Architecture Portfolio

PLACE - [MAKING] crafting connective + creative ecosystems

MATTHEW TEPPER selected works

contents table of

04.

MONTICELLO INNOVATION CENTER Charlottesville, VA

08.

MATERIALIZING JUSTICE: COURTyard/house

14.

NYC AQUATIC + WELLNESS CENTER

18.

HOUSING MATTERS: RICHMOND RETREAT

22.

CHARLOTTESVILLE CULINARY INSTITUTE

Staunton, VA

New York, NY

Richmond, VA

Charlottesville, VA

26.

2

PROFESSIONAL RENDERINGS Coastal Virginia

Hillside Retreat, completed January 2023 (personal project)

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01. COMMUNITY MAKERSPACE ARCH 3020: HIGH SCHOOL INNOVATION CENTER

WHERE: Monticello High School Charlottesville, VA

WHEN: May 2023 Professor Bobby Vance

The Monticello High School Innovation Center aims to promote display, making, and learning as integrated elements through its community-driven focus and atrium gathering and event space. The storefront makerspace concept organizes learning, making, and display as a unified space, a connective, underground point linking the public atrium space and student-focused learning and making buildings. Limiting the site’s exposure enables cooler temperature spaces, maximizes ideal lighting conditions, and prevents extensive southern exposure. The centralized outdoor pathway curates a connection between the existing school, landscape, and pond by embedding into the topography. Landscaping enables an extension of the program not solely as a circulation but clearly defines entrances and methods of procession. Mass timber is the primary building element, where the public atrium is an airy framing concept versus the heaviness of the student making building, despite wood serving as common material. Each above-ground moment is aligned as a 20 by 20-foot grid, paralleling the underground makerspaces. The program consists of various making spaces, both physical and digital, geared to the programmatic needs of high school students and how the community can become involved and integrated.

5 FT. X 5 FT. MODULE

COLLAPSABLE WINDOW DISPLAY

MOVES BOTH DIRECTIONS

PEGBOARD SYSTEM

Makerspace 20’ x 50’ Concept

Diagrams: Form, Program 4

MOVABLE WALL

Site Plan

36 Inch Wood Section Model

01. INNOVATION CENTER

Exterior Perspective

Atrium, Display + Makerspace Perspective 5

Perspective Section

Site Section 6

01. INNOVATION CENTER

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02. COURTyard/house

ARCH 4010: MATERIALIZING JUSTICE WHERE: The Wharf District Staunton, VA

WHEN: December 2023 Professor Seth McDowell

The courthouse aims to serve the Staunton community not just as a government building but also as a hub for community engagement and activity to enhance The Wharf and adjacent downtown Beverley neighborhoods. Excessive surface parking lots like this site threaten safety and stifle human interaction and sociability. The site intends to foster a vibrant, cohesive identity through a newly constructed courthouse and pavilion structure that bridge together through a unified courtyard. The site is most notable for the Staunton Farmers Market, held every weekend. A pavilion-like structure intends to provide permanent space for local producers and vendors. The central courtyard can offer an opportunity for community and civic engagement, in addition to public programming for vocational-driven classrooms and two multi-purpose spaces with street-facing views. The advancement of future courthouse design begins questioning the past’s classical architectural forms and the distinction and architectural language of courthouses and courtyards. Rather than the traditional hierarchical architecture model to implement an elevated condition for grandeur, the subtracted nature creates a more comfortable and human-centric understanding of the courthouse and its responsibility as a civic center. The project centers around four distributed courtyards as an opportunity to highlight natural light in various zones and provoke a balance between transparency and privacy. Programming is arranged in a series of strips, from private on the west side to public on the east side, with the courtyard anchoring the arrangement.

COURTYARD COURT

“an unroofed area that is completely or mostly enclosed by the walls of a large building”

“assembly held by a sovereign”

COURTHOUSE

a building that contains rooms where trials and other legal cases happen.

Courtyard and Courthouse Analysis 8

How can these concepts be translated in a contemporary context and understanding of space & the built environment?

02. COURTyard/house RIBBED WOOD STRUCTURE Allows the structure to open up towards the central community courtyard with rainwater captured in the building courtyard.

