Issuu

PORTFOLIO

RACHEL CHAN

01 Hogg Elementary School

This project involved the renovation and expansion of an existing school facility to meet the growing needs of its students and the surrounding community. The primary objective was to design and construct a new gymnasium, fulfilling a critical gap in the school’s amenities. The gymnasium also needed to meet the dual purpose of serving as a state-of-theart storm shelter, compliant with stringent tornado safety codes, to protect both school occupants and local residents.

In addition to the gym, the project included the addition of several new classrooms and specialized program spaces, enhancing the educational environment. Throughout the process, careful attention was given to ensuring that the new construction adhered to Dallas ISD’s strict design guidelines, balancing functionality, safety, and aesthetic appeal.

Spring 2023

Critics: Joshua Smith

Laboratory of the Speculative Real

In this laboratory, students were tasked to explore the humannature-technology relationship under the pressure of climate change and limited access to scarce resources. Our projects existed at the blurry edge of the physical real and virtual real. We attempted to define the humanness of a society fragmented by nature but connected via the metaverse amidst a dystopic reality.

Our research this semester was directed toward one of the most fundamental topics in architecture: the creation of domestic space plus a bonus type, titled “A Hitchhiker’s Guide to Hyperreality.” As we delved into world-building and crafting design fictions, we researched and implemented techniques often used in the video game and film industries. This immersion allowed us to become fully engaged in the realities we created, narrated, and designed by each member of the laboratory.

This lab aimed to investigate new ways to interpret, conceive, design, and describe landscape and architecture. While traditional methods of representation prevailed for some time, they made the cognitive process a one-way interaction with an “emitter” and a “listener” that barely interacted. Game technologies permitted the creation of realistic, oneiric, utopian, and dystopian universes. This approach allowed us to use, twist, bend, or reinvent the laws of physics, the flow of time, the hazards of weather, and the perception of depth, offering near-absolute freedom in exploring our speculative futures.

03

Spring 2022

Partner: Amatullah Gulamhusein and Madeleine Price

Critics: Dijana Handonovic

Reconstructing Memories

In this studio, we used the region of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a precedent to analyze and examine architecture as a vessel for identity during destruction and reconstruction.

The aftermath of the conflict and destruction that occurred in the 1990s during the Bosnian War is still evident in the thousands of destructed buildings, facades, homes, memories, and identities. Today the ruins serve as daily remainders to the atrocities that have occurred and are preventing reconsolidation and coexistence.

If the places that we inhabit plays a significant role in molding us as individuals, how do those ruins impact us? What effect do they have in our daily life?

As the ongoing debate between historians, architects, and politicians continues whether to rebuild, eliminate or memorialize the ruins, students this semester will have the opportunity to offer a temporary solution,...a space to be a site of social interaction connecting people together to form networks and cultivate identities.

THE KEY

We started this project by examining and analyzing the history and culture of Bosnia. From that research, we found that Bosnian food culture had a rich depth in Bosnian history, and underwent a series of evolutions that allowed us to draw inspiration from.

Food was a constant element throughout Bosnian history, from gathering days, to war time, to modern day; Bosnians have found ways to adapt to their environment and adjust their recipes to what was available.

Moving on, we created a key with custom designed symbols for each item. We graphed and charted our site analysis and research, following the graphic style of the book, Terra Forma. These graphs cover information on how we explored outside of the building, programming, germination requirements, our vertical garden system, and plant growth.

Map

The intervention that we designed goes into a war-torn building in the city of Mostar. The building was once a public library before the war. It now has a missing roof, the second floor has completely crumbled, and parts of the wall has fallen away. Today, it is considered a landmark that people use to rendezvous with each other, and it sits adjacent to a public pedestrian street.

As a continuation of our food theme, one of our programs within the intervention was a communal garden. The garden includes gardening boxes on the first floor, and many vertical gardens on most south facing walls.

The vertical gardens are designed to be part of the scaffold system that runs throughout the building. The idea of the vertical garden was not only to grow plants and herbs, but also to create a lavish and luscious environment that people were walking into; mimicking the natural overgrowth of plants and vines commonly found in abandoned ruins.

Arbortriums

Fall 2021

Partner: Jenna Agatep

Critics: Emily Moore

John Lewis was an American politician and reknown civil-rights leader. A Baptist preacher, Lewis began his fight for civil rights sitting in on lunch counters and eventually joining the Freedom Riders. His leadership and sacrifice during the voting rights march in Selma, Alabama led to the 1965 Voting Rights Act being passed and sparking Lewis’s career in politics.

