GATE WAY RE PORT VOL UME2 2014 BOSTON ARCHITECTURAL COLLEGE
Since 2008, the Gateway program has served over 1,200 students and nearly 100 different non-profits, neighborhood groups, and community partners. As a truly collaborative, relationship building endeavor, the program is constantly evolving and always seeking more ways to engage communities in Greater Boston and beyond. If you and your organization have an idea for a project and think it would be a good fit for Gateway, contact us! We would love to hear from you!
Copyright: Boston Architectural College. 2014-2015 Book design and layout: Benjamin Peterson Text: Gotham, Adobe Garamond Pro
Gateway Practice Department Boston Architectural College 320 Newbury St. Boston, MA 02115 617.585.0145 practice@the-bac.edu
GATE WAY RE PORT VOL UME2 2014
practice featured projects recent projects faculty biographies leadership get involved
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TABLE of CON TENTS
PRAC TICE
the locus of applied learning The Boston Architectural College distinguishes itself as being the only institution of spatial design with a curriculum that integrates both academic and experiential learning concurrently. The concurrent model, unlike internship or co-op programs, fosters student growth and development both inside and outside of the classroom simultaneously, and daily. While individual students may be enrolled in one of College’s four degree-granting programs, the collective student population is supported in their professional and educational pursuits through the Practice Department, the hub of applied learning. During their tenure at the BAC, students are hired by design firms and organizations as fully compensated employees, working in a variety of professional settings in architecture, landscape architecture, interior architecture, or related fields. As concurrent students, individuals acquire and develop necessary skills not only to design professionally, but also to practice design professionally. The synthesis of applied and academic learning fosters a robust dialogue between the classroom and the office, between the community of learners at the BAC and the community of professional designers at large. The experience in Practice encourages the growth of a reflective practitioner; a student is empowered to take ownership of his or her professional development and is responsible for understanding and articulating the trajectory of his or her learning. Twice annually, students report their progress, indicating the number of hours they have worked in firms or on related design projects. Moreover, students attend periodic, face-to-face Practice Assessments. In conversations with Practice Faculty (professional designers affiliated with each of the design disciplines), students present evidence that validates their experiences (Practice Hours), strategize about their continued professional development, and have the level of their professional skills (Skill Level) evaluated. The accrual of Practice Hours and Skill Level provides a benchmark of progress and forms the basis for a component of each program’s graduation requirements. In addition to a degree, students who graduate from the BAC have a substantive, vetted set of design experiences and skills. At the time of commencement, nearly 90% of BAC graduates are gainfully employed in design offices in Boston and beyond.
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a curriculum of applied learning
CITYLAB CONTEXT
As students move towards a total immersion in concurrent learning, they must first satisfy a curricular sequence in Practice that scaffolds professional and personal development through applied learning. CityLab, a four-day intensive experience, begins on the first day of the BAC. CityLab utilizes the city as a laboratory for learning through exploration. Students begin to contextualize not only the place of their learning, but also the complex problems and opportunities presented to designers in the continual making and remaking of the city of Boston. Community Practice, in the second semester of the Foundation year, focuses on the development of tools for collaboration and communication. Students begin to understand the utility of design-thinking as the currency of our disciplines and develop an awareness of the power and potential of design at the interface of community engagement. Gateway Projects offer an opportunity to test the experiences of the Foundation year through real projects with real community partners.
COMMUN PRACT
COLLABORAT COMMUNICAT
AC
PRACTICE
GATEWAY CONTEXT + COLLABORATION + COMMUNICATION
NITY TICE
TION ATION
CONCURRENCY
ADEMIC While the path through concurrent learning may be circuitous, students navigate a variety of experiences in practice, accruing skills through the application of knowledge. The design office, the city, and the world become sites for learning. Students understand not only what it means to design professionally, but also what it means to practice design professionally.
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the gateway initiative As the economy slowed in 2008, BAC students, like many in the design professions, found employment difficult, if not impossible. Others felt the impact of recession- non-profits lacked the capital and energy to realize projects as donations and contributions waned. Recognizing an opportunity to synthesize these mutual needs, the Practice Department paired its first group of students with non-profits in need of design help and the Gateway Initiative was born. Since the earliest projects, Gateway has proven to be a unique and effective platform for students to gain experience in project planning and delivery, design, collaboration, and skill building in partnership with community groups, municipal agencies, and non-profit organizations. Moreover, as evidenced in the projects featured in this report, Gateway has evolved to provide opportunities for students’ experiential learning by doing, has provided a robust conduit for forging unique partnerships through research and action, has demonstrated the benefits of transdisciplinary learning, has proven that design is a powerful tool for community engagement, and has scaffolded the development of skills, competencies, and individuals as leaders. Gateway projects are real, and the design problems challenging. Through direct engagement with community members as both clients and partners, students immediately understand the responsibilities and the rewards embedded in the design process. Successful Gateway projects not only satisfy the needs outlined by a particular client, but often exceed these expectations- presenting complex information through new lenses, uncovering further opportunties for design, and advocating for the role of designers and design-thinking in the resolution of messy problems. In alignment with a pedagogy of applied learning, students are expected to become active participants in their own educational experience. Students advocate for skills they’d like to learn, are asked to reflect on their own progress, successes, and challenges, and have the opportunity to share their work with peers at several key junctures in a semester’s long project. Moreover, a team of dedicated faculty, design professionals from many different disciplines, play a significant role as advisors, mentors, and facilitators for student learning and collaboration.
The process of developing a Gateway project begins with an idea. Clients, community partners, and organizations contact the Practice Department prior to the semester’s launch- often knowing only that they need design help. The Director of Gateway works with the client organization to clarify project goals, scope of work, and anticipated deliverables and develops a Letter of Understanding to ensure a mutually agreed upon set of expectations. The LOU establishes a level of professionalism for the project: students understand the import of a real contract for real work.
OPEN HOUSE
TEAM SELECTION
PROJECTS BEGIN Over the course of the semester student learning is enriched through strategically scheduled evemts called Friday Forumteams have the opportunity to receive and give feedback on their own and other projects, engage with outside designers or practicioners through lectures and panel discussions, and reflect on project status prior to important client meetings or presentations. Moreover, a team of Gateway Gurus as super-consultants, facilitate skills-based workshops, offer fresh eyes for critique, and supplement student learning throughout the duration of a project.
FINAL PRESENTATIONS FINAL BOOK
PROJECT ENDS
INITIAL MEETING
LETTER OF UNDERSTANDING HIRING OF INSTRUCTORS At the beginning of each academic semester, the Practice Department hosts an Open House, where students learn about each project directly from the client organizations and advising faculty members. Students apply for the projects that excite them most and are admitted to Gateway based on demonstration of interest, a sound academic record, and recommendations from faculty and academic advisors. Thereafter, student teams meet weekly with faculty instructors as a working group akin to a design office or studio. Students are expected to contribute 15 to 20 hours a week towards their projects.
GATEWAY GURUS FRIDAY FORUM
CLIENT MEETINGS Students meet with their community partners/ clients at least twice over the course of a semester. In initial meetings, students are given the opportunity to interact with the individuals and communities directly invested in the work of the Gateway project. The audience for these meetings and presentations often includes neighbors, members of a wider community, local leaders and activists, and other professional designers. At the end of a semester, a student collects all client feedback and presents a book of work that documents and curates the resolution of the clients needs.
