2021 Master of Architecture Thesis

SAID 2021

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UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE AND INTERIOR DESIGN MASTER OF ARCHITECTURE THESIS CATALOG

SAID 2021

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Acknowledgements SAID Director:

EDWARD MITCHELL

M.Arch. Coordinator: VINCENT SANSALONE

Program Coordinator: KIMBERLY LAWSON

DAAPWorks:

MOIRA MORGAN

Thesis Chairs:

MICHAEL MCINTURF

ELIZABETH RIORDEN

JOSS KIELY

EDWARD MITCHELL This publication accompanies the 2021 DAAPWorks Master of Architeture Digital Exhibition

All images are copyright of the artists, reproduced with permission of the artists. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any manner without permission of the University of Cincinnati School of Architecture and Interior Design

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Introduction

By Edward Mitchell, Director of the School of Architecture

and Interior Design.

Not even a plague could deter this excellent class of graduates.

The diversity of backgrounds, interests, and achievements in this group makes teaching a pleasure and a gift. SAID students won national awards for their work from the Urban Land Institute, were recognized for their professional achievements, and helped the younger students in our programs. They also have succeeded despite personal hardships, responsibilities to family, moments of self-doubt, and uncertain times.

Our undergraduates have taken on difficult assignments as they learned the specific challenges of architecture, landscape ecology, urban politics, and finance as well as the formal requirements of buildings.

Our Interiors students challenged themselves to bend the rules of their discipline and to stretch their aspirations to take on greater challenges including helping establish a legacy project in Cincinnati. Our dedicated faculty give the students the skills and confidence to ask tough questions and to imagine the future of architecture and interior design.

But despite the limited access the students had to the outside world, they were not limited in their imagination. This year students applied the Green New Deal into a neighborhood in Cincinnati, explored the Ohio River; constructed plans for creative affordable housing; addressed global warming; envisioned lively new public spaces in Bengaluru, Pittsburgh, San Diego, Beijing, Birmingham, Youngstown, and Mexico City; projected utopian and dystopian futures; envisioned new worlds of nomadic caravans, and robotic scavengers; sought bold visions to address our relationships with plant and animal life, the human subconscious, and the digital unconscious of our virtual worlds; sought creative solutions to underrepresented communities and addresses racial bias and disenfranchisement. It was a challenging year, but the students all persevered and were never, or rarely ever, disheartened or discouraged.

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The world needs more young architects like this group.

Many of us have experienced personal loss during the last few months and unimaginable anxiety, managing school and family and the mind dumbing loneliness of work remotely. The Interiors students never got to use their new classroom space. All of our seniors missed their final year on the UC campus. One of our graduate groups had only one semester together in our building. But despite physical distance, the students and faculty did their best to support one another and tried to make this world of video feeds, zoom conferences, and time displacement seem a little bit humane.

Last year ended abruptly with many questions. This year dragged on, and those questions remain. Many of us suspect that the world may have changed entirely while we were confined to home; but this year there is greater hope. We won’t get back the time we might have spent together, and we have become overly familiar with our respective apartments, childhood bedrooms, basement workshops, and impromptu offices.

This year had an odd intimacy. Most of our cohort will be storming back to celebrate on campus in a few short weeks, exited to be done with this chapter of their education, but holding great prospects in the near future. The Zoom generation may have missed out on model building and bowling, but they more than made up for it in added skills in new media. And they have projected those skills into terrific work that upholds our high standards and challenges us to constantly invent and create. A musician I am often fond of quoting once said, “You have to make music when there are no instruments… and it’s raining.” Well, you have to make architecture when there is no studio, the internet just went out, and the plague is just outside your door. This year’s graduates have figured out ways to project bold futures when the immediate future has often seemed in doubt. We at the School of Architecture and Interior Design congratulate you on all your achievements. You can count on our School to support you as you continue to reinvent our world with all your gifts and fortitude and talents.

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Thesis Students Michael McInturf/Liz Riorden: DANIEL ANDERI COLIN COOPER NICHOLAS DORSEY YINING FANG TODD FUNKHOUSER JOHN GARRISON MICHAEL JURIGA ISAAC KELLER TYLER KENNEDY BRANDON KROGER KELSEY KRYSPIN SHELBY LESHNAK LAURA LENARDUZZI LAUREN MEISTER DE’SEAN MORRIS BETH PAULSEN DREW PEDERSON

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ROBERT PEEBLES YIYING (RUBY) QIU JORDAN SAUER CHAD SUMME DAVID TORRES LAUREN VENESY DAMARIO WALKER-BROWN SAMUEL WILLIAMSON DONGRUI ZHU

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Thesis Students Joss Kiely/Edward Mitchell: BETELEHEM ASFAW MICAELA BECKER SNIGDHA BHATTIPROLU MITCHELL CURTIS JANAE EDWARDS JOSHUA FUNDERBURK HANG PHAN BENJAMIN RIDDLE AARON TKAC LUCAS WHEELER HANNAN AL-TIMIMI ALLY COLE KELSEY DEPOLO BRENDAN GIRTEN RACHEL GREEN MORGAN HEALD NANDINI KAUSHIK

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CHANDLER PHILPOTT

BRYAN RAYMOND

CHRISTOPHER ROBIE

RUGUI XIE

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Contents Urbanism and Planning Systems PERFORMANCE DRIVEN ARCHITECTURE SEAMLESS INSIDE OUT DETROIT

ACTIVATED GREEN SPACES ACTIVATING THE ALLEY THE EDIBLE SUBURB 2021 Director’s Choice Winner

DEFINING EMPTINESS

PUBLIC HOUSING: REVISITING ARCHITECTURE FOR THE MASSES FRAGMENTED CITIES AND FALLOW SPACES

(SUB)URBAN CLUSTERS 2021 Director’s Choice Winner

ONTOLOGICAL LIBERATION

LIFE AFTER THE PANDEMIC MIXED-CLASS CO-LIVING ARCHITECTURE FOR OUTREACH

2021 Outstanding Research THE PROFOUND VITALITY

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Politics, Identity and Aesthetics

ORDINANCE AND SPACE

2021 Outstanding Project THE (UN)CONVENTIONAL CENTER 2021 Best Thesis Document

DEUS EX MACHINA: THE ARCHITECTURE OF THREE FOLLIES IN (WASHINGTON D.C.) 2021 Outstanding Project

NON-PLACE MAKING THE BIG BOX THE CONTEMPORARY UNCANNY THE OBJECTS OF OTHERING, THE OTHERING OF OBJECTS 2021 Henry Adams Medal SENTINELS OF THE ANTRHOPOCENE

THE CHAPEL OF CHRIST THE ÆSIR

FACADE OF MANY FACES: A HYBRID SKYSCRAPER 2021 Urban Futures Winner

LAID PLANS

2021 Outstanding Research

YES, IN GOD’S BACKYARD

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Rural and Small-town America WELCOME TO SADNESS: THE (UN)HAPPY LEGACY OF THE CHAMPION CITY 2021 Outstanding Project COTTON IN THE CREVICES: REMNANTS OF A BLACK UTOPIA

2021 Best Thesis Document ARCHITECTURE TO SUPPORT A TRANSIENT AMERICA PATCHES, FIELDS, AND THE IN-BETWEEN APERTURES OF A LINE

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Sustainability and Environments

CINCINNATI’S CARBON CAPS

THE INFI-HALL THE NEW NORMAL TECH INTERCHANGE OPPORTUNITIES FOR LIMINALITY THE LABYRINTH OF EXPERIENCE THE MACHINE IN ARENA SYMBIOTIC ARCHITECTURE ARCHITECTURAL MEDIATION: MAN AND THE LICK RUN TAILORED ARCHITECTURE MODULAR/ KINETIC FACADES

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Urbanism and Planning Systems Daniel Anderi

PERFORMANCE DRIVEN ARCHITECTURE Snigdha Bhattiprolu SEAMLESS Mitch Curtis

INSIDE OUT DETROIT

Joshua Funderburk

ACTIVATED GREEN SPACES

Morgan Heald

ACTIVATING THE ALLEY

Michael Juriga

THE EDIBLE SUBURB

Nandini Kaushik DEFINING EMPTINESS Isaac Keller PUBLIC HOUSING: REVISITING ARCHITECTURE FOR THE MASSES Kelsey Kryspin FRAGMENTED CITIES AND FALLOW SPACES Drew Pederson (SUB) URBAN CLUSTERS Robert Peebles ONTOLOGICAL LIBERATION Yiying (Ruby) Qiu

LIFE AFTER THE PANDEMIC

Chad Summe MIXED-CLASS CO-LIVING David Torres ARCHITECTURE FOR OUTREACH Rugui Xie

THE PROFOUND VITALITY

Daniel Anderi Windsor, Ontario

All designs work within basic parameters and constraints to develop design solutions, however within urban housing developments current methodologies only consider a minimal required amount of inputs and data within a set amount of time. With no meaningful incentives to change development patterns affordable housing projects, along with their limited considerations, continue to create standardized, repetitive developments without any true responsiveness to the end user or surrounding context.

