2024-25 Yu-Yi Chuang by YU-YI, CHUANG

YU YI CHUANG

University of California, Los Angeles Master of Architecture

Selected Projects 2024-2025

Architecture as a Medium of Reconnecting Community

My Taiwanese heritage aligns with the selected scholarship criteria, as a preference is given to students from Asia and Southeast Asia. My commitment to contributing my knowledge and design ability to my hometown and highlighting Taiwan’s unique design landscape makes me an ideal candidate.

I was born and raised in Taiwan, an island country located in southeast Asia with a richhistory and multiculturalism shaped by its colonial past. I’m aiming to pursue a career as an international architect, hoping to utilize physical design languages to facilitate forums for communities to connect with their past, present, and future. Grounded in my cultural roots in Asia, my goal is to develop my design capabilities further and engage with diverse perspectives at the UCLA Master of Architecture.

My primary goal in pursuing a Master’s in Architecture degree at UCLA is to further explore ways to integrate architectural design into cultural and environmental contexts for community sustainability. Growing up in Taiwan, I witnessed a community embracing multicultural influences while having ongoing debates about cultural identity. Isolated geopolitics, coupled with military tensions and confusing cultural identity conflicts, shape my commitment to sustainability and preserving diverse voices. As an architect, I believe that architectural design and language are vital for fostering discussions and collaborations to find shared values. Therefore, I want to deepen my knowledge of different theories and design practices to design a building that is adaptive to changes. I aspire to use design to bridge the widening gap between people and places in my hometown Taiwan and across Southeast Asia, where rapid profit-driven development projects lead to urban homogenization and jeopardize our sense of place.

As an aspiring Asian Architect, I’m dedicated to becoming an outstanding international architect whose design can make my hometown, Taiwan, and communities in Asia better and accomplish the goal of connecting people and places in my local community. I believe that the scholarship will set a solid foundation for my academic journey at UCLA and beyond.

Space Frame Case Study

Learning from the precedent project, Hall of nation, designed by Raj Rewel, we try to fully understand the logic and characteristics of space frame structure system, and then design new project base on it.

ACADEMIC WORK

Year: Winter 2025

Team: Yu-Yi Chuang, Fernanda Zavala, Konrad Collins

Role: Main Designer Course: AUD412 Building Design Studio

Instructor: Heather Roberge

Interface

The Space Where People, Nature, and Culture Reunite

Environmental sustainability is embedded in the design. This project designs a new arboretum that brings nature back to the urban region and provides a better user experience. I apply architectural environmental analysis methods, daylight, sunlight exposure levels, and analysis, to design the arboretum in Los Angeles.

WORK

Year: Winter 2025

Type: Individual project Course: AUD412 Building Design Studio Instructor:

ACADEMIC

Heather Roberge

Contrasting Spatial Relationship Juxtaposed

This design continuously explores contrasting spatial relationships—enclosure vs. openness, structure vs. flexibility, light vs. shadow—creating a rich architectural dialogue. Through these dynamic interactions, the space fosters unique experiential connections, providing an immersive and evolving environment that seamlessly blends built form with natural elements.

The structure is composed of two spatial truss systems: a fully enclosed indoor box on the left and a semi-open space on the right, enclosed by a spaceframe structure on all four sides but featuring an open-air roof. These two volumes tilt in opposite directions, generating self-shading on one side while allowing for a fully open, semi-outdoor experience on the other. This duality creates a dynamic spatial composition, accommodating both indoor and outdoor arboretums. At the second and third levels, two intersecting floor plates form an X-shaped configuration, with the second level serving as an exhibition deck and the top level as a propagation deck. These overlapping platforms encourage multilevel interactions, allowing visitors to engage with the space from different perspectives.

Additionally, the right-side structure integrates two glass greenhouse tubes, which function both as structural reinforcements for the floor plates and as specialized environments for plant cultivation or exhibitions.

Indoor Arboretum Outdoor Arboretum

Space Frame

Greenhouse Tubes

Intersection X-Plates

The primary design concept utilizes pyramid-shaped structural units to provide both structural support and controlled sunlight filtration. This approach creates a varied distribution of sunlight exposure across the site, allowing for the strategic placement of plants based on their specific light requirements. By integrating this system, the design not only enhances environmental adaptability but also establishes a harmonious relationship between architecture and nature.

Purple Prairie Clover

Prickly Pear

Fall Glade Onion

Thimbleweed

Bradbury Beebalm

Joe Pye Weed

Wild Columbine

Tall Larkspur

Virginia Bluebells

Dense Shade

The Hidden Nature Beneath the City

Open Air Upper Deck

Indoor Exhibition Deck

Diamond in the Canyon

How to design an architectural structure that is adaptive to natural landscapes?

The site is located at the fringe between the mountain cliff and the urban view of Los angeles city, and the building is adaptive to this unique natural landscape. I utilized both the curve and flat elements to design the whole building since the structure can effectively follow this diverse terrain. Additionally, I created a space in this extraordinary natural landscape to invite people to visit the space and have leisure activities.

ACADEMIC WORK

Year: Fall 2024

Type: Individual project

Course: AUD411 Introductory Design Studio

Instructor: Max Kuo

random / orderly connected / separated part / whole inside/ out center / periphery

Understanding the Relationship between each Elements

The design process started from understanding the relationship of each elements in the picking artwork, and then extracting and reinterpreting them into new drawings. These new drawings reveal the concept of two contradicting ideas. Lastly, I try to overlap the 5 reinterpreting drawings to generate a conceptual plan drawing, showing the spatial relationship of it.

Delaney American, 1901–1979

“There always seems to be the shadow which follows the light.”

Beauford

Untitled c. 1955

Main goal is making the design like a diamond embedded within the canyon. By utilizing circular forms, I carved out openings to create key open-air spaces and introduce natural light. I extended the four corners of the structure, pulling the diagonal mass to its highest point to define the building’s main axis. One end serves as the entrance, while the other marks the spatial terminus. The interior layout follows this axis, creating a sequential direction of spaces that guides the flow of people within.

Year: Winter 2025

Type: Individual project

Course: AUD222 Architectural Mediation II

Instructor: Freyinger, C.P.,

M.,

Copp,

Rancourt, C.R., Ayata, A., Feghali, Y., Davidson, N., Wilson, A.M.

Rendering and photoshoping the attempt to place the design at the seaside area of Los Angeles

I incorporated two contrasting elements—curves and straight lines, curved surfaces and flat planes—to construct the roof and walls. The goal is to create a space that feels like a winding cave, yet imbued with logical order. The interior dimensions follow a rhythm of expansion and contraction, creating a sequence of spaces that cannot be see through at a glance.

Visitors must follow the light source, gradually exploring the depths of the space, achieving a sense of inner peace. At the end of the cave, there is an open viewing platform offering panoramic views of the city. Natural light for the interior mainly comes from gaps formed by the different panels of the roof and several primary open-air public spaces.

The building is partially embedded into the mountainside, allowing the landscape to extend into the interior or flow outward from within at various points.

In terms of floor plan, the design facilitates the separation of two groups in the main hall. One side leads to the sunlit center, while the other guides visitors to the spiritual space.

Draft Conceptual Model