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80 MILES
40 MILES
5 MILES
the bac 20 MILES 10 MILES
recent projects While the majority of Gateway projects take place within the city of Boston, partnerships have taken students as far as Salem and West Barnstable. The matrix on the following pages notes project content by discipline: architecture (AR), design studies (DS), interior architecture (IA), and landscape architecture (LA). The matrix also indicates project context urban (URB), suburban (SUB), or rural (RUR)- and client type- educational (EDU), institutional (INS), argicultural (AGR), municipal (MUN), and neighborhood (NBH). 7
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BCYF FACILITIES
2 BCYF MiLAB 3 CAMBRIDGE DANCE COMPLEX SALEM
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4 BROMLEY HEATH 5 CLIMATE ACTION PLAN 6 CITIZEN SCHOOLS LYNN
7 COMMUNITY PRACTICE
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8 DETAIL/ [INTER]SECTION
WATERTOWN CAMBRIDGE
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9 DOMAIN*
14 3
10 FISHER HILL GATEHOUSE
NEWTON
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16
1/2 4
10 BROOKLINE
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7/8 6
11 GORDON CONWELL
BOSTON
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12 GROVE HALL
12 13 LYNN PUBLIC LIBRARY
WESTWOOD
20 14 MAKERSPACE* 15 MEETINGHOUSE FARM* 16 LEARNING LANDSCAPE 17 PARKOLATION* 18 TREMONT NAIL
WAREHAM
18 15 W. BARNSTABLE
19 WALKER SCHOOL 20 WESTWOOD LITTLE LEAGUE 21 UU CHURCH OF SALEM
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AR 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21
DS
IA
LA
URB
SUB
RUR
EDU
INS
AGR
MUN
NBH
*FEATURED BCYF FACILITIES BCYF MiLAB CAMBRIDGE DANCE COMPLEX BROMLEY HEATH CLIMATE ACTION PLAN CITIZEN SCHOOLS COMMUNITY PRACTICE DETAIL/ [INTER]SECTION DOMAIN* FISHER HILL GATEHOUSE GORDON CONWELL GROVE HALL LYNN PUBLIC LIBRARY MAKERSPACE* MEETINGHOUSE FARM* LEARNING LANDSCAPE PARKOLATION* TREMONT NAIL WALKER SCHOOL WESTWOOD LITTLE LEAGUE UU CHURCH OF SALEM
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parkolation domain meetinghouse farm makerspace huxtable fellows
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FEA TURED PRO JECTS
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PARK O LA TION the power of the parklet A visitor enjoys a temporary respite in what is most commonly used as a metered parking space. BAC students, in collaboration with students from Boston’s Green Academy, designed and constructed an urban oasis adjacent to Mei Mei Street Kitchen in Boston’s Audubon Circle. The Parkolation Project- complete with solar panels, phone docking stations, and configurable seating - takes ownership of urban space and provides a strategic, if small, outpost for celebrating community. 13
learning by doing students MARIA BOLIVAR JAIME BUSTOS de HARO* LISA ISHIHARA ESTYVENS TORCHON GE WANG faculty CORTNEY KIRK client/ partners WILLA PERAGINE BOSTON GREEN ACADEMY location MEI MEI AUDOBON CIRCLE BOSTON, MA
A parklet, a small parcel generally no larger than a few metered parking spaces, reclaims urban space at a tactical level: what is generally reserved for cars is reclaimed for the street and the public. Parklets not only enhance streetscapes, they also add import to the necessity of public space. Fueled by whimsy and optimism for city life, parklets allow us to imagine the street as a site for public gathering, sharing, and relaxing. The Parkolation Project, a collaborative endeavor with students from the Boston Green Academy, designed, fabricated, and constructed a Parklet in Boston’s Audobon Circle. The BAC Gateway team served simultaneously as designers, makers, listeners, and translators as the visions of high school students became a reality. Parkolation attests to the power of partnerships- space was allocated by the city of Boston and shared with a young, innovative restaurant called Mei Mei Street Kitchen. Construction materials, including elaborately etched solar panel arrays were donated from a local start-up. Moreover, students from both the BAC and the BGA began to understand the inevitable impact of design- from idea to construction, learning happens by doing.
*HUXTABLE FELLOW
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designers are facilitators Over the course of the semester, BAC students found themselves acting as consultants, translators, and teachers. Developing and utilizing the skills of design communication, Gateway students carefully facilitated the transformation of ideas into reality. Design-thinking, iterative processes, and testing through making allowed the unbridled imagination of high school students to materialize into a place for public gathering, community interaction, and a respite from the bustle of the city’s streets.
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1. Maria Bolivar and Jaime Bustos de Haro, Huxtable Fellow, discuss the working proposals of a Boston Green Academy student. 2. A preliminary model highlighting the development of modular and mobile seating. 3. An intermediate proposal reveals the integration of technology- the parklet became fully energy sufficient and allowed its users to charge their laptops and mobile devices. 4. A rendering communicates the narrative of potential (hungry) users. 5. Boston Green Academy students fabricate the final installation.
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As is true with many successful Gateway projects, the best results demand committed, passionate actors who are willing to learn by doing. This tiny, temporary public park- complete with flowerbeds, solar-powered cellphone charging stations, and bike storage- was made real through the dedication of BAC students, faculty, and community partners. With the Parkolation Project, learning happened in various arenas. BAC students learned the power of small urban transformations, but also the impact of design communication and design as a tool for thinking through complex problems. Boston Green Academy students learned not only how to think like to designers, but how to make like designers, and how to envision a possible future where their actions have real impact. Community members learned that a small group of high-schoolers and college students were capable of envisioning and creating new public space. While the project has received significant press, including a feature in the Boston Globe, the process has sparked an interest in design-build projects at the BAC and has set the stage for future Gateways that predicate the importance of learning by doing, succeeding through making.
Mid-construction, students from the BAC and the Boston Green Academy witnessed an influx of passersby. Some passed with curiousity and continued walking, others stayed and asked how they could help. Mei Mei Street Kitchen proved an invaluable neighbor- delicious food deserves a desirable setting for its enjoyment.
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DO MAIN
the palimpsest of city-making A tangle of proposed highway cuts through Boston’s neighborhoods of Jamaica Plain, Dorchester, and Roxbury. Although the plan for this incisive interstate was never realized, its legacy remains in the form of vacant,city-owned properties. Understanding the history of city-making- the actors and agents involved in its processessallows our students to develop important and unique collaborations in research and in action.
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partners in research and action students ERROL BROWN RICKY GARDNER DAVID KURACHI UBE CAMILA MATHO NHA NEANG JOHNSON OSBAND* faculty CARL KOEPCKE client/ partners ROY AVELLANEDA MASS DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION location JAMAICA PLAIN BOSTON, MA
In the 1960’s, the Southwest Corridor project proposed the development of an 8-line highway that would bisect, and subsequently displace, the neighborhoods of the South End, Roxbury, and Jamaica Plain. As a result of community activism, the proposal was abandoned and the corridor reclaimed as the current incarnation of the MBTA Orange line and the Southwest Corridor Park. The legacy of the proposal remains in the form of vacant parcels of land, adjacent to the Orange line, acquired by the city and currently held by the Massachusetts Department of Transportation. Rather than dispose of the land, MassDOT has appropriated the parcels for the development of family-oriented, market rate to middle-income housing units. Using a single parcel as a test site, this Gateway Project explored paradigms for the architecture of housing. Contingent on code and zoning regulations, real estate markets, and other parameters, students developed schemes for 3-bedroom units per 3-family buildings that utilize innovative, affordable, and efficient modes of construction and that aimed to satisfy the possibility of deployment on other parcels.
*HUXTABLE FELLOW
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paradigms for dwelling Students developed an exhaustive catalog of housing units with an understanding that the principles embedded in their research could be applied to multiple sites in various conditions. Design research requires the acknowledgement of parameters or limits as catalysts for sophisticated design opportunities. The final document highlights opportunities for an architecture bound by ecological, economic, social and cultural forces. Students were forced to think beyond the confines of their design lenses to communicate like city agents, contractors, and real estate mavens.
Reference to neighborhood
Variety of windows Each unit emphasized
Threshold differentiated
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Individual Space Common Space
Unit Space
4 Landscaping
Projections (bays)
Threshold (focal point)
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Defi ning elements of frontality (partial example): landscaping, thresholds, projections.
1. Site plan indicating Mass DOT owned parcels adjacent to the MBTA Orange Line. 2. Students diagram opportunities for generating form at various scales, in various contexts. 3. An imagined housing unit considers the implications of landscape, streetscape, and relationships external to the interior dwelling. 4. Ecological conditions, unique to each site, offered opportunities to develop proposals that could perform in concert with wind, sunlight, and climate. 5. The implications of housing and communitiy development.
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The hybrid in its original form does not address the street edge.