We commonly see industries outside of architecture heavily influenced by data and technological advancements so much that it changes both companies internal operating structures and end-user products. This does not happen to nearly the same extent in the field of architecture. Digital technologies, such as generative design, allow architects to synthesize tremendous amounts of data and inputs within the same amount of time. Alternative project delivery methods, such as an integrated project delivery system, ensures that users values can be delivered within project constraints and promotes innovation throughout the entire process.

By leaning in on computational capabilities and functioning under performance driven models, urban housing projects can begin to reflect aligned interests between users, builders, and architects. The possibility to consider more data in the form of both quantitative and qualitative values can allow designers to take responsibility and be more creative in developing urban housing solutions.

Affordable housing demands continuously overburden new housing supply each year suggesting that the current system for developing affordable housing is more complex and restrictive than encouraging. Architects are limited to certain aspects where their ideas, advocacy’s, and decisions can influence change. Within the architectural aspects of means, methods, agreements, and products how can architects begin to influence change in the development of urban housing projects. By transitioning from prescriptive to performancebased ideologies how can architects embrace new strategies, technologies, and delivery models to improve both the decision-making process and the demands for adequate and affordable housing in the built environment. In this thesis a wide lens will be used to analyze the current scenario of each identified aspect and their shortcomings, while speculating on reasonable shifts an architect can consider when designing affordable housing.

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PERFORMANCE DRIVEN ARCHITECTURE 15

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Snigdha Bhattiprolu Princeton, NJ /Hyderabad, India

In 1947, Lewis Mumford’s ideology sowed the seeds towards ‘critical regionalism,’ a term which Frampton borrowed from Alex Tzonis and Liliane Lefaivre in 1981. Frampton believed critical regionalism should “mediate the impact of universal civilization with elements derived from the peculiarities of a particular place’. These “peculiarities” refers to the local site conditions. Some Indian architects do not accept western academia to define Indian regionalism. Instead, they consider it a intellectual colonization. During 1950s the Nationalistic movement focused on agriculture, swadeshi(self-reliance) in reference to textiles but it was a sentiment that was applied to every industry.

Nationalistic goals hold relevance today, while India as a developing country sees much contemporary architecture which is inappropriate to the climate and socio-cultural fabric.

The widening gap between urban centers which move far way from the cultural roots and rural centers which migrate, due to lack of livelihood towards urban centers, create pressing issues.

Urban migration overburdens cities and kills the agricultural powerhouses, the villages, as an economy, cultural incubator, and social fabric. Here, critical regionalism approach of striking a balance between ‘technological advancement’ and ‘retaining the cultural nucleus’ holds relevant but staying within the ideal so nationalistic gals is important.

The research is proposing ethical ecotourism and rural education as a mutually beneficial program to move towards sustainable rural futures. It views architectural design as a complex organism involved in a cyclic loop of the environment, using nostalgia as an unique selling point or incentive for ecotourism in villages as a revenue generating model. On the other hand, attracting agro-investors and educators to teach and learn from rural communities while living with them makes the project unique. The use of nostalgic triggers, resides in collective memory of the community, brought and served as ecotourism by the use of familiar sensory design of touch(salvaged materials),sight, smell, taste(forgotten recipes)sound(performing arts). However, the project refrains from using the local community as an exhibit instead promotes homestay. Rather, temporary occupants and permanent occupants live together in the system and thus learn from each other.

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SEAMLESS

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Mitch Curtis Dayton, OH

Gentrification, one of thhe most controversial topics in the United States over the last half a century, is often seen as a catalyst to increasing property value in the surround-ing context. However, the resulting displacement it causes has resulted in negative housing repercussions across the nation. Located on a riverine border with Canada, Detroit, Michigan is a city that has been marred by crime, poverty, and urban blight since the 1970s and gentrification is something the citizens have fought against. Especially with their need for affordable housing being one of the most prevalent in the country, with over one-third of the population living below the poverty rate.

By reviewing the existing and upcoming affordable housing and mixed-use projects that have been constructed and proposed in Detroit neighborhoods over the last few decades, I aim to propose an architectural intervention that attempts to address what a myriad of projects have failed to address and provide an alternative community to the city; moreover, a hub. Most notably, creating job opportunities, areas for in-door and outdoor recreation, and a model for surrounding neighborhoods to follow... this proposed intervention will aim to provide more than a temporary solution. A community model with tailored housing units to different family sizes and structures, various amenities, and commercial aspects integrated within will be designed and proposed for a real site within the metropolis. Weaving into a network of innovative nodes of happening spaces across the city that have begun sprouting up over the last 5-10 years of Detroit rebirth, this hub will tie into this infrastructure, while also providing something new for the city. Lastly, this mixed-use project will aim to provide a blueprint for not only for this particular borough of Detroit, but also for the other poverty-stricken neighborhoods in the city, and potentially across the United States.

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INSIDE OUT: DETROIT

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INSIDEout

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t DETROIT

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Joshua Funderburk Louisville, OH

The use of greenspace within an urban condition has the possibility to connect the different existing infrastructure elements of a city. This thesis project is exploring the urban conditions of connection applicable through a vibrant active recreational greenspace at the intersection of the Pittsburgh urban core, arena, university district, and desirable residential neighborhoods. Pittsburgh as a city has a historic past of industrialization, but in recent development is pushed towards a more high-tech future. In the city of Pittsburgh, recent redevelopment of the old Mellon Arena site has left it empty to community use. This location was once a spot of social interaction, starting as an important residential neighborhood.

The displacement of the residents saw the construction of the arena, the next phase of social context applied to the site. The intervention of a large scale public greenscape across this location works to tie the existing residential neighborhood and the urban downtown district through community interaction and the creation of a desirable location. Through analysis of existing park space project, such as the Parc de la Villette submissions by Rem Koolhaas and Bernard Tschumi informs the way programmatic data and movement is engaged throughout a site.

This thesis works to address that movement needed to articulate the connection between the different regions of Pittsburgh while activating the park greenspace with community focused programs of leisure, exercise, and engagement.

Terracing the existing topography creates the organizing element across the site, and this system’s intersection with a sculpted topography further details the divisions of the site while taking into account the edge conditions. As part of the activation of the landscape, a water management system works to collect, treat, store, and distribute water through the intervention and the important locations around the site. Through these processes of intervention, the goal is to create a system for community engagement that acknowledges the needs of the Pittsburgh urban condition. The focus on public program augments this idea that the site can be used by anyone and that it becomes an integral part of the city.

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ACTIVATED GREEN SPACES

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Morgan Heald Plainfield, IN

Due to medical and caretaking needs, many seniors face displacement from their homes and a sense of isolation from their community. An increasing percentage of senior citizens are choosing at-home assistance instead of nursing home relocation. For these seniors to continue living in their own homes, accessible design retrofits are often necessary. These retrofits adapt homes to meet the specific needs of the residents aging in place. Despite the comfort of living in their own homes, the decision to age in place can still result in seniors becoming isolated from their community through issues of independence and mobility.

This thesis uses the existing neighborhood of South Dunn Street in Bloomington, Indiana to implement a community of senior dwelling units along the alleyway.

The partial dependence of each senior dwelling unit on an existing singlefamily home integrates seniors into the neighborhood by increasing density and resulting in a dynamic of multiple generations on the same site. The alleyway with which these senior dwelling units align frames a linear, shared space to foster a network of activity among the senior residents as well as serving as the neighborhood’s access to residential parking, trash removal, and pedestrian uses. The offerings of a college town to be a walkable community with a range of cultural experiences and the opportunity for sociability matches the same needs for seniors. This proposal takes an otherwise isolated senior citizen and creates a hybrid of independence within a multigenerational, interactive community in an existing neighborhood.

