MA PORTFOLIO

ABSTRACT

This portfolio traces my development as an architectural student, from early hand sketches and spatial studies to resolved architectural proposals, technical drawings, visualisations, physical models, and research-led design.

The drawings on the right are hand-drawn studies collected across my life sketches of historic structures, architectural precedents, and spatial explorations made long before formal education began. They represent where my curiosity for architecture first took shape: through observation, proportion, and the discipline of drawing by hand.

From that foundation, the work in this portfolio grew in ambition and clarity. My interests have consistently moved around people, place, heritage, sustainability, and the relationship between architecture and the city. I am drawn to buildings that respond honestly to their context, carry memory, and offer something useful to the communities around them.

The progression here is not only in design ambition but also in communication plans became clearer, sections more informative, renders more atmospheric, and technical details more resolved. It is a record of learning how to think, question, and communicate architecture with increasing confidence.

Everything presented is my own work.

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CONTENT

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HOUSE FOR SIX PLANS / SITE ANALYSIS / VISUALISATIONS / DOMESTIC ORGANISATION

PAGE | 04–06 ACADEMIC / INDIVIDUAL PROJECT MUSEUM OF EXTINCT SPECIES PLANS / VISULISATION / TECHNICAL SECTION

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PAGE | 07–09 ACADEMIC / INDIVIDUAL PROJECT

This portfolio is arranged as a journey from early architectural studies to final-year design resolution. Sections 3–5 represent my final-year projects and are therefore given greater emphasis within the portfolio.

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These projects mark the strongest stage of my development, showing a shift from individual building design toward more complex architectural thinking programme strategy, technical development, documentation, physical modelling, adaptive reuse, and wider urban systems. Together, they demonstrate how my design approach, visual communication, and technical understanding became most fully resolved during the final year.

THE HARVEST PLANS / PROGRAMME STRATEGY / TECHNICAL DETAILING / DOCUMENTATION / PHYSICAL MODEL / URBAN NETWORK

PAGE | 10–18 ACADEMIC / INDIVIDUAL PROJECT LESLIE YARD MASTERPLAN / ADAPTIVE REUSE / TECHNICAL RESOLUTION / PHYSICAL MODEL / LANDSCAPE STRATEGY

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PAGE | 19–25 ACADEMIC / INDIVIDUAL PROJECT CIRCULAR RESISTANCE THEORY / URBAN RESEARCH / WRITTEN INVESTIGATION / CRITICAL REFLECTION

PAGE | 27 ACADEMIC RESEARCH / PUBLICATION

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HOUSE FOR SIX MULTI-GENERATIONAL DWELLING IN OUSEBURN THIS IS A MULTI-GENERATIONAL DWELLING DESIGNED FOR A FAMILY OF SIX IN OUSEBURN, NEWCASTLE, OVERLOOKING THE RIVER TYNE. THE PROJECT RESPONDS TO A DENSE POST-INDUSTRIAL CONTEXT THROUGH A LAYERED DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE SHAPED BY PRIVACY, DAYLIGHT, AGEING, AND SHARED FAMILY LIFE. THE HOUSE USES RECLAIMED BRICK, CONCRETE, STEEL, BREEZE BLOCK SCREENS, AND LARGE AREAS OF GLAZING TO CONNECT WITH THE INDUSTRIAL CHARACTER OF OUSEBURN WHILE CONTROLLING VIEWS FROM THE STREET. ITS STEPPED MASSING AND INTERNAL ORGANISATION SEPARATE PRIVATE ROOMS FROM SHARED SPACES, ALLOWING THE HOME TO SUPPORT DIFFERENT GENERATIONS WITHOUT ISOLATING THEM. THE PROJECT EXPLORES THE IDEA OF A COMPACT URBAN HOUSE THAT FEELS PROTECTED, ROOTED, AND OPEN AT THE SAME TIME.