As ambitious and uncertain as the project seemed at the onset, its final resolution demonstrates the potential application of design-thinking and design research in various civic arenas. While the projects outcomes began as imaginary, the possibilites and variables became real as students tackled challenges of site, zoning regulations, cost-benefit contingencies, construction methods, and building performance metrics. Domain also speaks to the necessity of both textual and experiential research as a mode of design process. In order to contextualize the projects goals, students needed to understand the complex history of city-making that created the conditions of vacancy in Jamaica Plain. Understanding the complexities of the past allowed students to engage the present with sensitivity. Moreover, while Floor Area Ratios and Maximum Efficiency metrics provide particular conditions for making objects, students needed to spend time on the ground, in the neighborhoods in order to understand the social fabric as paramount to making places. Mass Department of Transportation has expressed their gratitude towards the hard work and rigor of the BAC Gateway students. The document will be used as a primer for future development opportunities.
The model shows the hybrid stands in stark contrast to the street edge, which tapers the lot as it moves towards SW Corridor Park.
+
= 15’
Frontal zone The street edge is defined by the boundary of the lot. There is a 15’ setback from this boundary that defines the limits of the building, forming the street wall.
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The above diagram combines the hybrid typology with the shape of the street wall to define the new frontality of the building.
= The extrusion of the buildable area shows the vertical extent of the street wall. The street wall also takes the shape of the lot.
Units are then stretched, rotated and bent to fit the street wall to produce a new form.
Diagrams communicate the formal and spatial operations that contributed to the final schematic proposals for housing. A collaged streetscape explores the consequences of these decisions at the scale of the neighborhood. Design research encourages students to take ownership of their ideas by recognizing that decisions are never made in a vaccuum, and that good design decisions are often made in a storm of complex information.
MEET ING HOUSE FARM reviving working landscapes In Barnstable, layers of history, ecology, and narrative provide a foundation for reinvigorating community farm land. Through multidisciplinary collaboration, students uncover the complexities of place through multiple lenses, develop a fluency in the language each design discipline, and understand the power of synthesis- many disciplines working together towards a resolution that is inevitably greater than the sum of its parts.
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multidisciplinary collaborations students SASHA FRANCOEUR PEPE DIEGO GARCIA ANASTASIA LYONS* HANNAH SMITH NEIL YARUMIAN faculty ELLEN MERRITT client/ partners MEETINGHOUSE FARM location BARNSTABLE, MA
Meetinghouse Farm, located in Barnstable, MA, is a mixture of open fields, cultivated gardens and woodland with a unique mix of native and ornamental species. The Farm includes a 3000 sq. ft. unheated greenhouse with connected barn and three support buildings. The landscape is defined by New England style stonewalls. Water is provided from an onsite well. The Farm rents community garden plots and greenhouse space, operates a small farm stand, sponsors horticultural lectures, workshops and trips, conducts annual field trips for local elementary students with a focus on tree ecology and proÂŹvides community service opportunities for local high school and community college students. Participating gardeners follow organic gardening methods and commit to volunteer two hours a month to help with farm tasks. The property is now open to the public from dawn to dusk and is a popular walking site for area residents. As a first step towards revitalizing this productive landscape, students conducted a thorough analysis and documentation of the grounds and existing structures. By the end of the semester, students had produced schematic options at the scale of the master plan, proposed designs for the barn and central yard with recommendations for new plantings, vistas, and proposed possibilities for utilizing sustainable technologies to extend the life of the farm.
*HUXTABLE FELLOW
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the complexities of place Students in this Gateway project are enrolled in each of the BAC’s degree-granting design programs Architecture, Landscape Architecture, Interior Architecture, and Design Studies. As such, their respective disciplinary lenses allowed for a robust dialogue and a sophisticated understanding of the implications of design decisions across scales. Students began to understand the synthesis of landscape, technology, tectonics, and the relationships of part to whole in a real, working place.
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4
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ain garden collage
1. A site analysis describes relationships of specific parts to a larger, complex whole. 2. A diagram of integrated technological systems for water conservation and reuse. 3. Community members prepare a quilt of garden beds for spring planting. 4. Sasha Francoeur and Hannah Smith investigate the grounds. 5. A ‘low-tech’ proposal diagrams the efficacy, and beauty, of rain gardens as a strategy for mitigating water in saturated landscapes.
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A few of the individual students continued their committment to the project over the course of the summer, encouraged by the potential materialization of their design work. One of the team’s proposals has been executed according to plan and a second project proposal is in process awaiting review for funding from the town of Barnstable. The contributions of this Gateway team are significant not only in that their design developments continue to shape the future visioning of the Meetinghouse Farm board of directors, but also because they speak to the powerful nature of Gateway as home for true, interdisciplinary collaboration. From its inception, the project was never conceived of as a “landscape project” or an “architecture project,” but as a project and a process where the identification of tree species, the dissection of technologies for water treatment, and the sights, smells, and textures of farmland each played a significant role in the project’s successful resolution.
BAC Gateway students communicate final design recommendations to community members and stakeholders of Meetinghouse Farm. Complex problems require multi-disciplinary thinking; the sophistication of design-thinking and resolution depended on our students sharing ideas across disciplines and synthesizing these ideas to be 30 communicated to those most affected.
MAK ER SPACE PRE TABLE FACE of CON TENTS
preface name, if you make title- short it... bio Huxtable Lorem ipsum Fellow dolor Daliana sit amet, Zapata-Arroyo consecteturconstructs adipiscinga elit. full scale Quaefurniture si potest singula prototype consolando as a component levare, of universa a new introduction quo modo for Makerspace sustinebit? The Possible Videamus Projectigitur in Cambridge. sententias eorum, The Makerspace tum ad verba project redeamus. allowed Tu quidem BAC Students reddes; An to featured projects vero, inquit, understand how quisquam designers can potest facilitate probare, community quod perceptfum, development atprojects various Duo Reges: scales- constructio from the design interrete. of index ofquod. Teneo, inquit, furniture to the design finemof community illi viderispaces nihilthatdolere. foster Consequentia educational exquirere, entrepreneurial quoad sit growth. id, quod volumus, faculty and biographies effectum. Qui-vere falsone, quaerere mittimus-dicitur oculis se privass. afterward 31
engaging communities students LUIS BOLIVAR PERLA MULLER GE WANG MATTHEW WILLISTON XUETING WU DALIANA ZAPATA-ARROYO* faculty MEGHAN ARCHER MCNAMARA DYLAN MCNAMARA client/ partners THE POSSIBLE PROJECT location KENDALL SQUARE CAMBRIDGE, MA
In this Gateway project, BAC students researched and designed a Maker’s Space, for the students of The Possible Project in Cambridge. The Possible Project [TPP] is a youth entrepreneurship center that teaches high school students to start and run their own businesses. Many of those businesses involve making things, fabrication, or building prototypes of products. To date, TPP did not have the kind of space to support these activities. Through the generosity of the Cambridge Housing Authority, TPP has acquired space in a building waiting to be transformed. Students researched other, similar maker spaces, collaborated with students from The Possible Project to discern their needs and visions, and proposed several design schemes, including prototypes of full-scale furniture. The Possible Project was able to use the design proposals as a strong foundation for fundraising, capacity building and support. A successful crowd-funded campaign has launched to project into construction with intended occupation by Spring of 2015. The project was documented by CCTV [Cambridge Community Television] and short documentary was created to highlight the collaborative work of Gateway and its community partners.
*HUXTABLE FELLOW
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collateral bene´ts Gateway projects present an important avenue for community groups and non-profit partners to develop the collateral necessary to communicate ideas to larger stakeholders. With The Possible Project’s Makerspace, BAC students realized that a comprehensive proposal should be driven by the principles outlined by the community and that those principles could be investigated a various scales- from a masterplan of programmed spatial relationships, to the fabrication of flexible, multipurposed furniture systems.
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1. A rendering of the BAC’s proposed Makerspace, describing the importance of flexible, usable space. 2. BAC students visit the future home of The Possible Project’s Makerspace in Kendall Square. 3. A proposal for mutable storage systems to house material and display products. 4. Ge Wang applies color to a prismatic array of objects that will become modular furniture. 5. Daliana Zapata Arroyo and Luis Bolivar demonstrate the utility of their furniture proposal at a final client presentation.