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ACTIVATING THE ALLEY

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Michael Juriga Detroit, MI

The current paradigm of the decentralized suburbs, with its large homes and proportionately large commute times led to social isolation, disconnection with nature, great wastes of resources, and accelerating the currently ongoing climate crisis. The middle class has been whittled away by expensive real estate prices and rising debt. The need for affordable housing requires creative solutions such as downsizing, and more efficient home design. What was formerly known as the American dream will be simply out of reach for many people in the near future. Continuing into the future, relying on the dreams of the mid-twentieth century would simply lead to ecological disaster. An architectural response and a change in the way people live is required in order to tackle the climate crisis. It is necessary to address the role of architecture in society and present viable solutions that change its status from a luxury item to a societal necessity.

Another key to tackling climate change is to bring the separate facets of modern life together, to create community and social interactions between people. To change where food is grown, to having communities where public transport is widely available and convenient, and to build communities in which residents can easily walk to amenities.

Permaculture not only presents a sustainable way to produce food, but also provides lessons in the importance of a holistic and flexible design process.

Diversity creates strength and productivity within complex systems. In growing food close to home, the need to spend energy resources to bring in food from thousands of miles is reduced. Architecture and community design have a holistic impact on each other, as well as the environment. To design one element without another is to design in a vacuum. The economic requirements and the structure of a community need consideration in order to properly sustain a shift in the model of residential living. Each element cannot stand alone, and needs the support of the other to create the stability necessary to affect change.

The way forward is to create an architecture that accommodates the needs of the individual, but not at the expense of personal well-being or at the cost of future generations. This investigation seeks to research design philosophies and methods of permaculture design, and discover how its lessons can inform architectural design and urban densification.

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THE EDIBLE SUBURB

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2021 Director’s Choice Award

Nandini Kaushik Bengaluru, India

The urban fabric of cities is changing at a fast pace. To meet the requirements of a modern society, the existing urban fabric requires catalysts that stimulate the potentials of the city of tomorrow. The Indian cities are expected to grow rapidly from 340 million people in 2008 to a whopping 590 million in 2030. Population growth and rapid urbanization in India combined have created huge challenges to overcome the depreciating standard of living in urban areas. Overcrowded cities, illegal buildings and disparity in the market owes large demands for the growing population. The acceleration has been creating voids and lost spaces that are underutilized. Reconsidering the voids in Indian cities, necessitates micro-scaled renewal methods to support public spaces and community development. The expanding cities need to adapt this change of unpacking the strengths of urban voids, by reclaiming and implementing its potentials in an existing urban fabric. The result is a healthy transformation of vacant lands to urban spaces that enhance the life of the city and its inhabitants.

The reactivation weaves various public zones inspired by the street character in Indian cities. Integrating and unifying the neighborhood. The proposal attempts to re-choreograph the emptiness of a bypassed urban resource the site with its immediate urban fabric to enhance the life of the city and its inhabitants.

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DEFINING EMPTINESS

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Isaac Keller Fort Recovery, OH

Affordable housing in the United States is slipping out of grasp for millions of Americans every year. In the past cities used public housing as a powerful tool to provide adequate housing for those that were unable to afford housing in the private market. The downfall of public housing as a tool cities use is a complex story that involves changes in policy, changes in public perception, and changes in the built product.

Since 1998 no additional federal public housing units have been built, contributing to the existing housing affordability crisis that millions of Americans suffer from. It is time to reexamine public housing as a tool the city and the federal government can use to address the affordable housing crisis. This document will analyze past failures, identify past successes, and re-imagine how a new public housing system would function to address the issues of today and prevent the issues of tomorrow.

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PUBLIC HOUSING: REVISITING ARCHITECTURE FOR THE MASSES 43

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Drew Pederson Moorestown, NJ

The suburbs are ending… not ending in the final way one may think of like a bad movie, but ending as they are known today. It is documented that a gamut of people are choosing to live differently than people of the past. Instead of the traditional American Dream of a house, on some land with a fence, there are multiple dreams that do not end up in the suburbs.

Americans are situating themselves closer to where they work, depending less on car ownership, locating themselves near entertainment, and focusing on urban spaces.

In building the case for an urban cluster neighborhood, this thesis proposal examines the history of suburb development, verbs that represent design methods, and how thoughtful planning and design can construct volumes, buildings, and the in between spaces that offer a unique opportunity for opulent culture. The results suggest that isolation in the suburbs is no match for socialization is the sub-urban dream.

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(SUB)URBAN CLUSTERS

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2021 Director’s Choice Award

Robert Peebles Albuquerque, NM

At the dawn of the first urban century in human history, we are coming to understand the undeniable consequences of our occupation that has changed the record of geology and ecosystems on a planetary scale. Persistent and irrefutable marks providing evidence of these changes are the artefacts of the Anthropocene - a new geologic epoch born out of human’s ability to inflict ecological damage able to be seen through the lens of Deep Time. The Anthropocene thesis provokes designers to reevaluate fundamental attitudes, theories, and practices inherited from modernity. The term has fostered questions about the relationships and autonomy of politics, culture, and nature questioning the ontological structure of our urban environments. The previous models of urban construction prioritized the wellbeing of humans above all other factors - and placed the modes of production, productivity, agriculture, climate, water, and energy outside the bounds of the city Bringing these concepts back into the core of the urban diagram represents a sh·1ft to create a Flat Ontology City Restructuring the diagram’s core away from a concentric allocation where all nodes flow to one point - and instead, create a decentralized cloud where nodes previously found outside the city model take equal footing with human l”ife.

De-ontologizing our world view presents new understandings of the non-human agents that comprise our world and shows how these objects are entangled in a mesh to our own existence Mexico City represents an excellent opportunity to test the design of this new diagram due to the inextricable link of the non­human actors (geology & the water cycle) the city has; and how it suffers from design’s refusal to acknowledge or incorporate these elements. Modern hydrologic infrastructure has become massive in scale, often taking tradif1onal infrastructural forms, and blowing them up to monumental proportions but designed as a static single use object When considering design as the creation of a static object, this notion becomes problematic when confronted with actors that operate as a mesh of relations to non-human objects. Objects within these interconnected sets of relations create a networked assemblage that opposes the modern idea of categorical distinctions and organizes hybrid subjects. This hybridity extends beyond questions of philosophy and extends to the assemblage that is architecture itself and how it shapes they city and landscapes. The infrastructure of the Anthropocene seeks to define an architectural subject beyond the human that creates an assemblage that addresses multi­ scale territory and organic and inorganic actors produc·1ng opportunistic infrastructure that positively integrates with natural processes rather than disrupting them This thesis seeks to formalize a monument and iconography that creates the Lake Chalco-lztapalapa system’s physical manifestations and mark a change in the relationship to nature and emerging architectural hybridity with infrastructure that responds to the hybrid subjects of Mexico City’s Anthropocene period.

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ONTOLOGICAL LIBERATION: HYBRID INFRASTRUCTURES FOR THE ANTHROPOCENE 51

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Yiying (Ruby) Qiu Hengyang, Hunan, China

As working from home is becoming the new normal due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there is a growing need for home offices in the housing market. Yet the old home office concept does not suit in a socially-distanced world. The lack of social interaction and the blurred line between personal and professional life are some of the main problems people are complaining about after they started telecommuting for a long period due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This thesis explores the spatial relationship between home and workplace, from the medieval longhouse to the modern work home. Specifically, this thesis explains the need to combine dwelling and workplace by looking at the history of live / work projects when this building concept was first introduced to the public and its development in the past. By analyzing the design rationale and its historic contexts, this thesis explores the architectural response to the current housing problems in a COVID world and the residential design in the future.

This thesis proposes a multi-family housing complex that integrates flexible space design, sustainability, and urban farming to provide a self-resilient community in a pandemic. The intention is to seek new perspectives on housing to better protect working people in the next pandemic on a global scale. The design approach can be applied to other housing complex projects if needed in the future.

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REIMAGINING HOUSING: LIFE AFTER THE PANDEMIC 55

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Chad Summe Cincinnati, OH

Socioeconomic segregation in residential neighborhoods is an occurrence that according to the Pew Research Institute, is plaguing 27 of the nation’s 30 largest major metropolitan areas. Adjacent neighborhoods which differ radically in socioeconomic status (SES) are at odds with each other; and this is best understood through a set of observable institutional and social disparities. Upon reviewing the origin, context, effects, and previously deployed solutions to these institutional and social disparities, this thesis will propose guidelines for a project that seeks to address all of the most crucial of these issues; a mixed-class co-living housing experiment as an architectural response to the enduring effects of socioeconomically disparate residential conditions. This response involves a unification of a modified community planning strategy as a response to the institutional woes, and a set of architectural design and programming principles that respond to social disparities.

