UCL_Architecture & Design_Portfolio

R E W O R D

FOSchool of Art, Design and Architecture

Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business

Plymouth University

Drake Circus

Plymouth, Devon | PL4 8AA

www.plymouth.ac.uk

To the admissions tutor:

18 February 2024

I am writing to support Lucas McCarron’s application to the MArch programme.

I have taught Lucas throughout his BA (Hons) Architecture degree at the University of Plymouth, where he obtained a first class qualification. Lucas has distinguished himself from the beginning among a very strong cohort, mainly through his particular sensibility combining context awareness, tectonic refinement, and passion for the technical and constructive aspects of architectural design. In his first year, Lucas was part of a live project team that delivered the Riverside outdoors classroom, a participative design built entirely by our students; the merits of the project have been recognised through the RIBA MacEwen Award commendation.

Although I have supported Lucas’s development across the Design, as well as History & Theory in Critical Context streams throughout the degree, it was during his Y3 dissertation that I became particularly well acquainted with his worldview, ethos, and approach to the field and practice of architecture. Lucas’ praxis centres on the idea of architecture as meaningful social gesture, which has to negotiate between various factors and forces impinging on both the context of application and the potential proposal. In his theoretical work, he was particularly concerned with how places and artefacts of memory can make manifest and tacitly support conditions of racial, spatial, and socio-economic injustice. This attitude is highly transferable into critical design work, where attentive untangling of all these aspects at complex urban scales can directly inform the quality of the proposed work. In his work outside part 1, Lucas has also kept developing his expertise of traditional and contemporary techniques of construction, testing these through smaller scale builds, whilst also keeping up with the complexities of larger practice (e.g. medical facilities) through his placement work.

Lucas’ other interests – his passion for sustainability, alongside his appetency for music – also contribute to shaping his approach to architecture – interdisciplinary, rich and critical, and focused on meaningful action towards change. Through these qualities, as well as his rigour and impeccable work ethic, Lucas is ideally suited to integrate any Part 2 design studio. Therefore, it is my pleasure to recommend him for yours.

Should you require further information, I would be happy to provide it via the email contact listed below.

Yours sincerely,

Dr Ioana Popovici | Lecturer in Architecture

B.Arch, M.Arch, PhD | ioana.popovici@plymouth.ac.uk

Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

School of Art, Design and Architecture | Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business

University of Plymouth

Roland Levinsky Building | Room 401

MIND BODY SOUL

University of Plymouth, Year 3

THE GROWING SHELTER

University of Plymouth, Year 3

FRAME

University of Plymouth, Year 3

PEOPLES PERFORMING ARTS

University of Plymouth, Year 2

YEAR 3 DISSERTATION

Objectification of Colonial Ideology

MAKE LEARN

University of Plymouth, Year 1

THORNEWOOD HOUSE

No. 5 Church Square, Bristol

KTA

Architects & Urban Designers

RSA

Rud Sawers Architects, Totnes

GATHER

p. 7

p. 11

p.

MIND BODY SOUL

Stonehouse is rich with creativity and expression, yet neglected by local funding, facing major socioeconomic pressures, medical crises and threat from climate related flooding. How can these challenges be faced to secure and solidify an increasingly disparate community?

Mind Body Soul incorporates programmes of public bathing and clay sculpting, reviving forgotten local rituals from the site. Drawing from Japanese bathing culture, it aims to evoke collective wellness and foster community bonds through shared memories and traditions.

SENSORY DEPRIVATION CAPSULES BATH

1. Natural marsh pool

2. Walkway approach

3. Descent to changing rooms

4. Public gallery and archive/ storage

5. Water tanks and under pool facilities

6. The bathers central gathering and bath tea grinding station

7. Shinrin-Yoku forest

8. Heated natural marsh pool

9. Falling water massage (utase-

2.

3.

Entry to bar, lobby and cloak room N p. 2

GROUND FLOOR PLAN 1:200 [Right]

FIRST FLOOR PLAN 1:200 [Below]

1. Walking showers and prewash station/toiletries

Rest and cool area (with bath tea facilities)

Water tank sensory deprivation therapy

MIND BODY SOUL

MIND BODY SOUL

SECOND FLOOR PLAN

1. Sculpture reveal

2. Upper art and sculpture exhibition space

3. Light well to baths

4. Sculptors overlook, hired art rooms

5. Clay workshop

6. Clay firing

7. r Roof garden for outdoor exhibitions

8. Retracting panels

9. Seeing the journey ahead, allowing natural light to ground displays

MIND BODY SOUL

STRUCTURAL SYNTHESIS

Exploring tactility, materiality and phenomenology was key in allowing the idea of embodied space to permeate from research to manifestation, and design synthesis naturally adopted a tactile and tangible methodology, often making use of clay - a central programmatic aspect implemented as a social mediator.

Models assisted in key aspects of physical design decisionsthreshold, vertical interactions, play of light, spatial hierarchy and geometry of the facade. Modelling is an intuitive, meditative and experimental design methodology, and the intention was for this emotional process to transmute into the feel of the design.

THE GROWING SHELT ER

Devonport is a culturally diverse district of Plymouth, currently facing economic deprivation and encroachment of urban schemes threatening vital shared public spaces. How can parks function holistically and self-sufficiently in order to reduce commercial intrusion, allowing them to remain in the hands of the public users?

Our scheme aimed to unravel the palimpsest of historic sites across Devonport Park. Growing Shelter adapts an existing air-raid bunker, a buried monument of a once essential community shelter during the second world war.