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1
16' - 4
B
11' - 4"
MAIN N ENTRANCE AN E
C
Although Gateway teams do not often produce work beyond schematic design- projects have no ambition of taking away real work from real design professionalsthey provide an important foundation of research that makes the realization of projects much more tenable. Because Gateway students have the opportunity to interact directly with the community members as clients, they are able to witness the tangible and meaningful impact of design in real-time. Moreover, community members as engaged partners are able to see their own value, are able to reframe and refocus their own goals, and are able to equip themselves with the tools and tactics necessary to satisfy their missions. 35
16' - 8"
Designers designing a space for designing and making might sound a bit “meta,” but the Makerspace/ TPP Gateway indicates the importance of spatial-thinking as a catalyst for growth and change. The Posssible Project’s mission to developing new innovators, foregrounds the nature of design-thinking as a tenet of a new economy and of a new generation of leaders.
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OPEN CLASSROOM OFFICE IDEATION SPACE BATHROOMS
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18' - 8"
16' - 0"
0' - 4"
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UP
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Hex Nuts Hex Nuts
Hex NutsHex Hex Nuts
Hex Nuts Hex Nuts
Hex Nuts Hex Nuts Hex Nuts
Hex Nuts Hex Nuts
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CNC ROOM
SUPPLY P ENTRANCE
A schematic plan details the translation of the principles of The Possible Project into a space for making, learning, innovating, and growing. Rooted in the real necessities and the lofty ambitions of the client, the proposal presented a tactical and actionable document for future development. The work of the Gateway project has literally made the makerspace possible.
HUX TA BLE FEL LOWS design thinking into action The Huxtable Fellowship in Civic Engagement and Service Learning, generously funded by the Cummings Foundation, aims to mobilize students invested in the pursuit of design as a cultural and civic pursuit at the interface of community engagement. Here, Huxtable Fellows visit Boston City Hall to simultaneously understand the building’s architectural ambitions to provide an armature for public culture, and to develop relationships with the individuals and organizations who are actively engaged in making and remaking the city of Boston. 37
developing design leaders Over the course of the 2013- 2014 academic year, Huxtable Fellows participated in initiatives that have been designed to fulfill the four major goals of the Ada Louise Huxtable Fellowship in Civic Engagement and Service Learning: 1. Mobilize and reward talented, advanced students for their involvement in the BAC’s Gateway Projects. 2. Provide talented, advanced students with opportunities to connect with other Fellows, students, and mentors with the greater ambition of developing and sustaining robust relationships and networks both within and beyond the BAC. 3. Provide a body of work to help the Practice Department and the BAC to continue to sharpen pedagogies of applied learning and methods of assessing student learning through experiential education. 4. Heighten and insure the quality of final deliverables to Gateway clients, serve as mentors to students involved in Gateway projects, and strengthen the Practice Department’s portfolio of work related to Gateway.
The Fellows assumed leadership, advisory, and mentoring roles within the year’s Gateway projects. As a result of their experiences, the Fellows have developed the skills of effective time and team management, communication, collaboration, and professionalism that will allow them to assume a leadership role in developing new projects aimed at community engagement and service learning. For a Capstone Project, the Fellows identified partnerships with the Community Design Resource Center of Boston, the Fairmont Greenway Alliance, the Dorchester Bay Economic Development Corporation, and residents of the community of Dorchester. Working collaboratively with the aforementioned community groups, the Fellows proposed a project aimed to catalyze the growth of strong, sustainable communities by making safe, enjoyable, civic spaces. The proposal, recognized as a finalist for the Ford College Community Challenge, sought to envision, design, and transform a vacant lot adjacent to the Fairmont Commuter Rail Line- a blighted parcel that will become a space for community gathering and a strategic piece in a patchwork of green spaces that will run from downtown Boston through Roxbury, Dorchester, Mattapan, and Hyde Park. The following pages describe the participation of the Huxtable Fellows in Gateway Projects over the course of their tenure. Each Fellow has provided his or her own reflective narrative, describing the nature of his or her involvement in Gateway and discussing the opportunities afforded through the Huxtable Fellowship Program.
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ALINSAN ESTEVES
bachelor of architecture mayaguez, puerto rico
As an Ada Louise Huxtable Fellow over the last year I have had the opportunity to be involved in the BCYF MiLab Gateway Project as well as the Gateway Initiative as a whole. Both of these provided invaluable and very distinct experiences. One of the most valuable parts of participating in BCYF MiLab was to be able to see things from different perspectives from my own, and to facilitate the opportunities for each student to assume leadership positions. Working together with the client representative and a team of 6 students, we decided to deliberately limit the extent of my responsibilities by assigning a different student every two weeks to serve as a “rotating� Project Manager. My communication with the team was then limited to the Project Manager (mentoring) and Client Representative. At the end of the two weeks we all assessed the performance of the Project Manager. Having fellow students play this role had great results. The team had an incredible project that the client highly valued, a project that can only be attributed to the effort of this team of students. We all learned invaluable lessons from each other and all students had to face the challenges of leading a team and coordinating a design project first-hand-- experience that they will each inevitably face in this profession. The other aspect of my experience as a Huxtable Fellow was equally invaluable. Getting to know and collaborating with the other fellows, who are all extremely talented, ambitious, and dedicated, has been one of the best experiences of my education at the BAC.
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JAIME BUSTOS de HARO
bachelor of architecture villegas, mexico
For the past year through the Huxtable Fellowship, participating in Gateway projects, Community Practice and Parkolation, I have had the opportunity to promote and develop my design leadership skills in community-based services, offering critical mentorship, leadership, and technical instruction to less knowledgeable students. In the process of improving these skills, I became a better designer through teaching, sharing my ideas and passing on lessons learned through my own experiences in design. I learned that teaching is the process of becoming a leader, a mentor, and a peer advisor; there is much gained in the interchange of sharing information between myself and my teammates. Many times I found myself listening to and processing my teammates’ ideas into my own and vice versa. Through collaboration and communication, not only was my experience made more valuable, but also the end-product of a design was made more sophisticated, complex, and refined as the result of everyone’s input. Upon reflection, success in a community-based project, or any design project, relies on the dynamics of the design team. The team must be able to work together and perform as a “family” of sorts, there must be no “I” in team. As the result of open communication, careful resolution of conflict results in a process of mutual respect, collaborative effort, and successful design decision making.
