Olivia Arguello Portfolio

Brady Island Recycling and Exhibition Space

Professor Robert Burrow

Project Overview

8505 Cypress St, Houston, Tx 77012

This 3500 Project, derived from extensive site research about the Houston Ship Channel, aims to create a series of artificial life cycles that circulate and interconnect through a public exhibition space, and a recycling center to create an interface between the people, land, and industry. The organic form begins to highlight the edge of Brady's Island in an attempt to reactivate the edge and invite the community in. Sitting on artificial terraces, the building has a public access point on the West and a private workers access point on the East that interconnect paths in the center of the building on the second floor. The interior pathways create a maze like space, creating the incentive for visitors to explore the land and space around them. Lastly, the primary public access point stems from a connecting bridge starting from across the channel connecting to the second floor of the building, while also creating separate bike paths for visitor circulation.

1. Originally inhabited by the abandoned restaurant, the edge of the North West side of the island is cleared

2. 2’ experiencial terraces placed in response the the organic contours of the site

3. Terraces are offset subdividing the form of the building to create anchor points and programmatic zones, forming an overarching central enterance and gathering space

4. The framing of the form begins to highlight the stairs, platform, and connection between both the public interface (left) and recycling center (right)

Base Form

Bridge Connection/Paths

Circulation Connectivity/Interface

Recycled Material Imports/Exports

Internship | Summer 22' - Present

Falon Land Studio

Project Overview

Seagrass Art Installation (Landscaping/Art Installation)

Seagrass Art installation | Miami, FL | 2022- present

Individual Tasks: Rendered Visualization

Structural Coordination Digital Modeling

Light Rail Transit Line Esplanades (Metro Landscaping/Paver Replacement)

Harris County Metropolitan Transit Authority | Houston, TX | 2022-present

Individual Tasks: Rendered Visualization

Planting Design

Construction Documentation

Paver Replacement Exhibits

Digital Modeling

Boys and Girls Club of Walker County (Landscaping)

Playspace Project in collaboration with the Kaboom Foundation and support from the Powell Foundation | Huntsville, TX | 2022- present

Individual Tasks:

Concept Design

Digital Modeling

Rendered Visualization

Native Plant Identification Board/Spanish Translation

Multi Functional Student Dormitory

Professor Rafael Beneytez-Duran

Project Overview

1400 Richmond Ave, Houston, TX 77006

This 2501 project required a precedent analysis that was expected to be adapted to a new site and program while maintaining the underlying characteristics of the precedent. This proposal takes both physical and conceptual characteristics of the precedent and inverts them to create a multi functional student dormitory. This project was derived from the Teatro Bio Bio located in Concepción, Chile, designed by Smiljan Radić. The original concept of the Teatro Bio Bio followed the idea of a visual lightness on the exterior with a gradual heaviness culminating in the central theater. This project inverts that concept by creating a dense geometric skin, with a central gymnasium, surrounded by student dormitories, which picks up on the theme of lightness through its large open skylight.

Professor Ross Wienert

Project Overview

This 2500 project consists of a library and residences for historical and cultural research on African American history in the area surrounding PVAMU. The driving element behind the design is the creation of an ambulatory path between PVAMU, the site, and the cemetery. The Cultural Collection functions as a place of rest and reflection along this path and the journey is reflected in the circulation within the building. Each program requirement is met through a separate building requiring visitors to circulate around the central courtyard underneath the covered path creating the sense of a secular sacred space. This idea is further translated into the design through the roof’s structure which acts as a way to capture rainfall and frame the courtyard and path along with the cultural screening system that frames the building. In addition, the Cultural Collection as a whole is raised above the ground to symbolically preserve the sacred ground adjacent to the cemetery site. The Prairie-View Cultural Collection creates a sacred space for research and reflection to inform a better understanding of culture and historical materialism.

E.E. O'Bannion Street, Prairie View, TX 77445

Prairie-View Cultural Collection and Residence

Concrete Casting Site Studies

Water Feature

Inspired by the National Museum of African American History and Culture, this project incorporates an essential water feature created by the angular roof. When raining, this will capture the water and frame the garden. This also begins to represent ideas of ritual purification, cleansing, and rebirth.

Screening

Inspired by the interaction of light and facade in the National Museum of African American History and Culture, this project uses an exterior screening system to frame the overall form and circulation of the building. This facade also has potential for the application of cultural patterns and symbols and highlight the interior space through light amd shadow.

Elevated Platform/Path

The building platform is intentionally elevated to minimize direct contact with the ground preserving the existing ecological system and symbolically minimizing contact with the sacred ground connecting the the cemetary.

Menil Park Sculptural Pavillion Professor Joshua Smith

Project Overview

1400 Richmond Ave, Houston, TX 77006

This 1501 project was derived from visual and conceptual aspects from the precedent analysis done over the TKTS Booth in NYC. This hybrid system was designed to respond locally to the specificities of the Menil Campus site and a selected series of art works. This project creates multiple experienceial paths, through the paramentric stair-like structure, that circulate around the extrusions framing the existing trees on the site, becoming an artificial extension of the land.

Exploded Isometric

Selected Works

Selected Content:

ARCH 2328 Tech Concrete/Steel Assembly

Professors:

Rives Taylor

David Chelbus

Justin Smith

ARCH 3501 1 Week Design Exercise (Using Vray)

Professors:

Joe Rivers

ARCH 2331 Digital Vocabularies (Digital Fabrication)

Professors:

Michael Gonzales

Megan Jackson

ARCH 3397 Virtual Envisioning (Using Unreal Engine 4)

Professors:

Tom Diehl

Joshua Smith

2022 COAD Charette Project

Professors:

Rafael Beneytez-Duran

2501 Precedent Analysis (Teatro Bio Bio)

Professors: Rafael Beneytez-Duran

1501 Precedent Analysis (TKTS Booth)

Professors:

Joshua Smith

Concrete/Steel Assembly

ARCH 3501 1 Week Design Exercise

Section 1/4”=1’

Floor Plan 1/4”=1’

Section 1/4”=1’

Digital Vocabularies/Parametric Forms Using Rhino 3D/Grasshopper/Digital Fabrication

The development of 3D-printed architecture could be revolutionary in the design world, environmentally, and economically. Especially in a growing city like Houston, the increasing use of automotive vehicals needs to be accessable and affordable to all areas of the city. This proposal would suggest a low labor, environmentally friendly, and affordable modular design. The 3D printed modular pavillion would be quick to assemble for rapid construction to meet the needs of fast growing cities and encourage equitable distrabution of new infrastructure.

The Houston Medical Center currently contains a large parking lot as part of the MD Anderson Mid Campus. This area could beneift from a cost friendly addition of charging ports and a resting pavillion space.

Additionally, the proximity to the bayou provides an opportunity to install ports along the water front trail which encourages exploration and rest along the bayou.

2501 Precedent Analysis (Teatro Bio Bio) Axonometric/Sections

1501 Precedent Analysis (TKTS Booth) Drawings/Diagrams