnering with the Downtown Women’s Center (DWC), we envision a Los Angeles in which every woman is housed & on a path to personal stability. Our mission is to provide affordable permanent housing to single women experiencing homelessness, work with the DWC to provide more healthcare for women, and promote our core values of community, identity & accountability.
density of tents in Skid Row:
Homelessness should not be a cyclical problemthe cycle needs to be broken
the issues:
1 out of every 5 American women have been the victim of an attempted or completed rape in her lifetime 1 out of every 71 American men have been the victim of an attempted or completed rape in their lifetime
1 in 4 women and 1 in 9 men experience severe intimate partner physical violence, intimate partner contact sexual violence, and/or intimate partner stalking
people who have been sexually assaulted are:
3.4x more likely to use marijuana
6x more likely to use cocaine
10x more likely to use other major drugs
in 2019 there were 59 reports of rape cases from homeless women as victims
Women are 47% more likely to suffer severe injuries in car crashes because safety features are designed for men
151,107 more women than men in Los Angeles county, which is 1.49% of the total population
women of color now representing almost 70% of women in Los Angeles county. Latinas, representing the largest proportion of women
unit types
1bed/1bath
Micro communities within the U facilitate all sub categories of our core values, community, accountability, and identity. Within these spaces women can look to each other for growth, support, knowledge and comradery.
The individual Units within the larger U structure are diverse in resident profile creating a melting pot that flows into the greater building.
MICRO COMMUNITY
micro community
view from the roof of the Downtown Women’s Center looking east.
view from the 20th floor looking across the Los Angeles skyline looking south.
exterior outdoor spaces act as flexible group spaces. here, one has views across the interior atrium as well as to the Downtown Women’s Center.spaces act as flexible group spaces. here, one has views across the interior atrium as well as to the Downtown Women’s Center.
