Architecture, Urbanism and Planning
Allowing the Informal – Urban Block – 001 from softgrid_limited on Vimeo.
A study into how emergence can be allowed and partially directed within urban territories by understanding the underlying rules.
Part of a series of urban models incorporating emergent behaviour by Eric Cheung while he was a student in Post-Graduate Unit 6 at the University of Nottingham.Please see the following link for more detail:
http://designunit6.com/
Student: Eric Cheung
Research Leader: Ulysses Sengupta
I was invited to sit in as a panelist on a session at the festival by Marisol Garcia, from UCL at the Eleanor Marx-Aveling Galleries. The discussion was on the contemporary influences, forces, processes and outcomes of urban transformation in Istanbul, centred around the case of Kartal, where an international design competition has been won by Zaha Hadid Architects to transform a post-industrial neighbourhood into a new CBD for Istanbul (‘the CBD’ being the broad theme for this year’s festival).
Following a well researched presentation by the students, the discussion moved onto the possibilities that may exist somewhere in between practice and research to influnce urban change towards more inclusive futures. It was interesting to note both the depth of research and the attempt to implement methodologies for bottom up drivers within processes of urban transformation. The session proved to be too short for the discussion to progress to combining bottom up approaches and inputs with the top down policies and debates. It will be interesting to see if parallel tools will be proposed.
For further information on the context of the session, a web article by UCL’s MSc Building and Urban Design in Development (BUDD) is linked here
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/dpu/courses/masters/msc_building/Fieldwork/Istanbulreport2010lowres
Blog by MSc Building and Urban Design in Development course at UCL (within Development Planning Unit)
http://www.abitare.it/highlights/city-of-islands-istanbul-at-a-crossroads/
Festival Website
http://thisisnotagateway.squarespace.com/2010-programme/
Ganz_Feld_Verwand-Lung (Flux Territories – The beginning 01) from softgrid_limited on Vimeo.
An exceptional piece of work by Robert Buehler as part of his final undergraduate year at The University of Nottingham, Department of Architecture & Built Environment. (B.Arch)
The project involved the merging of virtual (animated), real (filmed) and found (film) material to explore ideas of cities as territories in constant change. It was the beginning of our explorations into emergent systems, parametric urban design and the relationship between identity, memory & urban patterns.
Student: Robert Buehler
Studio Leader: Ulysses Sengupta
More Detail: www.designunit6.com
Embedding Ecology – The Eco Farm Project 01 from softgrid_limited on Vimeo.
This is a quick early fly through of a project we are involved in (China ). The video was not meant to be of a completed design, but rather an attitude that we brought to the project in the early stages.
Our accepted proposal based on this quick visualisation reflected the main spatial/architectural principles involved:
1) An actual ecological area at the heart of the agricultural/scientific scheme
2) Public access to the new amenity created (a public park)
3) Working with the topography and studied water paths and collection
4) Incorporating/enjoying the abstract patterns created by human intervention in the form of agricultural landscapes
5) Shifting perceptual possibilities through seasonal variance
Produced in co-operation with: Marc Sawan
www.eye-kon.com