S AUGUSTA STREET

S CENTRAL STREET

LOUVERED TRANSCULENT PANELS Reduces glare on the southern and eastern facades.

Provides privacy for office and public circulation moments while allowing for appropriate daylighting.

EXISTING COURTHOUSE

STRUCTURAL CONCEALED SUPPORT Arched frame with limited spans enables minimal additional support. 10 foot-spaced members along curtain wall provide support to the panels + first floors.

W JOHNSON STREET

PROPOSED COURTHOUSE

BYERS STREET

MAXIMIZING NATURAL LIGHT Stepping motion maximizes naturally lit, internal spaces with three to five foot openings.

ED OS T OP PR ARKE M

UE

OK

RO

EB

DL

MID

Site Plan

EN AV

Facade / Detail Diagram

Structural Side Profile

Isometric Site Overview 9

Courthouse + Market Pavilion Rendering Developed in Revit 2024

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02. COURTyard/house

11

Courtroom Rendering

Public Circulation Rendering 12

02. COURTyard/house

Courthouse + Market Pavilion Rendering

Second Floor Plan

Ground Floor Plan 13

03. AQUATIC + WELLNESS CENTER ARCH 3010: NYC COMMUNITY CENTER

WHERE: Lower East Side New York, NY

WHEN: December 2022 Professor María González Aranguren

The Aquatic and Wellness Center aims to serve the community of not just the Lower East Side but serve as a hub between different neighborhoods and cultures. Upon initial observations of the LES, cultural identity through immigration was prevalent and later on expanded throughout Manhattan and the other boroughs. While these immigrants may have moved to form their new neighborhoods, a community center within walking distance to the LES, Chinatown, Nolita, East Village, NoHo, and Bowery could converge and come together. Located in Sara D. Roosevelt Park, where the site acts as a storage facility with public restrooms, it has the opportunity to expand services within the park and support those existing, including basketball courts, soccer fields, a playground, and seating spaces. Although the park stretches over seven blocks, its impervious surfaces hinder the idealistic, natural park environment that promotes a sense of peace from the chaos of New York. The building design focuses on outdoor pedestrian walkways as extensions of the park, keeping with the rectangular-shaped plot but allowing for moments of meandering and pause. The six-story structure sits just above the park’s treetops, allowing for views down to the southern park edge towards Chinatown and north to East Houston Street. The program, in parallel to the LES’ immigration history, consists of a blurring effect of its architecture, particularly from indoors and outdoors, and through flexible, multipurpose spaces. The focal point is the aquatic space forming a double-height space that allows those in the lobby, park, and the south’s amphitheater style seating with opportunities for engaging, observing, and lounging.

BOWERY BALLROOM

COFFEE SHOP

THE NEW MUSEUM

PUBLIC ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

Remagining the Lower East Side Moments of Connectivity + Community 14

CARNEGIE LIBRARY: TOMPKINS SQUARE

Outside Present-Day LES Limits Within Present-Day LES Limits

03. NYC COMMUNITY CENTER

Level 0: Interior Pool Perspective

Exterior Facade Perspective 15

Diagrams: Circulation, Program, Form

Perspective Section 16

03. NYC COMMUNITY CENTER WATER FROM UPPER FLOORS VEGETATION ROOTS

SOIL

STRUCTURAL ROOF SUPPORT

WATER DRAINAGE

RAIN WATER

WATER FUNNEL

WATERPROOFING

DRAIN

WATER REUSE TO UPPER FLOORS

FILTRATION SYSTEM

OVERFLOW SENSOR

Diagrams: Rainwater Management System

TO STORMWATER

TO STORMWATER

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04. RICHMOND RETREAT ARCH 2020: HOUSING MATTERS