Lewis served in the United States House of Representatives for Georgia’s 5th congressional district from 1987 until his death in 2020. His unofficial title was the “conscience of congress” and as the recipient of Presidential Medal of Freedom he is remembered for his invaluable contributions to the civil rights movement and his unwavering fight for social justice.

Description

THE PROGRAMMING & SITE

Located at the intersection of Auburn Avenue and Jackson Street, The John Lewis Center for Social Justice sits in the center of Atlanta’s historical district, serving as a space to bring together the people of Sweet Auburn to further the work the of the late Congressmen Lewis.

The North and East Facades are the principle facades. Across from Lot 393 Auburn Ave will become the future John Lewis Plaza to connect the site to a future city park. Building design should not exceed past height of Ebenezer Church towers, 40’-0”.

1. Lot 393 Auburn Ave.

2. Ebenezer Church

(Left top) Site Boundary; (Left Bottom) Site Map; (Right top) Programming and square footages; (Right bottom) Massing diagrams

intersection of Auburn Avenue and Jackson Street, The John Lewis Justice sits in the center of Atlanta’s historical district, serving as a together the people of Sweet Auburn to further the work the of the late Lewis.

Project Information

Facades are the principle facades. 393 Auburn Ave will become the future John Lewis Plaza to connect city park. should not exceed past height of Ebenezer Church towers, 40’-0”

Building Site

7,000 sf

Owners Requirements

Project Description

Additonal Project Information

THE CONCEPT

Southern Georgia Live Oak Tree

The Trunk

The

Canopy The Building

The concept for this project follows the abstraction of a tree. John Lewis’s legacy was prominent and everlasting, and was also rooted in Sweet Auburn. The Southern Georgia Live Oak was chosen for its thick trunks, wide canopies, and its long life span (around 1000+ years) to symbolize Lewis’s longevity and permanence in our society.

To create the canopy screen, inspiration was taken from the casted shadows of leaves and branches of a tree’s canopy. The effect broke up the sunlight and allowed dappled sunlight onto the ground. To mimick the same effect within the building, a fritted glass was designed and applied to all glass surfaces.

(Left top) Fritted glass design; (Right top) Night view render; (Right middle) East elevation; (Right bottom) North elevation

Our site analysis for this project concluded that the Justice Center was located in a busy part of downtown Atlanta, specifically, the historic district of Sweet Auburn. With abundant public transportation and foot traffic in the area, we included a station as an extra program in order to encourage visitors of the center to arrive by any form of public station. Forms of public transportation used in the area included a rail, buses, city bike stations, and complete sidewalks for pedestrian use.

Conveniently, the station is placed on the northwest corner of the center, connecting the outdoor plaza to the lobby, creating a transition from exterior to interior. (Left top) Station looking out at plaza render; (Right top) Travelling distance analysis from nearby landmarks; (Right bottom) West Elevation

THE INSIDE

1. Lobby

Abortrium

Event Space 4. Exterior Arbortrium 5. Prep Kitchen

Restrooms

General Storage 8. Mechanical Room

Electrical Room

Public Transpotation Station 11. Outdoor Plaza 12. Conference Room

THE DETAILS

Wall Section 1 3/16” = 1’-0”

(Left top) Outdoor render; (Right top) Section A; (Right bottom) Section B

THE PROGRAMMABLE BRIDGE

Inspired by the process of dredging, the idea of displacing materials elsewhere formed the concept of a programmable bridge, which takes after the shape of the bayou.

Ship Channel and Bayou Depth

Programmable Architecture

Flat Deck

REIMAGING SWISSNESS

Scale: 1/8”=1’0”

Section 1

0 8’ 16’ 24’ 32’

Section 2

Scale: 1/8”=1’0”

0 8’ 16’ 24’ 32’

EMBRACING COLORS

In response to the rising racial disparity in the U.S. near the end of the COVID-19 pandemic, this series of portraits focused and highlighted the faces of people who identify as BIPOC or a “minority” in the U.S. Paint was incorporated to emphasize different stereotypes, or facial features that each “minority” has been stigmatized with.

Participants were asked to write a narrative of their experiences and/or encounters they had with racism in this country. From their writings, and additional questions I asked, I was able to draw inspirations on what type of pattern and color to paint on each of their faces.

Self, 2022

Dinner Wrap, 2023

I See Red, 2023

THE ESSENTIALS

A series that focuses on the essential workers during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Some of the most essential people that did their best to help everyone stay safe and keep structure to a society that was on the verge of crumbling. Essentials could be found outside and inside of the home, supporting others in many different ways.