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DALIANA ZAPATAARROYO
master of architecture la parguera, puerto rico
Before being selected as a Huxtable Fellow, I had previous experience working with Gateway projects. As a result, I began my role as a Huxtable Fellow with a clear idea of how, as a mentor, I could motivate students to engage in social interest design. One of the biggest challenges I faced as a Gateway mentor/leader was to guide inexperienced students through a new professional challenge. I had to observe and identify the special skills each student has in order to assign tasks. I always tried to provide opportunities to each team member to select what part of the project he or she wanted to work on so that each individual felt more comfortable, respected, and engaged. I tried to maintain a high level of motivation among the team by encouraging a consistent, high-level expectation of work. I defined personal success by the community client’s reactions to our presentations, and their overall excitement, gratitude and faith in our work. As a Huxtable Fellow, I not only had the opportunity to be part of amazing community projects, but also, as a design student I was able to find a sense of community within my school. This group of Fellows has been a crucial part of my evolution as a professional during the last academic year. My Fellows and I share similar values, ideas of community engagement, passion about design, and a commitment to sharing design as a service to those who are typically underserved. This group of talented students has inspired me in so many ways, their exceptional enthusiasm, empathy and charisma is indescribable and I know that I have created relationships that will last for a long time. 41
JOHNSON OSBAND
bachelor of architecture cambridge, massachusetts
I am an artist, a dreamer, a scientist, an actor, a developer, a builder, a deviant, a pacifist, a boxer, a gardener, a chef - I am in design school because I am all these things, and because in design I see a synthesis of myself and the world I inhabit. I have participated in two Gateway Projects. One project, envisioning a modernization of the Lynn’s public library, necessitated design-thinking rooted in imagination and articulate communication. The other, working as consultants to MassDOT to develop prototypes for housing on vacant parcels, forced our team to consider the pragmatic concerns of all stakeholders involved in the making of the built world. I have addressed problems through various lenses; I have had access to client relationships often inaccessible to young designers, and I have collaborated with a diverse group of talented and motivated peers. Through the Huxtable Fellowship, I developed leadership skills that others would respect without being overbearing - by holding the reins, but with enough give that others could flourish. I lead with diplomacy and delegation so that group members feel they have room to evolve with the and emerge with new skills. The Huxtable Fellowship has allowed me the opportunity to bolster my commitment to design, to encourage the development of sincere friendships, and to allow me to participate in the making of the city of Boston - a city where I grew up, but, until now, have never been able to experience in such a powerful way. 42
ANASTASIA LYONS
bachelor of design studies niskayuna, new york
Over the past year I have supervised two Gateway projects: the Fisher Hill Gatehouse- that looked at adaptive reuse for an abandoned municipal waterworks system, and Meetinghouse Farm, in West Barnstable, MA on the site of an abandoned, yet beloved, nursery and garden center. This project was developed a large-scale master plan for the site, proposing a phasing of low-impact yet big-return interventions on the site. Through these projects I found my own strength as a leader and project manager. Leadership is on some level about assuming that role – I kept track of what experience each team-member wanted to gain and tried my best to match the workflow of the project against these factors, delegating the work accordingly. I told them that I am not the leader because I am the best out of all of them, but rather I am the facilitator, here to make sure that each one of the team-members gets what they need out of the project. The relationship with other Huxtable fellows was important as we were able to share strategies for leadership and tackle particular challenges of group dynamics, how designers come together to share their ideas in each of our particular projects. After serving as Huxtable fellow, I feel confident assuming a role as a leader even when I’m not the most experienced designer present – leadership is about showing up, being present and being willing to jump in to overcome challenges. I think Gateway projects give the BAC a student an advantage, precisely because they are the ideal laboratory for students to discover methods of design collaboration. 43
Screen captures from a short film documenting the Huxtable’s engagement with the Fairmount Greenway Alliance
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bcyf facilities study bcyf milab cambridge dance complex bromley heath campus climate action plan citizen schools detail inter/section uu church of salem ´sher hill gatehouse gordon conwell grove hall neighborhood study lynn public library learning landscape tremont nail walker beacon school westwood little league 45
RE CENT PRO JECTS
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BCYF FA CIL I TIES STUDY Students will create a guide for assessing BCYF facilities that will help BCYF assess and analyze their 35 facilities in a consistent and systematic way. Areas of assessment could include use, energy efficiency, building maintenance and condition, and suggestions for improvement [program/use and/or physical plant]. Students will meet with BCYF leadership to understand their priorities and goals, and will take trips to several BCYF facilities to help them understand some “typical” facilities. Beyond the initial semester’s work of putting together the guide, the goal is to engage future Gateway teams in actually doing the assessments on an ongoing basis for BCYF. Students will use 2-3 BCYF facilities as case studies to develop the guide.
client BOSTON CENTER FOR YOUTH AND FAMILIES faculty CAL OLSON location VARIOUS
BCYF Mi LAB
client BOSTON CENTER FOR YOUTH AND FAMILIES faculty MARK ROSENSHEIN location VARIOUS
BCYF’s “MiLab” is an incubator for innovation and creativity for young people to exchange ideas and build community leading to invention, influence, and impact. The space will foster and inspire youth to become active participants in their community center and their community. It’s where the “I” is more than just me - it’s innovation, ingenuity, imagination, ideology, and much more. MiLab’s goals include planning and carrying out youth-driven campaigns to address an issue/challenge in their community; youth-driven program design or event for the community center; outreach campaigns planned by youth to increase youth enrollment in the center; fostering teen entrepreneurship and civic engagement. BCYF plans to provide MiLab spaces at 3-4 community centers. BAC students will work with BCYF staff and local youth to create design visions for a prototype MiLab, engaging design strategies like modular furniture, lighting, “idea lounges,” white board walls, technology, storage, etc. Students will work on preliminary budgets, specifications, product and finish selection for the MiLab prototype, as well as investigate similar spaces and precedents around Boston and beyond. The work done in this semester will help BCYF secure funding to implement the MiLabs.
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The Dance Complex building, an 1884 Odd Fellows Hall in Central Square, Cambridge, currently houses six studios. Each space serves dance well, but we ask: how we can be purposeful in our dimensional usage of each studio, and its connecting hallways, stair landings and portals? The total building should be a place where there is room to celebrate individual dance genres apart from each other as needed, but also a place where celebrating the common and binding thing among us- pure movement. BAC students will engage in a collaborative partnership with the Dance Complex to reimagine and envision the present and future of the Complex. Preliminary assessment and analysis, conducted in concert with the staff, board, and community of the Dance Complex, will seek to identify priorities and opportunities for design as part of a master plan. As the project develops, more specific foci may emerge: opportunities for increasing visibility of dance through a storefront at street level, developing schemes that enhance the adaptability and flexibility of studio space, and examining opportunities for a theater to accommodate emergent or evolving modes of movement.
A 21st CEN TURY SPACE FOR DANCE client CAMBRIDGE DANCE COMPLEX faculty JENNY FRENCH ANDA FRENCH location CENTRAL SQUARE CAMBRIDGE
BROM LEY HEATH
client HYDE-JACKSON SQUARE MAIN STREETS faculty DREW KANE KURT PESCHKE location JAMAICA PLAIN
The Bromley Heath/Centre Street project is a case study for the productive intersection of urban design and landscape architecture. Working simultaneously at the scale of the city and at the scale of the park bench, students will situate their work within a multitude of overlapping and integrated contexts. Students will interface with multiple public agencies, as well as community members from the Bromley Heath Housing complex and the adjacent neighborhoods. They will then make informed design recommendations to the client based on a close analysis of the complex’s urban form, and the built environment, research of other successful housing precedents, and diligent design studies using the tools of the urban designer and landscape architect. Students will be required to organize site visits, attend community meetings, and engage regularly with the client. Ultimately, students will develop scenarios for landscape and urban design interventions that can resolve the physical relationship of the housing complex and Centre Street in order to create a more unified environment, whereby Bromley Heath is seamlessly incorporated into the community fabric.
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Building on the work generated during 2012, students will review, analyze, and revise the existing Climate Action Plan [CAP] to create the second edition of the CAP. During this semester, students will follow the comprehensive plan for rewriting and updating the CAP laid out in Spring 2013,for a deadline in January 2014, as well as work on specific parts of the CAP. Additionally, students will be, as appropriate, engaged in expanded research, including impacts of individual building performance on the natural environment and ecological health. The students will prepare a presentation to BAC administration for the end of the semester, as well as recommendations for implementation, funding, and awareness in the wider BAC community.
CAM PUS CLI MATE ACTION PLAN
client BAC (INTERNAL) faculty SIERRA FLANIGAN BLAKE JACKSON location 320 NEWBURY ST BOSTON
CITI ZEN SCH OOLS
client ORCHARD GARDENS ELEMENTARY faculty ALICE BROWN
The goal of this Gateway project is to build on, refine, and revise the 10-week curriculum designed for Citizen Schools by a Gateway team in Spring 2013. This curriculum is being developed to teach middle school students about the design process, and engage middle school students in design thinking. Learning goals for both the middle school students and the BAC students include seeing how the design process and design thinking can be applied to different subjects and disciplines, and then applying that knowledge; using a design problem to explore methods of collaboration and teamwork to solve problems; helping students see how designers work and opening their eyes to a possible career in design. BAC students will work with a group of middle school students at Orchard Gardens once a week, facilitate planned exercises, and reflect on the success and outcomes of those exercises weekly. These lessons and reflections will form the basis of a curriculum book that the BAC students will compile for Citizen Schools at the end of the semester.
location ROXBURY
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BUILDING AXON
SECTION A-A
A 5+6
3+4
1+2
BOYLSTON STREET
MA
A
IN
ST
RE
ET
SOURCES CONSULTED CHING, FRANCIS. "BUILDING CONSTRUCTION ILLUSTRATED." ALLEN, EDWARD. "FUNDAMENTALS OF BUILDING CONSTRUCTION."