The institutional disparities that have allowed residential neighborhoods to be socioeconomically segregated are rooted in racial segregation, as well as income segregation or “concentration of poverty.” Mixed-income housing projects of the past may have been effective at times of achieving its primary goal of deconcentrating poverty but have not proven to be effective in addressing social issues. Instead of deconcentrating poverty with mixed-income housing, the community planning strategy for this thesis seeks to mend socioeconomically differing neighborhoods through “mixed-class” housing; this involves a mixture of residents based on not only income, but also education and occupation. This strategy will allow for a much more diverse mixture of people based on the socioeconomics of a given site, while providing a more opportunistic condition for the involved social disparities to be addressed through architecture, programming, and spatial design.

The social disparities that arise from socioeconomically segregated neighborhoods decrease the likelihood for residents to engage in daily social interactions that would lead to advantageous community relationships. The architectural response incorporated in this thesis involves examining the most crucial of these issues, and proposing a series of design principles, programmatic elements, and strategic adjacencies with a focus on co-living social architecture as precedent. These strategies represent the means of encouraging more community relationships in a housing development that would house residents with a mixture of socioeconomic classes. This thesis explores the basis of dismantling institutional norms that contribute to socioeconomic segregation in broader neighborhoods through mixed-class, and how incorporating that ideal gives more validity to reinforcing diversity, engagement, and social interaction among the classes at the building scale.

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MIXED-CLASS CO-LIVING

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Kelsey Kryspin Maumee, OH

Bustling warehouse districts, rumbling railways, and flaring refineries were once the soul of midwestern cities. Industrialization was the genesis for the regions presently known as the rust belt region. Many now associate these regions with fallow parking lots, hollow warehouses, and weed-covered railways. Toledo, Ohio is a representation of a rustbelt city once composed of intact urban fabric.

Modernization has changed the city. The intact urban fabric has disintegrated.

Industrial buildings are now obsolete and scattered between modern structures.

Cultural center, business hubs, and entertainment districts are disconnected, only to be held together by the urban tissue. Urban tissue is decayed, with fallow space. The problem that is being approached is how to address these fallow sites. Historic preservation would be a misguided methodology for addressing the fragmented city. Historical preservation addresses monumental, noteworthy sites. The industrial remnants are non-noteworthy and non-exemplar of their style, but they are old, and they are there. There must be another way of thinking about the city when analyzing these sites. The traditional values of historic preservation are being substituted through a new convention of thinking. This new convention is addressed through a series of analogies.

The act of seasoning has various meanings. First, it can be applied to cooking.

The seasoning of a cast-iron skillet is a functional process that creates a layer of protection to a material. The value for a seasoned product is to create longevity to its life. Seasoning is also a method of adding to. The objective for seasoning food is to enhance the flavor. Seasoning is also applied through a form of maturity.

Seasons are a sequence of patterns. These patterns are represented through the four seasons of the years. These seasons represent the pattern of life. Plants will grow, thrive, and decay with this pattern. These methods of seasoning represent a new way of analyzing the fallow sites, which will be characterized as unseasoned sites. Seasoning architecture may be a key step in the recipe to architecture’s longevity. This thesis will explore the anatomy of a fragmented city infused with fallow and unseasoned sites. The intent of the exploration is to reveal the potential effects of natural curation through seasoning of sites .

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FRACTURED CITIES AND FALLOW SPACES 63

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David Torres Indianapolis, IN

Underprivileged neighborhoods in U.S. cities have been isolated and abandoned in detriment to its inhabitants. The perception of these areas as ”bad” deters any involvement for improvement which creates a cycle of poverty that forces generations to live through undesirable conditions. The result is an uneven playing field in life caused in part by lack of opportunities through infrastructure, safety, and education which sees no solution as society turns a blind eye.

Architecture, program, and implementation of community outreach can be used as tools to revitalize these communities and implement new ideas and structure to alleviate the disadvantage that some are born into and erase the stigma of place.

Creating mixed-use buildings that feature housing as well as a community hub centered around the values and strategies of community outreach organizations as well as giving purpose to empty unprogrammed lots are solutions that would benefit the community and help change the reputation of these neighborhoods.

With the idea of outreach at the forefront, as well as the needs and desires of the residents in mind, proper facilities can be built that address the main issues that residents go through every day and aim to revitalize these often-ignored places and change their narrative.

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ARCHITECTURE FOR OUTREACH

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2021 Outstanding Research Award

Rugui Xie

Yueyang, Hunan, China Rapid urbanization has been going on since China started economic reforms in 1978. The economic and urban architecture development increased imbalance in the distribution of wealth causing economic inequality, while it had some positive socioeconomic impacts across Chinese society.

This thesis argues for the value of urban villages as places from an urban design perspective, meanwhile, seeks to understand the causes of these inequalities in the housing system and the negative impact of the reformation in rapid urbanization by learning from political, social, economic, and cultural influences and developing a new rational solution to address the current issues.

During the years, the government, developers, and architects invest money and efforts in the city’s massive development. Still, the potentials of these marginalized urban villages as part of the urban fabric are rarely studied.

This thesis will be analyzing a typical urbanized village neighborhoods in Shenzhen. Based on the analysis, it will be used to compare the new urban renewal approach for upgrading the living condition of marginalized communities and as an opportunity to incorporate a greater variety of socioeconomic groups into the same neighborhood. In the proposal, a series of interventions for the public space of the urban village that benefit both side of government and residents will be delivered through research and design iterations.

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THE PROFOUND VITALITY

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Politics, Identity and Aesthetics Betelehem Asfaw

ORDINANCE AND SPACE

Micaela Becker NON-PLACE MAKING: DE/ FORMING THE BIG BOX Ally Cole THE UNCONVENTIONAL CENTER Colin Cooper

YES, IN GOD’S BACKYARD

JaNae Edwards THE OBJECTS OF OTHERING, THE OTHERING OF OBJECTS Todd Funkhouser SENTINELS OF THE ANTRHOPOCENE John Garrison THE CONTEMPORARY UNCANNY

Brendan Girten LAID PLANS Rachel Green

FACADE OF MANY FACES

Brandon Kroger

DEUS EX MACHINA

De’Sean Morris

FINDING A LOST STYLE

Aaron Tkac THE CHAPEL OF CHRIST THE ÆSIR

Betelehem Asfaw Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Hospitality can be regarded as a cornerstone of Ethiopian culture. The intense social interaction also can be perceived easily even if it is exercised in various ways depending on the number, condition, and locale of the community. Ethiopians are substantially attached to their culture and ethics, and as a result, these inveterate traditions were brought to North America by Ethiopian immigrants. These traditions have been passed on to the second and third generations, though, where and how the new immigrants practice these might differ. In the case of Cincinnati, religious institutions play a major role in being the locus where such traditions are put into practice.

As Ethiopian immigrants began forming a congregation, local church buildings purchased from other religions, mainly Catholic and protestant churches, were used as places of worship as a stopgap measure. However, some of the spaces of the church have to be transformed to abide by Ethiopian Orthodox church ordinances such as a partitioned sanctuary (where the altar rests) and qidist (where communicants stand during liturgy), secluded church building from the ancillary programs, and related space requirements. The ordinances have a great value which distinguishes the Ethiopian church from the other Eastern Orthodox churches that share the same doctrine. As ordinance in the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahdo is defined as a directive of implementing the church’s dogma, it applies to every aspect in the observance of worship since the physical building or the congregation or the human body itself can be referred to as a church.

The rendered spatial adaptations and modifications are very substantial as they revamp the interior space to be efficient for the ritual activity, mainly, in liturgical service. Introducing social interaction into the church building itself, however, has been controversial to envisage with the ordinance, since the communal practice and the church tradition are different in space utilization and character, apart from the specific set decree that the church has regarding the adjoining programs to the sanctuary.

This project analyzes how the home culture is practiced by the diaspora as well as the second and third generation of Ethiopian immigrants in the United States and follows several lines of inquiry.