OUSEBURN, NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE YEAR TWO / SEMESTER ONE ARCHITECTURE STUDIO RESIDENTIAL / MULTI-GENERATIONAL HOUSING RECLAIMED BRICK, CONCRETE, STEEL, BREEZE BLOCK, GLASS

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SITE, MASSING & CONTEXT ANALYSIS Site analysis informed the dwelling’s massing, orientation, privacy, and material strategy. Layers of movement, land use, traffic, noise, sun path, wind, and surrounding building heights were studied to understand how the house should respond to Ouseburn’s post-industrial context.

ROOFTOP SOLAR STRATEGY LIGHTWEIGHT PRIVACY SCREENING TERRACED OUTDOOR SPACE

FIRST FLOOR BASEMENT LIGHTWELL PRIVATE SLEEPING ZONE

CONTROLLED STREET FRONTAGE VERTICAL CIRCULATION CORE OPEN-PLAN FAMILY LIVING

GROUND FLOOR ACCESSIBLE RAMPED ENTRY BREEZE BLOCK SCREEN WALL

BASMENT

EXPLODED DIAGRAM The stepped massing arranges private and shared spaces around light, views, circulation, and external terraces, allowing the home to support six family members across different generations. The separated floor plates also show how the dwelling organises users by age and daily routine, with elderly family members placed on the ground floor for easier access, while younger and more private sleeping spaces are arranged across the upper and lower levels. This spatial organisation is explored further through the 2D plans.

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DOMESTIC ORGANISATION & LIVING SPACES

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BASMENT LEVEL 01. Reading Area, 02. Highschool Student room, 03. University Student Room 04. Bathroom 05. Basment Courtyard

GROUND LEVEL 01. Living Room, 02. Kitchen, 03. Dinning Room 04. Office Room 05. GrandParent Room 06. Bathroom 07. Terrace

FIRST LEVEL 01. Master Room, 02. Highschool Student, 03. Bathroom 04. Rooftop Terrace

The plans organise a multi-generational household around shared living, privacy, daylight, and retreat.

Communal spaces are centred around the kitchen, dining, and living areas, while private rooms are separated across levels to give each generation independence.

Interior views show how material warmth, brick, glass, and controlled daylight create a domestic atmosphere connected to Ouseburn’s industrial character.

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MUSEUM OF EXTINCT SPECIES PUBLIC MUSEUM AND ENVIRONMENTAL E X H I B I TI O N I N O U S E B U R N

MUSEUM OF EXTINCT SPECIES IS A PUBLIC MUSEUM IN OUSEBURN, NEWCASTLE, DESIGNED TO RAISE AWARENESS OF EXTINCTION, ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE, AND THE CLIMATE CRISIS. THE PROJECT COMBINES PERMANENT EXHIBITION SPACES, TEMPORARY INSTALLATIONS, EDUCATION AREAS, PUBLIC GATHERING SPACES, AND A CENTRAL CIRCULATION VOID. THE BUILDING ACTS AS BOTH MUSEUM AND URBAN CONNECTOR, LINKING THE STREET EDGE WITH THE RIVERSIDE THROUGH A VISIBLE INTERNAL ROUTE. ITS MATERIAL LANGUAGE OF BRICK, STEEL, GLASS, CONCRETE, AND TERRACOTTA RESPONDS TO OUSEBURN’S INDUSTRIAL CHARACTER WHILE CREATING A PUBLIC LANDMARK FOR REFLECTION, LEARNING, AND ENVIRONMENTAL AWARENESS.

OUSEBURN, NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE YEAR TWO / SEMESTER TWO ARCHITECTURE STUDIO MUSEUM / PUBLIC EXHIBITION BRICK, STEEL, GLASS, CONCRETE, TERRACOTTA

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SPATIAL ORGANISATION & PROGRAMME

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EXHIBITION EXPERIENCE & ENVELOPE DETAILING The museum’s exhibition spaces are designed as a sequence of immersive environments, moving from habitat-based displays to darker reflective spaces focused on extinction, preservation, and environmental damage.