In a world of BIM and 3D drawing sets, what is to be learned from constructing drawings orthographically, in 2 dimensions? In this pilot Gateway Lab, students will engage in construction detailing and drawing exercises, learning how to think about how buildings and drawing sets go together. We will work primarily in section, developing a “detail catalog” that demonstrates a student’s understanding of a particular case study building. Students are expected to have a basic working knowledge of AutoCAD and SketchUp or Rhino, or be prepared to do self-guided tutorials to catch up. This is NOT a software tutorial class, but rather a lab to learn how to think, how to ask questions about how buildings go together as a designer, or a contractor, or an engineer might. Students will engage heavily in drawing, the redlining process, and be expected to purchase (or consult) several key texts. Priority will be given to Architecture students.
DE TAIL IN TER/ SEC TION
client BAC (INTERNAL) faculty PRACTICE DEPARTMENT location 951 BOYLSTON BOSTON, MA
UU CHURCH OF SALEM
Students in this Gateway project will be working with The First Universalist Society in Salem, founded in 1805, to document and analyze their existing space, with special attention paid to accessibility, entrance and building orientation, possible alternative uses, and master planning of the facility and grounds. Students will engage aspects of architecture, interior design, and landscape architecture as they help the Society envision these changes to their spaces, and develop materials to help the Society in their fundraising and rental efforts.
client THE FIRST UNIVERSALIST SOCIETY
The work done in this semester will directly feed work done by a group of Historic Preservation students in Spring 2014, who will be conducting a HABS survey of the buildings as part of their coursework.
faculty BRANDON CUFFY location SALEM, MA
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The Fisher Hill Gatehouse, designed by Arthur Vinal, was built in 1887 as the high service reservoir for the Boston Water Supply System. The water was pumped from the Chestnut Hill Reservoirs up to the Fisher Hill Reservoir. This gatehouse houses the valves that controlled the intake and outflow of the water. The Reservoir and Gatehouse will soon be the basis of a new municipal park. Building on the recently finished Conditions Assessment Report by CBI, and the design for the new park, students will help the Town of Brookline document this historic structure, envision new uses for it, and propose 3-5 schemes for its adaptive reuse. The goal of this project is to help raise funds for its restoration and renovation, as well as engage the community in a process of design and information gathering. Students will participate in two community meetings, meet with the Preservation Commission, the Parks & Recreation Commission, and engage directly with issues of preservation, community process, adaptive reuse, feasibility, and understanding historic construction.
FIS HER HILL GATE HOUSE
client TOWN OF BROOKLINE faculty CHRIS HILLEBRAND location BROOKLINE
GOR DON CON WELL
client GORDON CONWELL THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY
Situated at a fast-growing section of Roxbury, the Gordon-Conwell Center for Urban Ministerial Education serves about 300 students in part time and full time study. Students will work with Gordon-Conwell to assess their current and future spatial needs, and possibilities for renovations and/or additions to their buildings and campus. Spatial needs include a large gathering space, community space, parking, a library, and potentially a few more classrooms; students will study the potential for building another building on an adjacent lot, or building vertically on top of existing buildings. Additionally, students will investigate the possibility of sharing these spaces with the neighboring Urban League of Eastern Massachusetts.
faculty LIWEN ZHANG location ROXBURY
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The Grove Hall Community Study for 2013-14 is a continuation of work by Gateway students working with the Earthos Institute over the last two years . The project is a collaboration with the Greater Grove Hall Main Streets (GGHMS) organization, and Boston’s Department of Neighborhood Development (DND). The overall intent is to create a dynamic and ongoing toolbox for creative self-sufficiency and economic development for the Grove Hall community as “The Ideal Neighborhood of the Future”—and to continue developing this process as a template for other communities and bioregions. Based upon system and urban design studies carried out last year, the Earthos Grove Hall team intends to create and install online the “Grove Hall Community Map System.” This will include both GIS base information (working with GIS interns from Tufts University) and “crowd-sourced” information by Grove Hall stakeholders. In addition, specific urban design ideas resulting from Earthos’ studies and reviewed with the GGHMS committee will be documented and mapped as part of the system.
GROVE HALL NEIGH BOR HOOD STUDY
client EARTHOS INSTITUTE faculty SARAH HOWARD PHIL LOHEED location ROXBURY, MA
LYNN PUB LIC LIB RARY
client LYNN PUBLIC LIBRARY faculty CINDY LEE SON WOOTEN location LYNN, MA
In 1897, George A. Moore, a nationally known architect, won the competition for the design of the Lynn Public Library. Completed in 1900, the building at 5 North Common Street is a stately Renaissance Style anchor for the North entrance to the Lynn Commons. The library was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1978, but is currently unable to accommodate the holdings and functions of a modern library for this quickly changing urban environment. Students will engage the staff and trustees of the library, study the shifting demographics of the community as well as other library modernizations, and then develop guidelines that anticipate future needs. These guidelines will include an addition of square footage and a reconsideration of programming to be determined through dialogue with stakeholders. This project is particularly suited to students sensitive to changing trends in library design and historic preservation. The goal for the final report is to help attract the attention of City leaders and planners to fund a future competition for library modernization.
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In 2010, Newton North High School opened the doors of a contemporary, 413,000 sq. ft. building to house its community of almost 2000 students, faculty, and administrators. At the request of the school’s leadership, a particular parcel of outdoor space was left undesigned; sandwiched between the theater wing and the arts wing and adjacent to the classrooms that house a program for green engineering, the landscape has been retained for the development of an outdoor classroom. This green common space will become the locus of the campuses sustainability initiatives and is intended to become an outdoor classroom: a landscape of learning, gathering, and contemplation. Working collaboratively with students from Newton North, BAC students will develop design strategies for an innovative outdoor classroom space to serve not only as a place for gathering, but also as a site for investigating and understanding ecological systems. Scaffolded as both an opportunity for collaborative design and design education, this Gateway will establish a set of design priorities and proposals for future implementation.
LEARN ING LAND SCAPE NNHS client NEWTON NORTH HIGH SCHOOL faculty BEN PETERSON KATY FOLEY
location NEWTON, MA
TRE MONT NAIL
This Gateway project will focus on design development and implementation of a wayfinding /signage package and museum-type display units to be used by the Tremont Nail Factory District for the Summer 2014 War of 1812 Celebration and for future marketing endeavors. The Tremont Nail Factory District is located in Wareham, MA and has been listed in the National Register of Historic Places since 1976. It was the site for one of the Nation’s oldest cut nail manufacturer which was founded in 1819. The company still exists in Mansfield, MA, but no longer owns the historic property in Wareham which is currently owned by the town.
client TREMONT NAIL FACTORY DISTRICT faculty JOHANNA ROWLEY
This is a great opportunity for upper-level Architecture, Interior Design, or Landscape students who are interested in exhibit/museum design and historic preservation. Wareham, located on the south coast of Massachusetts, is approximately one hour driving-distance from Boston. Students must have access to a car in order to visit the site during the semester.
location WAREHAM, MA
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Serving approximately sixty students who struggle with a range of emotional problems and learning disabilities, Walker/ Beacon High School moved to its current Watertown campus in 2006. Consisting of several buildings, including a historic Greek Revival farmhouse, the Watertown campus does not yet adequately serve Walker’s needs, which include more space for students and for staff, a better entry and vehicular circulation, and better utilization of existing and proposed buildings. Moreover, outdoor space remains largely unprogrammed and the farmhouse is completely unoccupied. Students working on this project will help Walker identify their priorities and programming needs, produce schematic options for the master campus plan, and survey and propose options for the adaptive reuse of the farmhouse.