How can the communal activity co-exist with the church discipline? Which functions go along with the church’s decree? What are the major regulating parameters and space altering directives that bring up the architectural transformations? The research will also scrutinize the programmatic and aesthetic implications triggered while enhancing the remodeled spaces as a case test in spatial exploration. In addition, this project explores how distinct elements of Ethiopian architecture can be sought to be envisioned in the repurposing process and how it can rejuvenate the existing interior or exterior scheme. This study will conclude by examining the effects of spatial evolutions on human perception and experience in contrast with the different accustomed practices and views of an original Ethiopian church building structure and social gathering spaces as they have appeared in immigrant communities in the United States.

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ORDINANCE AND SPACE

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2021 Outstanding Project Award

Micaela Becker Sewickley, PA

An exurb is a district beyond the suburbs and well beyond the city center that can be characterized as a transitional zone from the urban fringe to the rural pastoral, fitting somewhere in between. The American exurbs originally emerged as growth centers that were the outcome of decades of suburban sprawl and the shift towards the aesthetic of the pastoral as people and corporations moved to the urban fringes. Exurbia displays settlement patterns and landscapes that at first glance seem very much a part of the city, but in actuality exist entirely car dependent and devoid of any central business district, making them distinct from their urban predecessors. Exurbia generally consists of architecture that is placeless, lacking any significant markers that make it specific to its site, location, or landscape. This placeless architecture that could exist anywhere in the U.S. is reflective of the global age of consumerism, seen in cookie cutter housing developments, big box retail stores, strip malls, warehouses, condoblock developments and more.

Few building typologies have had as much of an impact on the American exurban landscape and American mind than the big box store. The big box typology first emerged in the early 1970s, and when it did advocates of postmodernism saw the confluence of signage set against the façade as an opportunity to challenge its signifying potential. Through deformation, this thesis seeks to push back against the monotony of form, materiality and organization of the big box store as a provocation of exurbia. The project seeks to challenge the existing form of the big box and present it as a productive element through its deformation and interaction with its surrounding topography to present a novel reading of its possible architectural expression of a non-place.

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NON-PLACE MAKING: DE/FORMING THE BIG BOX 81

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2021 Outstanding Project Award

Ally Cole Greenville, NC

Conventional in its banality, yet unconventional in its representations, the convention center epitomizes a space of architectural plurality in compositional unity. Through the investigation of varying artificial environments producing urban effects, this thesis proposes an architecture of a self-contained internalized world. Through the marriage of the magical and the banal, this proposal reconceptualizes the preconceived notions of a convention center.

This thesis tests the role of architecture in the fragmented city of Seattle, Washington, which functions as the largest company town in the nation. As the effects of a single corporation control an existing community’s infrastructure, this city questions if functional differentiation is the primary factor in societal differentiation. This proposal creates an architecture to foster the inexorable blending of fragments, an architecture that functions as the city Seattle never quite is.

The design of the UnConventional Center will intensify and concentrate urban effects in its program and representation. The preexisting notion of a convention center’s form, program, and relation to the public and its host city will be questioned. Seattle’s UnConventional Center will stand as a perfected collective destiny.

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THE UNCONVENTIONAL CENTER

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2021 Outstanding Research Award

Colin Cooper Cincinnati, OH

It is not the intent of this thesis to provide a reasonable solution for the affordable housing crisis that plagues many American cities today. It is not within the scope of this research to provide answers as to why the affordable housing gap has become so unmanageable.

The intent of this thesis is to illustrate the severity of the affordable housing gap.

The scope of this document is to illustrate the process by which I have identified and refined my resolve. The goal of this document, as well as the research and illustrations herein, is to serve as a provocation for a broader discussion centered around the future of housing and the urban fabric of Cincinnati.

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YES, IN GOD’S BACKYARD

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JaNae Edwards Westerville, OH

This project interrogates why and how architecture and the visual arts have been used a tool of creating the Other, while in turn, the Other uses these same fields as a way of liberating themselves. The basis of this exploration and examination consists of the myriad ways that otherness can be utilized to raise awareness and be a catalyst for change.

The Other has routinely been delegated to the margins of society, vision, and memory. They have often been kept out of the public realm due to their supposed base and animal instincts - their apparent uncleanliness. The Other are often depicted as less than, even lacking, if depicted at all. When one of the Other dares to attempt to leave the margins, they face scrutiny and mistrust; the display of any will of their own is viewed as suspect and dangerous. The popular consensus of those in power is that it is better for those who are “other” to remain silent and unseen, or at the very least, shallow and predictable at the periphery of society.

The Other, as a form of rebellion and subversion, take advantage of their marginalized status and invisibility to subvert power structures, while remaining relatively unnoticed. From the French salon to the black beauty salon, utilizing the margins has allowed the marginalized to grow, develop, and support each other to create a better current and future reality. The Other also subverts existing power structures and norms through the way they represent themselves through fashion, art, and the creation of alternative narratives and stories.

The Objects of Othering, The Othering of Objects is an exhibition proposal that, through the use of five everyday objects, explores the ways one navigates the complexities that arise due to the construction of the Other, and the Other’s refusal to accept the boundaries placed upon them by those in power. Each object reveals aspects of society’s viewing and treatment of the Other, such as erasure and displacement while challenging the gaze and aesthetic norms and celebrates identity and the self.

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THE OBJECTS OF OTHERING, THE OTHERING OF OBJECTS 93

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2021 Outstanding Graduate Student 2021 Henry Adams Medal

Todd Funkhouser Reedsville, WV

Humanity currently lacks direction for the future; society must fundamentally change its ways of living and existing. Societies have shifted away from their agrarian past, and many cities are confronted with densification to accommodate an endless flow of new urbanites. Cities are requiring excessive infrastructure to barely produce enough energy and water for the growing populations.

Consequently, large regions of the country are left geologically ravaged and discarded once they no longer provide resources for the burgeoning society. If humanity does not reflect and understand what lies ahead, more of the Earth will be devastated in the name of progress.

This outlook fuels a new type of architectural discourse, not sustainable, not green, not efficient, but rather pensive and reflective. The new architecture seeks to arrest viewers’ attention then release them into a state of introspection and contemplation much like the sublime artwork and literature of the 18th and 19th centuries. These new approaches need used where they are most impactful: in the presence of humanity’s ecological transgressions to exploit the tensions between historical devastation and existential revelation. An example of this environment is the Inglewood Oilfields in Los Angeles, California. The oilfields are one of the largest undeveloped pieces of land in Los Angeles representing the fraught history of the city’s role in the Industrial Revolution. The richness of the Oilfield’s landscape and history combined with methodologies of the contemporary sublime inform the architecture deployed. Sublime architecture, sculpture, and landscape photography conceptually underpin experiences created in this landscape providing moments of repose, remembrance, and existential reflection. The cumulative experiential effect will provoke visitors to reflect on histories of times past by standing as a reminder of where humanity has been and the future it is tasked with creating.

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SENTINELS OF THE ANTHROPOCENE

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John Garrison Middletown, OH

The architecture of today has consistently followed the common treatise of aesthetics, a dogmatic pursuit of the comfortable, attractive, and beautiful for the masses. Thus, architecture has been most complicit in the concealment of undesirable aspects of our world. In doing so, we are left disassociated away from entire portions and aspects of our lives. This subconscious effort of deterrence therefore leaves us blinded to critical effects of social, political, and environmental issues that physically shape our world.

It is the duty of architects to manifest theory in built form for society to begin to address the underlying issues that affect our lives. If left unresolved, we may fall from these forces that have been alienated away to our periphery vision and suffer estrangement to our conscience leaving us unable to interact with past or future memory. By employing the theory of the Uncanny, we may begin to reveal the grotesque and undesirable aspects of the world and address their implications.

Contemporary and future technologies are continuously developing and cataloging our digital lives as a counterpart to our physical ones. The relatively new typology of the data center now serves a greater purpose and meaning in this dissociative world. Housing a digital duplicate of ourselves, it persists after our death, an impression of our memory that will live on even if we physically perish. By employing the Uncanny, we can begin to reveal the implications of the data center in the contemporary world, as a funerary monument integrated within our built environment rather than hidden away.

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THE CONTEMPORARY UNCANNY: ARCHITECTURE FOR A [DIGITAL] POSTMORTEM 101

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2021 Urban Futures Award

Brendan Girten Cincinnati, OH

New York City /was/is/will always be/ drowning. Past occupations of Manhattan have claimed and developed lands that were historically at risk of perpetual flooding. With the emergent climate emergency of the 21st threatening the future Manhattan with rising sea levels and an increase of storm surges that inundate the coastline, New York City officials took drastic development policy measures.

A No Redevelopment Policy was adopted in hopes of curbing carbon emissions, but New York City is only one metropolis participating in this global phenomenon.