The new programme is intended to bring prevalence to local agricultural groups through the creation of a self-sustained, small scale circular economy incorporating aquaponics systems, countering rising food prices in struggling communities.

Our group scheme created a framework that fed directly in to a series of proposals. Some of these proposals were developed as individual projects and others existed as part of a wider outline masterplan.

These included the addition of new public transport and electric tram routes, a bypass utilising existing infrastructure to reduce traffic, inner city fishing pools and pop-up markets utilising historic sites.

I created a plan and design for the conceptual model [Top] and constructed it in collaboration with two group colleagues.

The masterplan intervention schemes [Below] were also my work, designed in Adobe Illustrator.

F R A M E

A collaborative project working with sustainable forestry groups to design an seating space that aims to frame and express the story of Fingle Woods forest, highlighting its rich, prehistoric past.

This was a team based experience, we decided to camp out to immerse ourselves in the Fingle Woods to gain a more tactile understanding of the site and materiality.

*All work showcased is my formatting based around a collaborative digital model that I was continuously involved with*

THE PEOPLES PERFORMING ARTS CENTRE

With aspirations greatly affected by the philistinistic attitude of the 2020 government towards the arts sector with deprecating campaigns to encourage re’skilling, alongside a city-wide loss of culturally significant venues and pubs, this space affords prestige to the artdependent local community by placing their talents at the forefront.

A project responding to the Plymouth National Marine Park coastal rejuvenation scheme, aiming to use this influx of funding to reinstate the seafront as a place that has, historically, dissolved social boundaries. The intention is to utilise the transcendent language of performance to bridge increasingly disparate communities in the area.

YEAR 3 DISSERTATION:

OBJECTIFICATION OF COLONIAL IDEOLOGY

The widely publicised Black Lives Matter protests of 2020-2021 in the UK sparked the public dismantlement of monuments representing figures responsible for an uncomfortable British colonial history of slavery, persecution and oppression. This was a public reaction to persistent, deeply engrained cultural hegemonies and pedagogies.

This dissertation confronts Britains self-centred postcolonial memorialisation of history, interrogating monuments as a layer of the urban environment, and exploring how hegemonies, imagined traditions and ritual behaviours are spatially perpetuated.

ESSAY STRUCTURE

Architecture is explored as a landscape that can inflict psychological control, mapping points solidified history within the built environment, touching on themes such as Michel Foucaults (Jeremy Benthams) theory of the urban ‘Panopticon’.

Relationships are drawn to contemporary issues such as digital media, which risks becoming a weighted blanket spread across a landscape of false histories, augmenting misinformation.

Ultimately, the essay urges towards an architecture of malleability that enables dialectical inquiry, seeking ways of enabling conversations and fostering diversity as the new norm.

A network of imposed memory

RiverAvon

GATHER MAKE LEARN

Featured by RIBA - [ https:// rb.gy/m8p1vj ]

This collaborative project during my first year at University of Plymouth saw the full stage construction of an outdoor learning area at Riverside Community Primary, with a brief intending to encourage children to learn through doing and moving, challenging the traditional classroom structure.

Our class worked towards a final design selected from one team, and then undertook the construction process together by allocating specific roles. My jobs included sourcing and preparing recycled pallets and offcuts in the wood workshop into usable wood bricks and pallet walls, taking care to assure these were suitable for use by children.

[Photo credits: Andrew Morris, Lucas Voss]

THORNEWOOD HOUSE

NO. 5 CHURCH SQUARE, CLUTTON

After passing this project through the planning process and passing successfully on first submission (changes only to external cladding), we took on the construction of this low energy home from the ground up, in place of an existing disused garage.

Construction was intended to be minimal waste, and we aimed to reuse materials and offcuts wherever possible.

This was a drastic learning opportunity for myself as I personally completed design and planning phase alongside my grandad - a carpenter, and worked from to foundation to construction.

The build was completed after 10 months of construction with 2-3 on site workers including myself, and the help of electricitians, plasterers and crane operators.

RSA

RSA - LARGE SCALE RESIDENTIAL

Following my time at KTA, I decided to gain experience in a smaller architecture firm to better understand the difference in practice when dealing with smaller projects in a fastpaced a close-knit team.

Rud Sawers Architects offered me an invaluable experience as a Part 1 Architectural Designer, working within a range of sectors.

Entering this 99 house scheme mid construction using 2D drafting software was a great way to improve my detailing knowledge.

RSA

RSA SMALL SCALE - RESIDENTIAL

During this time, I dealt directly with clients, contractors, consultants and planners and eventually began running projects. I primarily used Adobe Suite, Sketchup, MicroStation, and sketching skills to work on design and development, detailing, and achieving planning permission.

[Top Right] - Technical detailing for stage 4 of a three bed residential build, liaising with roof designers and contractors.

[Bottom Left] - Concept for a client, timber infil structure within a historic (non-listed) first floor courtyard.

[Bottom Right] - Collaborative design with Rud for a replacement dwelling, surrounded by a small dense pine forest.

RSA

This experience allowed me to build unique techniques to liase with clients, and develop designs progressively, as well as increasing my appreciation and care for finer details, materiality and achieving a design that emboddies and reflects the needs of the client.

[Top Right] - Creating detailed sections for a large school extension including classrooms and supporting spaces.

[Bottom] - CADing Ruds design and creating plans for a series of industrial units intended for multifunctionality as offices, storage and small business uses.

[Bottom Left] - Preliminary design for a private client, a small footprint wellbeing spa and gym adjoining an existing pool. Envisioned as a multi-use adaptable space.