Portfolio

Marie Zenzie 3rd Year B.Arch Portfolio Virginia Tech School of Architecture

Boat House & Sailing Center

04-11

3rd Year / Fall 2024 13 Weeks

Nature Observatory Guest Retreat

14-19

2nd Year / Spring 2024 11 Weeks

Cambria Passenger Station Competition

20-23

3rd Year / Fall 2024 1 Week

Documentation of 1908 Quaker Cabin

24-27

Post-2nd Year / Summer 2024 7 Weeks

King St. Restrooms AIA Competition 3rd Year / Spring 2025 3 Days 02

28-29

Cadence Pavilion

30-33

2nd Year / Fall 2023 3 Weeks

Horticulture Garden Shed

34-37

2nd Year / Fall 2023 3 Weeks

Pin-Up Pavilion

38-39

2nd Year / Fall 2023 1 Week

Collection

40-43

2nd Year / Fall 2023 1 Week

Selected Artworks

44-47

2023 & 2024

03

structure to shore to lake Both buildings are positioned in relation to the shore, creating an intermediary space for outdoor instruction.

Boat House & Sailing Center Claytor Lake, VA 3rd Year / Fall 2024 13 Weeks 4,950 sq ft This sailing facility complex accommodates the Virginia Tech Sailing Club and their boats. The program is split between a conditioned center located inland and a partially-covered boat house and dock network situated on the shore.

04

1/16” scale site axonometric 24” x 36” tagboard

3rd Year / 13 Weeks

05

Boat House & Sailing Center

06

3rd Year / 13 Weeks enclosure of light Six large, sail-like fabrics hang from cables attached to the beams and foundation. They shade the boat house’s interior from the south-eastern sun and provide a delicate layer of enclosure.

optical tapestry Arrival at the sailing pavilion’s delta via boat assumes the viewer to have their perspective blurred by water, sunscreen, bright rays, and reflections. The architecture and environment are distilled to figures of line, form, and color.

3/16” scale axonometric, layered 24” x 36” tagboard & trace paper

07

Boat House & Sailing Center

Section 01

Section 02

Section 01

docking, storage, & instruction

Section 02

08

The boat house’s interior can host eight sailboats: four harbored and four hung from a cable pulley system. Ampitheatre style seating allows for outdoor teaching on the water.

3/16” scale basswood model photograph render

3rd Year / 13 Weeks

09

Boat House & Sailing Center

3/16” scale strucutral axonometric, layered 24” x 36” tagboard & trace paper

schooling, service, & storage Interior spaces include a conference room, office, small library, kitchenette, open storage foyer, and restrooms with showers.

Covered storage to the left is for sailboats with their masts down.

10

3rd Year / 13 Weeks

procession The covered pathway permeates the building, concealing the entrances and framing a view of the lake. The large front windows and column arcade open the facade.

11

Sketchbook

12

2nd & 3rd Year

13

reciprosity The gift of site requires delicate reciprocation. The plan is treated as a series of embedded rooms connected by a system of pathways rather than one dwelling unit.

Nature Observatory Guest Retreat Heritage Park, VA 2nd Year / Spring 2024 11 Weeks 4,490 sq ft This guest house is designed to accommodate nine friends visiting for weekend excursions to explore local natural areas.

1/8” scale elevation through ground Mulberry Prismacolor pencil on 24” x 36” tagboard

14

2nd Year / 11 Weeks

1/8” scale site double section model 24” x 36”

15

Nature Observatory Guest Retreat

earth to dwelling to sky The retreat is partially embedded; thick stone walls taper and culminate in perimeter cleretories. Defined floor to ceiling windows pair with carved landscape channels. The roof structure prioritizes natural light.

16

2nd Year / 11 Weeks

17

Nature Observatory Guest Retreat

reflection The observation tower above a meditation chamber allows guests to reflect on their natural surroundings. The qualifications of a “tower” are redefined regarding vertical height and visibility. The light shaft illuminates the underground alcove below.

18

2nd Year / 11 Weeks

19

Cambria Passenger Station Competition *Second Place Cambria Yard, VA 3rd Year / Fall 2024 1 Week 3,150 sq ft This proposed train station for the New River Valley is designed to accommodate varying levels of transportation and movement. Fluid exterior to interior transitions welcome passengers into the station and allow people to move efficiently. *All work shown was completed within the competition’s given six days.

20

3rd Year / 1 Week

3/8” scale section model 18” x 24”

a place for waiting The roof above the interior waiting space opens up into a glass atrium, where passengers can see both the arrival of trains and vehicles for pick-up.

21

Cambria Passenger Station Competition

22

3rd Year / 1 Week

3/16” scale axonometric 24” x 36” tagboard

circulation The southern entrance welcomes quick pick-ups and drop-offs from the back road. The bridge invites pedestrain entry and culminates in an overlook facing the train tracks.

23

decay The wood conditions of the cabin exhibit histories of repair, layers of staining, natural weathering, and structural decay over the past century.

Documentation of 1908 Quaker Cabin Independent Sustained Investigation Pocono, PA Post-2nd Year / Summer 2024 7 Weeks 2,640 sq ft This dwelling garners an essence of place through its history, local values, and natural surroundings. Built in 1908, my family’s cabin in a secluded Quaker community has served as the architectural heart for annual summer festivities of many generations. This cabin is clad with memory, ancestry, and natural bliss.