This policy employed various agents to deal with storm debris, storm berm construction, continual occupations of flooded structures, and a shifting and temporal occupation of an ever-evolving ground plane condition. What we 22nd digital historians have been able to reconstruct from the digital archives of the gizmos and gadgets of the 21st century have given us a glimpse into what life was like in Manhattan following the implementation of this policy.

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LAID PLANS

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Rachel Green Moorestown, IN

Skyscrapers of the late 19th century looked vastly different than they do today.

Historically, the skyscraper began as a single form extrusion containing a single program. Throughout history the skyscraper took on many new forms. Zoning and setback laws of the 1960’s changed the way that the skyscraper looked and was thought about. There has always been a race and desire to have the tallest skyscraper in New York City, and as technology developed it allowed for skyscrapers to be built taller. New York City would become one of the most prominent cities for the skyscraper as well as one of the most iconic skylines.

As new heights were reached there was a split from the once ornamental and sculptural skyscraper. Both in past and present day New York City there is an emphasis on designing the tallest and most slender skyscraper. As previously mentioned with the emphasis on height, there was importance placed on the glass tower. Over time this led to the skyscraper becoming an ambiguous and aesthetically standardized building. Office towers and apartment buildings look the same and offer no indication as to what the skyscraper contains. Newer developments have taken over historic parts of New York City and are alien to the architecture surrounding it. While the technology has enabled these skyscrapers to expand, people and historic architecture is forgotten.

This thesis explores the historic and theoretical development of the skyscraper and how to challenge the current entire glass clad skyscraper. Through façade articulation, program, section, relationship to the ground and character, this skyscraper will become a place in which every person can have it all. Through the relationship of both public and private spaces, the skyscraper will transform from an ambiguous, glass tower into something that represents the history of New York City.

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FACADE OF MANY FACES

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2021 Outstanding Thesis Writing

Brandon Kroger Cincinnati, OH

Americans love their history, and they certainly love their historical architecture.

Architecture has always operated in between reality and fiction; the original and the copy, a precedent and an antecedent. history and future. Architect, and architectural representation, would seem to tend towards representations of truth, representations of the time in which they were produced. Architects are engrossed by notions of truth; truth in material, truth in form, etc. But what happens when truth is relative? What if the meanings of symbols, and their associations with time and history, do not matter - in fact, are not allowed to matter? What happens when our digital mechanisms fold multiple readings of history into one, without a beginning or end?

Architecture and urbanism today desires to recycle, reuse and regurgitate a canon of precedent and standard; a canon or a code, (or perhaps a catalogue) is often critically suspect, and are often simply facsimiles divorced from meaning.

But why? Why do Americans in particular obsess over particular styles, fetishized aesthetics or mass produced material approximations? These tend to be smallscale architectural components and details (column covers, statuettes, faux marble, screen printed wood textures, etc.) but also encompass the borrowing of whole projects and building forms, and are usually tied to some specific moment in history: Imperial Roman, Hellenistic Greece, Hindu, Judeo-Christian, Colonial American. Architecture has a long legacy of this, where resonances of projects fluidly move through time, constantly reinterpreting itself; this is essentially the critical intent of Postmodern architecture, but done ironically. One might even correlate the often-taught axiom, “Architects don’t design buildings, we design things that look like buildings.” Even further, one could say Architects design things that look like buildings, which look like other buildings.”

While Postmodern architecture is critically ironic in its resurrection of historic precedent, it reaches a point today where the mechanisms of design simply replicate what we see as historical, without critical intervention; it is Postmodernism, but taken as fact. Design operates within a new modality where architectural production forfeits itself to algorithmic thinking - the Internet, its conduit.

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DEUS EX MACHINA: THE ARCHITECTURE OF THREE FOLLIES IN (WASHINGTON, D.C) 113

De’Sean Morris Baltimore, MD

This thesis suggest that black architecture can start to be defined by interrupting the semiotic structure of films that portray black space. This may occur by introducing new objects to these images or by reassembling preexisting elements. Both would be a method of collaging ideas and by collaging these elements, a new image can be produced which presents new ideas about the action and space that were previously presented in a film or video.

This study follows the notions that the lack of definitive and autonomous black architecture contributes to and perpetuates a lack of definitive black identity; That the continued creation of images that juxtapose black society with architectural strangers of the past facilitate this as well. And that the monetization and incentivization of these images encourages their circulation and consequently their influence on black identity. To find a black architecture, the image of black life must therefore be addressed in tandem with the architecture associated with Black people, the descendants of the international style found in public housing and other urban conditions and typologies.

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FINDING A LOST STYLE

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Aaron Tkac Delaware, OH

The responsive nature of architectural storytelling has equipped the built environment to mesh with its surroundings and to serve the current sociocultural needs of the community that it is a part of. However, the story being told through the architecture is often the same story already being told through the culture, making it redundant and deprived of the imaginative qualities that such a monumental art form should have. Architecture needs to fit into the community, so we assign it a style. Architecture needs to be green, so we put a green roof and some solar panels on it. Architecture should be safe and accessible, so we govern it with code books. Culture calls and architecture responds.

The real potential for architectural storytelling is not in its ability to simply retell the story of a place and people in time, but rather in its ability to create the story of a place and people in time. Through the exploration of the space between what we see as fiction and what we know as reality, the author-designer can imagine new mythological worlds and design for conditions that others may not even consider.

Parafiction, Spectacle, anthropomorphism, and various represen-tation methods provide the author-designer multiple ways in which to explore the space between fiction and reality, a world referred to here as myth. Focusing on religious architecture and its many ties to storytelling throughout time, this thesis aims to study the ways in which architecture can be used to tell a story and to push for a new design methodology which works by creating architecture and story together. Through the distortion of reality into myth, this methodology offers the author-designer the ability to create for the unknown, to imagine new parallel worlds, and to examine what changes – cultural, political, geographical, physical, historical – could lead to the manifestation of that world in reality.

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THE CHAPEL OF CHRIST THE ÆSIR

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Rural and Small-town America

Kelsey DePolo ARCHITECTURE TO SUPPORT A TRANSIENT AMERICA Bryan Raymond PATCHES, FIELDS, AND THE IN-BETWEEN Damario Walker-Brown COTTON IN THE CREVICES: REMNANTS OF A BLACK UTOPIA Lucas Wheeler

APERTURES OF A LINE

2021 Outstanding Thesis Writing

Kelsey DePolo The United States’ labor market is shifting towards temporary gig work, advancing communications technologies are eliminating the need for people to meet in shared physical spaces, and global warming threatens the longevity and livability of cities and towns around the world. In the future, it will be increasingly unnecessary and even ill-advised for humans to attempt to settle permanently in one location, yet the transient populations that currently exist in America are already insufficiently supported by the infrastructural systems in place.

This thesis project proposes a tandem system of mobile architectures and moveable plug-in infrastructure that is designed to provide support to a nearfuture society of an ever-growing number of these transient Americans. By following a caravan of travellers with differing needs and desires on a rather mundane cross-country journey in this hypothesized future, it is revealed that though many of those who will live a nomadic lifestyle are able to do so as a result of social and economic privilege, at least as many will do so out of necessity. For the migrant workers and climate refugees forced into this lifestyle, the proposed mobile architecture and infrastructure would provide a degree of physical and social comfort to its users, but it would likely be unable to provide true respite from the ever-increasing tenuousness of employment and stationary, property-based settlements.

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Bryan Raymond Nashville, TN

Youngstown, Ohio reveals a paradox common among other postindustrial cities: for decades its population, economy, and industries have been in a state of perpetual motion, yet the city itself appears to have come to a halt, lingering in a state of uncertainty. The precarious status of the city has been induced by the departure of its once-powerful steel industry, resulting in the exodus of over half of its peak population. Given its lack of density, the city is now overwhelmed by its accumulated matter, leaving its landscape fragmented and perforated with vacancy and residual spaces. Youngstown joins other Rust Belt cities in the discussion of “shrinking cities,” a term adopted to describe cities that have been impacted by a significant population loss in a relatively short period of time.

In the now diffuse, low-density urban fabric, landscape urbanism holds a newfound relevance, able to take on the role of a framework that catalyzes urban renewal from a large-scale perspective. The thesis also explores the possibilities of achieving urban intensity without density. To this end, the measure of intensity must shift from the quantitative to the qualitative. Intensity is measured not from the mere juxtaposition and accumulation of urban form, but from the overlaps and tensions between dissimilar programs in the process of flux.