WAL KER BEA CON SCHOOL
client WALKER BEACON HIGH SCHOOL faculty DAVE FENCHEL location WATERTOWN, MA
WEST WOOD LITTLE LEAGUE
Westwood Little League has been engaged in collaborative project with the Town of Westwood to bring substantial improvements to Morrison Park. So far, Phase One- including field reconstruction, installation of dugouts, etc.- has been completed, and planning and fundraising for Phase Two is now underway. WLL does not, however, have buildable plans for the concession stand, restrooms, and entrance to the Park, and is seeking a clear vision and compelling drawings to aid in the fundraising and construction of these structures.
client WESTWOOD LITTLE LEAGUE faculty KRISTINA OSBORN
This project presents several design challenges, including serving as a functional and welcoming entry to the Park, providing and efficient and enjoyable experience for patrons and volunteers (including still being able to watch the games!), and tying the Park back to the street and community. This project will be built as a part of Phase Two of the Westwood Little League improvements to Morrison Park.
location WESTWOOD, MA
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alice brown
carl koepcke
jack cochran
cindy lee
brandon cuffy
philip loheed
marc john d’amore
meghan a. mcnamara
dave fenchel
dylan mcnamara
sierra Âľanigan
ellen merritt
katy foley
cal olson
anda french
kurt petschke
jenny french
mark rosenshein
sarah howard
johanna rowley
blake jackson
son wooten
drew kane
liwen zhang
cortney kirk
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FA CUL TY BIOS
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Alice Brown MUP, Harvard GSD Sasaki Associates Alice is an urban planner at Sasaki Associates in Watertown where she focuses on community engagement, programming and activation, and disaster recovery and resilience. She has also worked locally on the Greenway Links Initiative, which is working to connect the linear park system in and around Boston, and the City of Boston’s Bicycle Plan. Prior to earning a Master of Urban Planning with distinction from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design, she taught middle school and high school math in the Bronx and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Jack Cochran M.ARCH/ MUEP, University of Virginia UrbainDRC, INVIVIA, ARC (Cambridge) Jack Cochran is an architect, urban planner, entrepreneur, and writer, focusing on the future of the city and the environment. He is co-founder of Urbain DRC, a design/research firm located in Cambridge, MA, and C’ville CSF, a community-supported fishery in Charlottesville, VA. He is a designer at ARC/Architectural Resources Cambridge, teaches in the Practice department at the Boston Architectural College, and received Master of Architecture and Master of Urban and Environmental Planning degrees from the University of Virginia.
Brandon Cuffy M.ARCH, Harvard GSD NBBJ Brandon Cuffy is an architectural designer at NBBJ and instructor at the Boston Architectural College. His work focuses on the synergies that exist between neuroscience and architectural design for the creation of healing spaces. His graduate thesis examined the current state of United States prisons and their degenerative effects on the neural activity of prisoners, and he speculated on the implications of the role architecture can play in the healing and rehabilitation process. He received his Bachelors of Science in Architecture from the University of Virginia, and earned his Masters of Architecture degree from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design.
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Marc John D’Amore BFA (Industrial Design), RISD TED, Design Museum Boston Marc is an industrial designer and user specialist. Over the past decade, Marc has established relationships with leaders in the data management, media, healthcare, and financial services sectors—working directly with executives at Fortune 100 companies, addressing strategic challenges though applied-collaboration and design-thinking principles. A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, Marc also studied Product Design Engineering at the Glasgow School of Art, and Liberal Studies at Brown University. He has lectured at the undergraduate and graduate level at area design schools, including the BAC and RISD. He currently sits on the Advisory Board of Design Museum Boston.
Dave Fenchel M.ARCH, University of Maryland Joseph Kennard Architects David has been practicing architecture for over 10 years in Boston and Washington, DC. His career has been grounded in residential projects that have a strong emphasis on high quality craftsmanship, attention to detail, and sensitivity towards site, context, and sustainability. David holds a M.ARCH with certificate in Urban Design from the University of Maryland, as well as a BS in Architecture from the University of Maryland and an AAS with major in architecture from Northern Virginia Community College. He is a project designer/manager at Joseph Kennard Architects.
Sierra Flanigan BA, Sustainability, Wheaton College EcoMotion Sierra spearheaded EcoMotion’s division of campus sustainability and her role as Director of Campus Sustainability and Social Innovation after graduating from Wheaton College. Sierra’s experience aligning campus stakeholders inspired her work with EcoMotion, where she has collaborated with dozens of school communities across the country to develop innovative sustainability programs in policy and planning, energy efficiency, finance, and community engagement. Sierra also organizes a monthly Sustainability Collaborative at the Cambridge Innovation Center’s Venture Cafe and is in the third year of planning Boston’s Earth Day unConference.
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Katy Foley MLA, Rhode Island School of Design Katy is a practicing landscape architect with design experience in New York, with !melk, Boston with Landworks Studio, and currently in Newport, RI. Her teaching style fosters a supportive learning environment centered on group design discourse. Katy is a Rhode Island Certified Horticulturist. At R.I.S.D. she received the American Society of Landscape Architects Graduate Honor Award, 2009, the Rhode Island Builders Association/Dagata Scholarship, 2008 and the Ruth Fisher Harwood Prize, 2008.
Anda French M.ARCH, Princeton University French2D Anda French co-founded French 2Design in 2008, a design firm whose work explores models of overlap between architecture, art and information, which can be found in many built and experimental projects. Anda’s work, which promoted the use of text-messaging based urban installations, was exhibited in the US Pavilion at the 13th Venice Biennale of Architecture in 2012. Anda previously taught at Syracuse University, the New Jersey Institute of Technology and in the Barnard + Columbia Undergraduate Architecture Program. She is a registered Architect in Massachusetts, and is NCARB Certified.
Jenny French M.ARCH, Harvard GSD French2D Jenny French co-founded French 2Design, a firm exploring models of overlap between architecture, art and information, which can be found in many built and experimental projects. In 2013 French 2D was one of five finalists in the Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1 Young Architects Program. Jenny’s research focuses on bringing to life world of the architectural imaginary, developed in research as a recipient of Harvard’s Appleton Traveling Fellowship and at the American Academy in Rome. Jenny teaches architecture and design studios at the BAC as well as Tufts University. She holds a A.B. from Dartmouth College and an M.Arch from Harvard University.
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Sarah Howard MPP, Tufts University Earthos Institute Sarah Howard is Co-Founder and Executive Director of Earthos Institute. Howard’s cross-sector work focuses on bringing people together to create inclusive, thriving communities with resilient, sustaining environments. Howard has served on numerous boards and committees including: Urban Edge (Roxbury, MA), Blackstone Academy Charter School (Pawtucket RI), Ashmont Hill Chamber Music (Dorchester, MA), Westport Housing Partnership and Westport Housing Authority (elected Commissioner), City of Somerville Urban Agriculture Ambassador Program, EcoDistricts Global Protocol Advisory Committee, Grove Hall Main Streets Design Committee, and Brickbottom Creative Common Advisory Board.
Blake Jackson M.ARCH, Architectural Association- London Tsoi/Kobus & Associates Blake Jackson is a licensed architect and is the Sustainability Practice Leader and an Associate with Tsoi/Kobus & Associates in Cambridge, MA. As Sustainability Practice Leader, his focus is on integrating sustainable design strategies, technologies, and LEED certification. In addition to teaching at the BAC, he is also co-chairman of the Boston Society of Architects (BSA) Sustainability Education Committee, is a frequent speaker at national conferences, and is broadly published in many highly circulated trade magazines. Drew Kane MCRP, Georgia Institute of Technology Utile Drew’s professional focus has been on the regeneration of urban environments including district master planning, campus planning, mixed-use communities and Transit Oriented Development, both in the US and abroad. Drew’s interests range in scale from the everyday use of urban spaces to the fundamental role of infrastructure in the city’s form and movement. At Utile he has been involved with the Mill River District Planning Study, a strategic plan for the future of industrial development in New Haven, and a district master plan Downtown Hartford to include design guidelines, implementation strategies and new zoning.