PERMANENT EXHIBITION: PRESERVED SPECIES AND SKELETAL DISPLAY

Technical section - Envelope wall section and façade assembly

HABITAT DISPLAY SEQUENCE

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THE HARVEST URBAN GASTRONOMY HUB IN NEWC ASTLE The Harvest is an urban gastronomy hub in Newcastle’s Creative and Cultural Zone, designed around food, learning, sustainability, and community exchange. The project brings together hydroponic growing, culinary education, recipe development, dining, and rooftop planting within a transparent greenhouse-like structure.

Located on St John Street near Grainger Market, Central Station, and St John’s Church, the building responds to Newcastle’s historic urban fabric while introducing a new public destination for food culture. Its glass, timber, steel, and brick language reflects the project’s ambition: to make the lifecycle of food visible, from growing and cooking to sharing and giving back.

ST JOHN STREET, NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE YEAR THREE / PROJECT 3.1 / SEMESTER ONE URBAN GASTRONOMY / FOOD CULTURE / HYDROPONIC FARMING GLASS, TIMBER, STEEL, BRICK

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INTERIOR SEQUENCE & FOOD CULTURE

The Harvest is organised as a visible food journey, moving from production to preparation, exchange, and dining. Visitors enter through the hydroponic grow room, where crops are cultivated under controlled light as part of an urban farming system. Food production is therefore exposed from the beginning, turning the building into both a public destination and an educational environment.

HYDROPONIC GROW ROOM

MARKET

URBAN FARMING DISPLAY

RECIPE LAB

COMMUNITY LOUNGE

COMMERCIAL KITCHEN

RESTAURANT AND BAR

ROOFTOP DINING GARDEN

The sequence continues through the farming display, market, recipe lab, commercial kitchen, lounge, restaurant, and rooftop dining garden. Each space reveals a different stage of the food lifecycle: growing, selecting, testing, preparing, cooking, eating, and sharing.

Rather than presenting food as a finished product, The Harvest treats it as a cultural and environmental process. The building connects sustainability, learning, hospitality, and social exchange through one continuous interior journey from farm to fork.

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CIRCULATION, PROGR AMME & FLOOR ORGANISATION

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INTERNAL FIN ISHES & SERVICE INTEGRATI ON Material Atmosphere / Lighting / Ventilation / Building Services

A SOUTH-FACING SECTION SHOWCASING THE INTERNAL SPATIAL ORGANISATION

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TECHNICAL RESOLUTION & ENVELOPE DETAILING

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PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE & RISK MANAGEMENT

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PHYSICAL MODEL & FAÇADE STUDY The physical model explores façade rhythm, structure, transparency, and shadow. Timber fins, exposed framing, glazed volumes, and roof geometry were tested to understand how The Harvest sits within its urban context.

The illuminated model shows the building as a public landmark, revealing internal activity while creating a layered threshold between the street and the food hub.

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The city-scale strategy positions The Harvest as an anchor within Newcastle’s food, cultural, and educational network. From St John Street, the project connects toward Grainger Market, Central Station, the universities, Ouseburn, Sunday Market, House of Tides, Ouseburn Farm, and other cultural destinations.

The pop-up system allows the project’s values to move beyond the building itself, creating temporary points of contact across the city. These small interventions can support food education, surplus food distribution, urban farming awareness, and public gathering, forming a wider network of exchange.

Together, the building and pop-up create a woven urban system: one permanent civic hub and a series of flexible extensions that spread the culture of growing, cooking, sharing, and giving back.

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U R B AN F O O D A N D CU L T U R E N E T W O R K THE HARVEST POP-UP NETWORK: CONTRIBUTING TO FOOD CULTURE, URBAN FARMING, AND THE 25M × 25M URBAN GRID

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LESLIE YARD REGE NERAT IVE REPAIR HUB IN HEBBURN

Leslie Yard transforms the former Hawthorn Leslie Shipyard in Hebburn into a regenerative repair hub rooted in industrial memory, ecology, and community repair. Rather than erasing the abandoned shipyard, the project works with its existing warehouses, dry dock, jetties, and landscape scars to create a new civic destination on the River Tyne.