The project will speculate on a transition of Youngstown’s landscape into a continuous natural space that involves the intensification of moments within this green network through the harmony of architecture and landscape. First, a broader vision for the city is devised, in which points with high social and economic potential are determined as starting off points for growth. Landscape is asked to take on the role of infrastructure, setting up a framework for uncertainty yet retaining a degree of formal specificity.

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2021 Outstanding Project Award

Damario Walker-Brown Lexington, KY

Mound Bayou, Mississippi is a small community founded by newly freed African-Americans in 1887. Historically known as an agricultural town, it thrived economically, educationally, and spiritually into the first decades of the 20th century while becoming a physical example of the desire of African-Americans to self-determine. By the time of the Great Depression, Mound Bayou began a slow and painful decline with the economic downturn and the introduction and influence of mechanization on agriculture, costing people their livelihoods.

Mound Bayou today stands as memory of a proud historic past worthy of revitalization and reinvestment in its people and their community for continued existence in the 21st century. As a contemporary representation of the concept of a “Just City”, the purpose of this thesis shall be to inquire and examine the current conditions of Mound Bayou. In addition, this will be an exploration of how architecture can serve as a catalyst in conceptualizing a future on how this community can take its first steps to revitalization. The main focus of the design will be a new Community Center and Vocational school serving as way to influence the economic and communal reinvestment into this Mississippi Delta town.

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Lucas Wheeler Florence, KY

Near constant visual stimulation is generated by the surrounding environment every day. The weather conditions, time of day, and time of year all effect how people perceive space. Daylighting produces a powerful range of conditions that transform the perception of building structure and spatial qualities. On the other hand, daylighting creates opportunities to harness solar energy and increase task performance. Environmental factors like brightness, temperature, air quality, and sound accompany the overall aesthetic of a built environment. All of these factors need to be addressed to optimize the user experience.

Light is used as a means to relate, navigate, and derive meaning from inherent building qualities. While light reveals what is present, it can be manipulated to conceal elements such as structure and space. The supremacy of vision has been reinforced by technological innovations that transformed society and their perception of what is present. Through addressing the necessity of the eye in the contemporary era, this project proposes the framework of a museum to be used as a tool to activate sensorial reactions to space. In the same way music is best understood through silence, the way in which light enhances the spatial experience is most readily apparent when we experience darkness.

Architectural space has emotional and psychological effects that are often forgotten about in design consideration. Current museological design often aims to be an object in the city rather than focusing on the collection they house.

Lighting plays an important role in museums where it needs to achieve balance in preserving the art and engaging the visitors. This thesis will investigate the qualitative and quantitative dimensions of space in museums through natural and electrical lighting. Apertures of a Line delves into the relation of perception between light and structure. Through a procession of spaces, this museum offers a new territorial atlas for people to explore their senses in an architectural experience.

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APERTURES OF A LINE

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Sustainability and Environments Nicholas Dorsey

CINCINNATI’S CARBON CAPS

Yining Fang THE INFI-HALL Shelby Leshnak

THE NEW NORMAL

Tyler Kennedy

TECH INTERCHANGE

Lauren Meister OPPORTUNITIES FOR LIMINALITY Chandler Phillpot THE LABYRINTH OF EXPERIENCE Benjamin Riddle

THE MACHINE IN ARENA

Christopher Robie

SYMBIOTIC ARCHITECTURE

Jordan Sauer

MAN AND THE LICK RUN

Sam Williamson TAILORED ARCHITECTURE Dongrui Zhu

MODULAR/ KINETIC FACADES

Nicholas Dorsey Alexandria, KY

The United Nations has bluntly proclaimed that “climate change is a global emergency that goes beyond national borders.” In parts of the world, especially the vulnerable coastal regions and extreme biomes, this statement is a gross understatement as locals are already witnessing their lands and homes transform before their eyes. To residents of other parts of the world, the American Midwest comes to mind, this proclamation may appear exaggerated and ridiculous. To these individuals, the landscape is not significantly changing. Furthermore, if climate change is such an issue, they question, “why isn’t more being done?”

This thesis attempts to broadly address such a question. Specifically, it investigates both current and future developments, policies, and innovations generated to reduce carbon emissions for the building industry, arguably the worst contributor. Many such developments have made the creation of carbon neutral communities an achievable possibility. Some of these proposed communities and their principles are explored. The culmination of such advancements is put forward to explore ways Cincinnati, Ohio, a surprising leader for sustainability in the Midwest, can become a carbon neutral city by 2050. Attention is paid predominantly to the development over the Fort Washington Way highway caps. As of 2020, the Fort Washington Way area is devoid of many principles of sustainable design, but it has great potential to be developed into a thriving, desirable, carbon neutral community of the future.

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CINCINNATI’S CARBON CAPS

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Yining Fang

Jiujiang, Jiangxi, China China currently faces a significant challenge in the educational field. The classteaching system and its congruent educational architecture are out-of-date.

This study aims to determine how modern educational architecture in China developed into the current situation and explore a new typology of classroom building layout that would enhance the teaching-learning efficiency and quality.

The new typology is developed based on the ancient teaching philosophy, while also learning from the experiences of the development and changes of educational architecture in China in each stage for the past 150 years. In this context, a classroom building is defined as the building at a campus that serves the function of teaching and learning with other supportive programs, not a building with only regular classrooms.

To develop this typological layout in a classroom building, besides a series of historical materials, an in-person survey was also distributed to potential users of the chosen site. High school students and teachers were randomly given the survey and asked to express their concerns and thoughts of current campus and school buildings. The results show that integrative and interactive spaces that would provide complex functions are needed.

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THE INFI-HALL

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Shelby Leshnak West Chester, OH

The Covid-19 global pandemic in 2020, has tested companies to their limits.

They have pursued new techniques in the industry through sending employees home for long periods of time. They have had to continue their everyday working lives at home during the pandemic. Overall efforts to create this new normal of working have been successful.

The new normal of working from home will continue past the end of the pandemic, and will remain a new requirement in every working environment. Working from home has created more convenience, cost savings, and satisfaction for employees. Americans will permanently shift their jobs to inside their homes and we will see the city centers beginning to disperse.

Office buildings will become vacant and families will be able to spend more time together. As the shift in culture continues America will see an increase in close knit communities because of social isolation from lack of workplace interaction.

These communities will be formed through personal connection and focus on the prosperity of the community, instead of being based on company office location.

Working from home is the new normal for employees across America and it will change the future outlook on work and home life.

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THE NEW NORMAL

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Tyler Kennedy Angola, IN

To devolve is to degenerate. Architecture of the home is devolving. In nature, evolution propels life forward, determines the strong, and eliminates the weak.

In housing, evolution corrects past error, adapts to an ever-changing occupant, and utilizes the apex of technology of the time, or at least it should. Housing has become unsuitable.

That statement especially rings true when considering the expansive developments of the technological world and their impact on people’s daily lives. In the United States, we have seen the continual production of stick-framed rectilinear housing for hundreds of years. Most of the technological innovation being incorporated into homes and living spaces has to fit within the 16” between studs. They are a “plug-in” product designed to enhance the user’s life. They take on a passive role within the architecture of the home. What if technology became the architecture of living instead of being placed within the home?

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TECH INTERCHANGE

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2021 Service Award

Lauren Meister Cincinnati, OH

Museums as learning institutions have been around for centuries, originating as personal collections within private homes and extending to open exhibitions that anyone may attend. The ritual of attending a museum, similar in manner to other ceremonial activities, is parallel to that of a reverential experience with an additional facet of learning. But how will the postmodern museum look and function? What are strategies developed by museums and cultural centers that will best heighten the overall experience and perspectives gained by visitors? While there are various models of learning and identities that help define typical museum visitors and why they visit, there needs to be a more modern lens applied to this methodology to understand guests in the 21st century, especially in light of recent events including the Covid-19 pandemic. Such places need to be more resilient and flexible to respond to issues presently or imminently existing and not simply to preserve previous moments in time.

By reflecting on previous practices and understanding the present need of institutions such as these, this thesis will explore scenarios in which a modern museum is combined with an academic complex and community cultural center serving a variety of demographics.