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Cortney Kirk, ASLA, LEED AP MLA, Rhode Island School of Design Copley Wolff Cortney is a landscape architect with over five years of experience working on a variety of institutional and academic projects. Cortney holds a Master in Landscape Architecture RISD where she was the ASLA student representative and the recipient of an ASLA Student Award in 2007 for “Toolboxes for Learning.” For the last four years, Cortney has been teaching advanced architectural studios, workshops, and technical classes at the BAC. When not at work, Cortney is a devoted home brewer and pizza chef on a quest to perfect ‘Ohio Pizza.’ She also enjoys working on her home (circa 1860) and social broadcasting about landscape architecture. Carl Koepcke M.ARCH, Harvard GSD INVIVIA, UrbainDRC Carl Koepcke is a co-founder of Urbain DRC as well as a designer for INVIVIA. His work is situated between traditional disciplinary boundaries of art architecture and technology. A graduate of Harvard Graduate School of Design, Carl’s work has been exhibited in multiple exhibitions at Harvard University and featured in GSD Platform 4 and 5, as well as on ArchDaily and the Creators Project. Cindy Lee M.ARCH, Boston Architectural College Cindy Lee is an architect and planner with experience on a variety of projects including healthcare and higher education. Her role has encompassed all phases of design/construction process which has enriched her design approach and helped her to solve construction challenges. She graduated from the BAC in 2005, and is an AIA competition winner in 2006; House for an Ecologist. Philip Loheed, AIA, NCARB M.ARCH, University of Michigan Earthos Insititute A former partner of Benjamin Thompson with his own practice, Loheed counts many award winning architectural, urban and master plan designs for a wide variety of waterfront, campus, housing, and commercial projects worldwide. He has taught ecological design since 1992, building on his training in terrain analysis at Harvard GSD’s Department of Landscape Architecture. Instrumental in the creation of Earthos Institute, he has deep faith in intergenerational partnerships to address contemporary problems.
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Meghan Archer McNamara M.ARCH, University of Michigan Payette Meghan Archer McNamara currently works as a designer at Payette Associates where she is managing the construction phase of a lab building renovation for Cornell's College of Engineering. She was educated at Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning at University of Michigan where she graduated with a Masters in Architecture in 2012. In addition to her work at Payette, and teaching in the Gateway Program, Meghan has lead several youth programs on Architecture throughout the Boston metro area.
Dylan McNamara BFA, School of the Museum of Fine Arts- Boston Boston Architectural College Dylan McNamara is an artist/fabricator who works in a variety of scales. He was trained at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston where he developed narrative graphite drawings, figurative sculptures, and large scale prints. After receiving his BFA, Dylan began to work at a variety of museums in the Boston area as an art handler and installer, including for the deCordova, Boston Center for the Arts, and the McCormick Gallery at the Boston Architectural College.
Ellen Merritt MLA, Rhode Island School of Design Boston Architectural College When she is not teaching studio or Gateway classes at the BAC, Ellen focuses on projects with a particular regard for the link between habitat and health. She has worked with architecture and development firms in the New England area on institutional, commercial, civic and residential design projects as a landscape consultant and designer. Ellen is responsible for the site design of the Lewis Bay Research Center and is involved with ecologic strategies to improve the water quality of Cape Cod bays and estuaries. She also serves on the advisory board of Meetinghouse Farm and co�authored a grant proposal to establish an arboretum dedicated to the horticultural heritage of a former nursery in the Town of Barnstable.
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Cal Olson B.ARCH, University of Minnesota DRA Architects Following his degree, Cal secured a position for one year in the office of Louis Kahn in Philadelphia. He has since worked in firms in the US and Europe of a variety of scope and scale, including numerous projects with an emphasis on primary, secondary, and post-secondary education for public and private institutions. He has taught as the University of Minnesota’s School of Architecture and the Boston Architectural College. Currently he is an Architect at DRA Architects in Waltham, MA
Kurt Petschke M.ARCH, University of Virginia Klopfer Martin Design Group Kurt is a Landscape Designer with 5 years of experience in the design of urban and public landscapes, as well as institutional, commercial, and residential design. Educated as an architect, he has practiced in a variety of architectural design offices, and has worked in both landscape and building construction trades. Kurt is currently a project designer/manager at Klopfer Martin Design Group.
Mark Rosenshein The Architectural Team Mark Rosenshein is a senior project manager with The Architectural Team, Inc., having been with the firm since he moved to the Boston area 15 years ago. Mark has a broad range of architectural project design and management experience, including work on Boys & Girls Clubs, community centers, historic preservation projects and high-rise residential work in downtown Boston. He attended George Washington University and Binghamton University and has been a Gateway faculty member for three years.
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Johanna Rowley MS.ARCH- Heritage Preservation, U.Minnesota Boston Architectural College Johanna serves as the Director of Assessments within the Practice Department at the BAC. Prior to joining the BAC, she was an instructor within the Interior Design department at the New England Institute of Technology and Newbury College. Johanna owns Rowley Design Studio, where she continues to develop her design expertise in the Corporate, Small Retail, Residential, Historical Preservation and Sustainable markets. She successfully passed her NCIDQ exam in 2006.
Son Wooten M.ARCH, Boston Architectural College Stef´an Bradley A graduate of the Boston Architectural College, Son has professional experience in healthcare, corporate and residential design. His roles have covered a variety of phases and this experience has enabled him to pursue his interest in the sequencing of spaces, contextualism and landscape design. Son graduated from the BAC in 2007 and was one of the two designers of the winning entry for an international competition for the Michael Klahr Holocaust Resource Center at the University of Maine, Augusta in 2005.
Liwen Zhang M.ARCH, Harvard GSD Elkus Manfredi Architects Liwen is currently an associate at Elkus Manfredi Architects located in Boston. Her interests involve exploring how institutions play a role in defining viable civic and cultural spaces in cities. With a background in architecture, urban design and applied arts, and a strong interest in landscape architecture, Liwen is committed to collaborations across disciplines and scales. She believes that strategies for problem solving and design thinking ultimately occur at the intersection of interdisciplinarity. Born in China and raised in both England and Hong Kong under the British education system, Liwen has also lived, worked and studied in Paris on projects in North Africa, Copenhagen, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Shanghai.
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Benjamin Peterson Director of Practice Instruction, Director of Gateway Ben received a BA in Anthropology and Environmental Studies from Bowdoin College and an MArch from the Rhode Island School of Design, where he focused his studies on the intersections of architecture, landscape, and infrastructure. While at RISD, Ben co-edited a publication cataloguing the work of RISD's faculty and students engaged in design work in the developing world. In addition to teaching as a member of the faculty of both the BAC and Wentworth Institute of Technology, Ben was Lead Faculty for the BAC's Summer Academy, a summer program in design exploration for high school students. He has practiced with several local design offices and serves on the Board of Directors of the Community Design Resource Center (CDRC) of Boston. Johanna Rowley Director of Assessment in Practice, Faculty Johanna serves as the Director of Assessments within the Practice Department at the BAC. As part of a team dedicated to the experiential learning process, Johanna assists students in their professional development pursuits. She firmly believes that a learned experience through "doing," and the ability to communicate learned experience through the written word and graphic detail, portrays a richer story of a student's experiences throughout his or her academic career. She received her M.S. Architecture Heritage Preservation degree from the University of Minnesota in 2011, and her undergraduate degrees in Interior Design (2003) and Architecture (2004) from the University of Minnesota. Johanna owns Rowley Design Studio in West Wareham, MA. Beth Lundell Garver Director of Foundation Instruction, Faculty Beth is a registered architect and lead education director for the BAC's CityLab Intensive. The CityLab Intensive immerses all incoming undergraduate and graduate students in a series of field-based exercises that explore urban systems comprising the City of Boston. Beth received her Master of Architecture in Urban Design from the Harvard Graduate School of Design and her BArch and BIA from Auburn University in 2003, where she studied under the late Samuel Mockbee at the Rural Studio. From 2004 to 2012, she worked with Rafael Vinoly Architects in New York and San Francisco. Beth's current work centers on design as a social agent cultivated through architecture, urban design, and geography.
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Len Charney Dean of Practice, Faculty Len holds a Masters of Architecture from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1979), a Masters in Teaching from Antioch College (1974) and a Bachelors of Science from Cornell University (1971). His diverse career has focused on three professional areas: education and career development training, design and construction management, and community planning and real estate development. Len's teaching experiences range from secondary to university and post-graduate assignments. He has also participated in the launch of innovative programs of instruction and career enrichment, including a certificate program in facility management and asset planning for architects and facility engineers in the US and Canada.
Jaime Libowitz, Manager of Practice Carline Arcene Practice Information Coordinator Pam Loewy Practice Operations Assistant
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For more information about Gateway and other design programs at the Boston Architectural College please visit us on the web: http://www.the-bac.edu/ education-programs/practice/gateway-initiative We look forward to developing new relationships with community partners, faculty, and future design students.
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Gateway Practice Department Boston Architectural College 320 Newbury St. Boston, MA 02115 617.585.0145 practice@the-bac.edu