The proposal brings together repair workshops, exhibition spaces, a community auditorium, ferry access, ecological planting, and a dry dock bio-pool.

It reimagines the riverfront as a public landscape where industrial heritage, social purpose, and environmental recovery can coexist.

HEBBURN, SOUTH TYNESIDE YEAR THREE / PROJECT 3.2 / SEMESTER TWO ADAPTIVE REUSE / REPAIR HUB / REGENERATIVE LANDSCAPE CORTEN STEEL, RETAINED BRICK, STEEL FRAME, GLASS, WILD PLANTING

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LESLIE YARD MASTERPLAN REPAIR, ECOLOGY, AND RIVERFRONT RECONNECTION The masterplan reimagines the former Hawthorn Leslie Shipyard as a regenerative riverfront landscape. Rather than erasing the site’s industrial remains, the proposal works with the retained warehouse frame, brick office building, dry dock, jetties, and service yards, adapting them into a civic network of repair, exhibition, performance, ecology, and river access.

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01. The Leslie Foundation| The former Hawthorn Leslie office is reused as a civic threshold, combining heritage, public programme, and community identity.

02. The Echo & Archive | Retained warehouse frame reused as a public auditorium and archive, holding the site’s industrial memory through new cultural life.

-E 03. Repair Pop-Up Containers | Reused shipping containers converted into small repair stations, supporting local making, tool reuse, and circular economy activity.

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The interventions shown on the right illustrate the key components of this strategy, reconnecting Hebburn with the River Tyne while transforming a fragmented post-industrial site into a public landscape of memory, repair, ecology, and community life.

04. Dry Dock Bio-Pool | The existing dry dock is reimagined as a natural pool and ecological landscape, turning industrial infrastructure into public restoration.

05. Event Jetty & Ferry Terminal | The river edge is reactivated through ferry access, events, and viewing platforms, reconnecting Hebburn with the River Tyne.

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E X P L O D E D A X ON O M E T R I C & A D A P T I V E RE U S E S T R A T E G Y The exploded axonometric reveals how Leslie Yard works with the retained industrial shell rather than replacing it.

The existing warehouse frame is preserved as a structural memory of the shipyard, while new interventions are inserted below and around it to create public, cultural, and ecological programmes.

The roof is lifted to expose the relationship between old and new, showing how the retained frame, new envelope, circulation routes, civic spaces, and landscape interventions operate as one regenerative system.

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THE ECHO | Auditorium

SOUTH-WEST ELEVATION

LONGITUDINAL SECTION THROUGH THE ECHO

AUDITORIUM STAGE VIEW

SEATING AND ACOUSTIC CEILING

CIRCULATION CORE AND RETAINED FRAME

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T H E L E S L I E F O U N D A T I O N: C O M M U N I T Y & O P E R A T I O N S H U B

01. RECEPTION & ARRIVAL HALL | Main entrance and connection point between buildings.

02. CAFETERIA | Dining space with coffee bar, kitchen, pastries, snacks, and WC. 03. TEMPORARY EXHIBITION SPACE | Flexible space for exhibitions, events, and workshops.

04. CIRCULATION CORE | Main stair, lift, and accessible circulation routes.

05. PLANT ROOM | Building services and mechanical equipment.

06. STORAGE & WC | Operational storage and public toilet facilities 07. MAINTENANCE GARAGE | Storage and maintenance hub for site equipment.

08. MARKET SQUARE | Outdoor space for markets, events, and community activities.

09. PATH TO TERRACE | Hidden pathway leading to a viewing terrace and informal seating area.

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GROUND FLOOR PLAN

FACADE OF THE LESLIE FOUNDATION

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TECHNICAL WALL & FOUNDATION DETAIL

Exploded 3D assembly illustrating the relationship between the corten steel rainscreen façade, acoustic wall build-up, and secondary steel structure.