The goal of having such a place as a one-stop destination would be to create a large overall snapshot of the University of Cincinnati, Clifton Heights, and greater Cincinnati area communities, engaging diverse groups of people at various levels. A building and surrounding urban design layout are envisioned in proximity to UC’s campus, presented in models and drawings, and described in an in-depth essay extrapolated primarily from research on the narrative experience and relevance of physical museums. The physical nature of the museum will challenge preconceived notions of what these buildings should offer, showing a holistic perspective of what they can grow to be. The investigation also shows how a postmodern museum/cultural center can be associated with other institutions (such as universities) to encourage community conversations. As a result of this thesis project, UC and the Clifton Heights Community Urban Redevelopment Corporation will have a set of contemporary, critical, architectural images which reflect the opportunities available by creating a public learning center that encourages community dialogues while celebrating artifacts and research collected by the University throughout the years. Also, architects, museum curators, exhibition designers, and people associated in other related disciplines will have access to this methodology for making museums and similar cultural centers more participatory and meaningful for the users, locally and globally.

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OPPORTUNITIES FOR LIMINALITY

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Chandler Philpott Cincinnati, OH

This project originates in the abstraction of the idea of the ‘liminal’ or transitional space in rites of passage to an idea of a relative disciplinary space between any two concepts. This abstraction draws a parallel between the idea of subjective experience in general and the specific idea of designing to accommodate this at the intersection between architecture and clinical psychiatric practice.

The archetype of the Labyrinth is demonstrated (in western culture) to be a robust symbol of subjective experience for both architecture and psychiatry, and is selected as the top-down, narrative-drivenmodel for spatialization of the practical interface between the two. For the bottom-up, objective-drivenmodel, a fiveaspect description of Salutogenic design is taken to support the differentiation of physical space. These five aspects are: Self Efficacy; Relaxation Response; Sense of Coherence; Biophilia; Prospect and Refuge. The investigation of the central issue from complementary perspectives leads to the development of a theoretical architectural ‘machine,’ which should support effective treatment of psychological distress: The Labyrinth.

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THE LABYRINTH OF EXPERIENCE

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Benjamin Riddle Cincinnati, OH

Stadia consume extremely high amounts of energy in short periods of time, yet some sit idle for more than half a year and are only used to their full potential as little as one day a week. Given the precious nature of energy, this is an egregiously inefficient use of energy over the lifecycle of the stadia. A stadium can draw enough energy in one game day as it would take to power twelve homes for an entire year, and these extreme spikes in draw and lack of production create a negative balance in energy consumption with limited operations throughout the year.

Situated between sustainability and athletics, this project explores the design of a stadium to develop an envelope design that produces more energy than it uses making it an energy-plus building, allowing the surrounding community to benefit from its presence. In addition to adopting the most current sustainable energy technology this thesis also focus on integrating the site with renewable energy resources while creating an opportunity for people to use the buildings on non-game days, further engaging the public in a new form of public space.

By developing and integrating an envelope that addresses renewable energy resources and materials appropriately selected to benefit the surrounding community, the project specifically takes on the role of harnessing the sun’s energy. The envelope will be site and climate specific to Scottsdale, Arizona,but the core concept of the envelope will be transferable to a variety of sites and climates around the world. Scottsdale, Arizona is known as a winter vacation destination as well as a one of the two homes for major league baseball spring training. This project also explores the creation of public use other than attending sporting events in such stadia, expanding the program to function not only during game days, but every day. A stadium design will be produced for this specific site presented in architectural drawings and models and described in a critical essay which will explore the strategies used in developing the design and envelope.

As a result, this thesis project will have a set of architectural images which could progress the modern design of stadia and architects will have access to methods of integrating energy-plus design into future stadia making them more engaging and beneficial to the community.

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THE MACHINE IN THE ARENA

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Christopher Robie Columbus, OH

Humans spend more than 90% of their time indoors, yet we know little about the health effects of the indoor environment. A healthy body is one of the founding goals of architecture, and throughout history, architecture responds to both the scientific technology of the era and the diseases that plague it.

In the 21st century, increasingly hermetic building envelopes have disconnected the inhabitant from the ecological and environmental systems of the exterior in an attempt to assert tighter environmental control. New research and technology in microbiology points to the advancement of these envelopes as a major factor in reduction of microbial biodiversity in the indoor environment and the human body. This is implicated in a number of negative human health outcomes, most notably sick building syndrome and allergy.1 Psychologically, the hermetic envelope isolates the body and mind from the meteorological, physical, and temporal systems of the environment. These separations from this set of systems points to a necessary evolution of understanding space and the body, where a hermetic envelope disrupts the continuous ecology and environmental connection to the context.

To understand this disconnection, I define a set of three major systems of the environment- Biological systems, Atmospheric systems, and Polychronic systems.

These systems, architectural responses to them, their current disconnection, and potential reconnections are examined in this paper. I propose a design for a home that incorporates and builds on the concepts and objects examined for each system as a basis for design, radically altering existing typologies to provide a new concept of the body and space as continuous ecology, reveal the environmental conditions of space, and develop architectural forms that act as indicators and recorders of the local environment.

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SYMBIOTIC ARCHITECTURE

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Jordan Sauer Cincinnati, OH

We marvel at it, yet we fight it. We need it, yet do not control it. Since the beginning of time, mankind has been intertwined with the elements of nature.

The problem is that man must still have shelter. Architecture is a great mediator between man and the elements. Simple architectural choices can either facilitate or block connections between the two parties. As a result, the relationship between the two has not always been harmonious. Today, the elements are often completely blocked from our buildings and daily life. This blockage can also be seen in other aspects of the built environment like infrastructure.

The ancient Lick Run has been forced through a sewer pipe for over 100 years.

Controlling the watershed has been challenging and resulted in 1.5 billion gallons of combined sewer overflow a year. As a result, a massive 200 million dollar, 1.5 mile long greenway attempting to daylight the Lick Run is nearing completion. This project demolished 92 buildings in an already crumbling neighborhood that is a major transportational thoroughfare.

If the Lick Run Greenway is successful, architecture will harmoniously mediate between humans and the natural elements while fulfilling community needs.

This means architecture must facilitate connections to wind, earth, water, sun, and living organisms. Ultimately, it is an opportunity to jump start a struggling South Fairmount with development that complements the Lick Run and encourages community participation.

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ARCHITECTURAL MEDIATION: MAN AND THE LICK RUN 177

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Sam Williamson Independence, KY

Tailored Architecture aims to design, develop, and build custom homes that allows the consumer to better understand and comprehend the details that are involved in the home making process. Unlike other custom home business models, Tailored Architecture develops a system of informative cards that not only educates the client but also gives them the opportunity to pick how their home is assembled, laid out, detailed, and finished. This results in a more immersive experience with the client and architect that current models do not offer. The success of this model comes from the rudimentary playing cards that the client receives from the architect to determine each element of the home.

We strive to design homes that are tailored to the individual’s lifestyle in every aspect of the home making process.

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TAILORED ARCHITECTURE

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Dongrui Zhu

Pingdingshan, Hunan, China The notion of transformable facades suggests an unconventional design thinking in which both the building exterior’s configuration and functionality changes interchangeably between varied real-time environmental conditions.

As ideas such as energy efficient design, performance driven design, and sustainable design progressively influence more architects, adaptive kinetic building facade systems prove to be an ideal tool to actualize these environment oriented design objectives. Furthermore, an intelligent multifunctional building facade system also provides building users improved indoor comfort level and contributes to sculpting a visually attractive dynamic building facade.

For decades, modern technologies have played a major role in contemporary upscaling climate change. Sleek contemporary urban glass office high-rises pose subtle yet growing risks to the urban environment and worsen the urban habitat. However, evolving technologies can also become an effective tool to combat environmental challenges. This research attempts to find innovative kinetic facade design solutions which contribute to mitigating urban glass office high-rises’ negative environmental effects. Then, the design proposals will be evaluated in terms of indoor lighting performance and the building facade’s visual impact on the immediate surrounding context.

Overall, this thesis explores retrofitting an existing office high-rise with modular kinetic facade systems and speculates the possibility of embedding kinetic components into future office high-rise designs. In P1, the research methodology starts with precedent case studies where the study concentrates on extracting applicable kinetic concepts and components from each precedent. In P2, experimental modular kinetic facade systems are generated with overarching design goals, which aim to block undesirable sunlight while continuing to admit sufficient daylight and create visually dynamic building facades. The proposed modular kinetic facade demonstrates how the system can help convert existing urban glass office high-rises into a safer and more eco-friendly influencer of the urban habitat.

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MODULAR/KINETIC FACADES

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SAID 2021 Book Design: Brandon Kroger