Between uninsulated walls and eaves, sublime new growth seeps through, including ferns, spiders, moths, dragonflies, and bats (as well as the occasional bear break-in). This is the marrow that defines familial and religious Quaker values of simplicity, natural connection, peace, and community.

24

In anticipatory memoriam of the cabin’s demolition in October 2024 (due to structural decay), I spent my weekends of that summer documenting its existing structure and architectural conditions. For these handdrafted drawings, I referenced an architect’s baseline dimensions of the cabin, although I took the majority of measurements by hand while spending weekends there to draw and document.

Post-2nd Year / 7 Weeks

all drawings drafted at 1/4” scale 18” x 24” vellum and tagboard

framework The structural beam & eave plan serves as a reflected ceiling plan. Exposed framework, lack of insulation, and the material promenance of wood have structural candor.

25

Documentation of 1908 Quaker Cabin

East Elevation

North Elevation

West Elevation

South Elevation

26

Post-2nd Year / 7 Weeks

Second Floor & Roof Plans (layered)

First Floor Plan

27

King St. Restrooms AIA Competition *School-Level Finalist Alexandria, VA 3rd Year / Spring 2025 3 days 2,200 sq ft The proposed architecture revitalizes the existing covered metro station space. In addition to necessary ADA-compliant utilites, the side spaces include private childcare & nursing rooms as well as seating.

The ‘carved’ outside space provides a gathering destination for large school groups, children who may have lost their parents, friends meeting at the station, or people searching for directions. *All work shown was completed within the competition’s given three days.

28

3rd Year / 3 Days

eddy & illumination Masoned partitions of glass block and brick create a free plan of efficient pedestrian flow. Sunlight is captured by the curved glass block walls and diffused into the space.

29

Cadence Pavilion Forest Grove Clearing 2nd Year / Fall 2023 3 Weeks 1,840 sq ft The pavilion’s modulation and spatial sequencing provide its title of ‘Cadence.’ This architecture encourages a type of methodical procession, varying based on the time of day.

30

exploded axonometric, layered 18” x 24” vellum & trace paper

2nd Year / 3 Weeks

schema The pavilion’s diagrammatic floorplan is iterated to create the patterns of the 34 sliding doors.

31

Cadence Pavilion

module & structure A modular structural & track system allows the pavilion’s 34 sliding doors to move. Different interior spaces are created throughout the day to emphasize various architectural patterns and pedestrian flows based on the sun path.

32

2nd Year / 3 Weeks

circadian configuration The morning sun highlights the east, open entrance of the pavilion. By dusk, the configuration of doors creates further enclosure and emphasizes the sunken west room.

33

Horticulture Garden Shed Hahn Horticulture Garden, VA 2nd Year / Fall 2023 3 Weeks 66 sq ft This shed humbly serves the care of its local landscape by storing necessary equipment for Virginia Tech’s Hahn Horticulture Garden. Its design is subservient to the landscape’s natural beauty. In this manner, the shed is not a statement of its own, but regarded by its modest purpose to sustain the garden.

34

2nd Year / 3 Weeks

utility & order Division of the plan into primary, secondary, and tertiary use spaces increases accessibility and efficiency by utilizing compartmentalization.

35

Horticulture Garden Shed

release The shed’s embedded gutter system releases water at two points on its back-facing side.

Landscaped drainage allows rain to flow down the natural slope of the topography.

36

2nd Year / 3 Weeks

roof to column to floor Elevations and sections display the shed’s exposed beam to column relationships. The partitions’ apertures create a sense of transparency.

37

Pin-up Pavilion

Pin-Up Pavilion *Competition Finalist Burchard Hall, Blacksburg, VA 2nd Year / Spring 2024 1 Week 400 sq ft Contemplation, critique, and revision are at the core of an architectural education, although many students grow numb to their projects while rooted to their desks. This sequestered space encourages students to pin-up in-progress work, reflect, practice for reviews, and discuss ideas with peers. *All work shown was completed within the competition’s given six days.

38

2nd Year / 1 Week

adjustable exposure A thin curtain along the perimeter allows for flexible levels of privacy within the space.

39

craft & process This work was created with an oil-based printmkaing ink and a metal paint palette knife.

Collection 2nd Year / Fall 2023 1 Week 18” x 24” posters The merit of craft and analog means of creation often becomes lost within an increasingly digitized society.

Although technology allows for greater applied precision, there is an equal value placed on the precision of idea, method, technique, process, and act of making.

40

2nd Year / 1 Week

41

Collection

42

2nd Year / 1 Week

Process in relation to “product” and the idea of finality.

Ode to the iterative process & the design principle of repetition and pattern.

Underlying structure & reasoning beneath the drawn construction of a design.

43

Selected Artworks My approach to painting and drawing is fundamental to how I design architecture. The process of layering is a way of thinking that is paralleled between various creative methods. The practice of pause and observation is crucial to an artist and designer in order to both discern and construct detail.

44

2023 & 2024

MotherMother (2024) acrylic on canvas 18” x 24”

45

Selected Artworks

Archive of Musings (2023) acrylic on canvas 18” x 24”

46

2023 & 2024

Remnants (2024) acrylic on canvas 18” x 24”

47

Marie Zenzie zmarie@vt.edu