3D axonometric technical render illustrating the proposed auditorium wall build-up and NV7 corten steel rainscreen façade system. The external envelope is fixed to a secondary steel structure, where HE200A members transfer vertical loads and RHS 160×100×6.3 sections provide horizontal support through bolted plate connections. The assembly comprises micro-perforated acoustic timber panels, acoustic absorption backing layer, plasterboard lining, steel stud framing, mineral wool acoustic insulation, rigid air barrier, Proctor Passive Wraptite SA membrane, DCT Vulcanwool insulation, Nvelope single sliding and double fixed brackets, vertical cassette rail profiles, cassette hangers, EPDM sealing tape, rail fixings, a ventilated cavity, and corten steel cassette cladding panels secured with stainless steel fasteners. Together, these components create a durable, adaptable, and high-performance building envelope, delivering acoustic control, thermal efficiency, weather protection, and a robust architectural expression that reflects the industrial heritage of Leslie Yard.

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TECHNICAL STRATEGIES & INTERVENTIONS

The bio pool utilises a closed-loop water circulation and filtration system integrated within the existing dry dock structure. Water is drawn from the pool through a submerged intake chamber and pumped through a series of planted filtration beds containing gravel media, wetland vegetation, and biological treatment layers. The filtration process removes suspended particles and improves water quality before returning clean water back into the pool. Existing dock walls are retained and adapted to accommodate concealed pipework, drainage channels, and maintenance access points. This approach transforms the former industrial infrastructure into a functioning ecological water management system while minimising mechanical intervention and supporting long-term environmental performance.

DRY DOCK BIO POOL | TECHNICAL SECTION

The suspended catwalk system creates an elevated connection between Bay A and Bay B through a lightweight, reversible steel intervention.

Secondary IPE members, steel grating panels, and cable cross-bracing span between primary beams to provide circulation, viewing platforms, and exhibition access while preserving the existing industrial fabric of Leslie Yard.

SUSPENDED CATWALK STRUCTURAL STRATEGY

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CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT & PHYSICAL MODELLING

Digital massing model used to test programme distribution, circulation routes, and landscape interventions.

Site topography laser cut from layered card and assembled to represent the existing landscape and dry dock conditions.

The design process was developed through a series of physical and digital models exploring site topography, industrial heritage, structural systems, and spatial organisation. Iterative model making enabled the testing of massing, circulation, landscape integration, and adaptive reuse strategies, informing the final proposal and strengthening the relationship between architecture, infrastructure, and the existing shipyard fabric.

Structural Framework Assembly | Warehouse Physical and digital models, fabricated from acrylic and metal, were used to test the auditorium's primary steel structure, spatial enclosure, and construction strategy.

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CIRCULAR RESISTANCE: RESEARCH PUBLICATION

Circular Resistance: Rewiring the Urban Periphery in the Age of Entanglement investigates the evolution of modernist urban planning and its contemporary manifestation within the infrastructural landscapes of Cobalt Park, Newcastle. The publication critically examines Le Corbusier’s *Radiant City* as a model of order, efficiency, and functional separation, comparing it to the fragmented realities of contemporary data parks, logistics infrastructure, and peripheral urban development. Through a combination of critical theory, speculative drawings, diagrams, collages, and visual artefacts, the research explores themes of the Anthropocene, entanglement, hyperobjects, infrastructure, and post-human urbanism. Rather than viewing the urban periphery as residual space, the project repositions it as an active system shaped by global flows of data, energy, labour, and ecology. The study ultimately proposes a circular urban strategy that challenges the rigid zoning and linear growth models inherited from modernism, advocating instead for interconnected, adaptive, and ecologically responsive forms of urban development.

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Thank You Thank you for taking the time to view my portfolio.

This collection represents my architectural journey, development, and progression across design, research, technical resolution, and visual communication. I hope the work gives a clear sense of my interests, approach, and ambition as a designer.

Mohammad Al-Dabbagh Email: mohammad.102001@gmail.com Phone: + 44 744 510 7198 LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/mohammad-al-dabbagh Location: Leeds, United Kingdom

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