WHEN: May 2022 Professor Jaime Sanz Haro

WHERE: Scott’s Addition Richmond, VA

Mindful of the context of Richmond’s Scott’s Addition District, the housing complex follows the orthogonality of the street interface but creates a dynamic, undulating form on the plot’s west-facing side. In maintaining the sleek horizontal elements without a cold and commercialized environment, wood orientated vertically serves as the primary material, with concrete slabs differentiating each floor’s organization of balcony spaces. While each floor’s interior remains unified and stacked, the shifting, extending, and contracting concrete slabs and units create an illusion. The curvature enables natural boundaries overlooking slightly different viewpoints between each apartment for privacy, in addition to a series of planters as extensions of the railing. Floor to ceiling glass follows the movement of the expressed slab edges and invites daylight into every apartment. Aligned on the east side, the in-unit private spaces and six circulation corridors ensure cross ventilation for the three apartment types. Each unit boasts a private balcony with access to communal and covered outdoor patios on each floor for residences to come together. Supporting the public on the ground floor consists of a cafe and communal workspace for in-unit and other neighborhood residences, adjacent to a meandering pathway of greenery and seating spots..

Diagram: Form, Outdoor Spaces

Type A

Type C

Type B Floor Plan Arrangements 18

Level 4: Private Outdoor Terrace Perspective

04. HOUSING MATTERS

Perspective Section

19

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04. HOUSING MATTERS

Isometric Overview 21

05. CULINARY INSTITUTE

ARCH 2010: URBAN ADDITIONS

WHEN: November 2021 Professor Katie Stranix

WHERE: Downtown Mall Charlottesville, VA

The culinary institute intends to serve as a public center to learn, create, and consume farm-to-table meals sourced from the regional Charlottesville area and the rooftop garden. The Downtown Mall serves as outdoor, pedestrian space with a variety of activities, including art galleries, theaters, and local shops. With the rise of privatization on the downtown mall, the culinary institute hopes to foster a sense of community and collaboration. Aiming to provide local ingredients to the culinary teaching studio and restaurant, vegetation plantings are situated throughout.

Horizontally shifting on each floor allows for moments of cantilevers extending into the downtown mall and towards Third Street. The extensive wall of glass from the east encourages to energize the side street by placing the main entryway, while southern light is minimized with horizontal wood slats. By encroaching on the the side street of the Downtown Mall, the design intends to encourage both indoor and outdoor public activity through a variety of gathering and seating opportunities while maintaining adequate walking space. The extension also enables various forms of circulation and spaces for observation overlooking Charlottesville.

Diagram: Form, Circulation

Downtown Mall Overview

Floor Plans 22

pedestrian access

05. URBAN ADDITIONS

Downtown Mall Perspective 23

Iteration 1

Perspective Section 24

Iteration 2

Iteration 3

05. URBAN ADDITIONS

Final Iteration

Perspective Section Programatically, the first-floor lobby leads to an amphitheater-style seating area that can be used as an educational lecture space, or a comfortable area to read from the book wall. Moving to the second floor, the double-story space is the main culinary space, arranged with a series of cooking stations. One can access this space by the arrangement of staircases and mimics the cascading facade.

By positioning this culinary space towards the mall, support spaces including restrooms and a cozy hostel room cantilever over a neighboring structure. The third floor serves a dining experience, with indoor and outdoor seating options. The curvature extends to the rooftop, where more amphitheater-style steps lead to a rooftop garden that promotes urban agriculture and communal interactions used by space, and the greater Charlottesville community.

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06. RENDERINGS PROFESSIONAL

WHEN: August 2022

WHERE: Coastal Virginia

ARCHITECTUREFIRM is an architecture and design firm specializing in hospitality, residential, and contemporary art spaces. With my time based in their Brooklyn, New York office, one major project was the rendering of a contemporary home located in coastal Virginia. The objective was to express to the client an understanding of the meshing between the established home design and the newly presented landscaping plans. Using these landscaping plans resulted in a process between Revit, Enscape, and Photoshop to illustrate the materiality and nautrality of the site and the residence.

The following rendered section (page 25) are of Arts & Letters Creative Co’s headquarters in Richmond. Taken from a line drawing section, this method enhances a flattened two-dimensional to three-dimensional understanding of the space through its blending of old warehouse features and new, modern inserts.

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06. RENDERINGS

Coastal Virginia Home Isometric Site Overiew

Rendered Section 29