Research
The site, situated on Lake Ontario, was historically the world’s largest coal-burning generating station. The station was active from 1962 - 2005, but today it is an empty brownfield site.
To understand the implications of the generating station, I documented surficial geology, wind patterns, flora and fauna presence, bird migration and fish habitats.
The geotechnical report (right) documents borehole samples taken from the site, detailing surficial geology and the substrates that make up the site. The boreholes can be read as sections through the earth: extrusions of the layered, compacted substrates.
The conceptual section of the site (below) represents the boreholes, extending from the ground up into the sky. These elements are the layers that create the object. The bird migration, surficial geology, fish habitats, wind erosion, flora and fauna create the stratification of the borehole and the object itself.
Object to Building
Looking at the program through the lens of the initial experimentation process, external forces have made an imprint on the object itself. Similar to this, the building is a space in which artists and geologists can experiment and leave behind their artifacts so that their successors must confront what has come before them. A layering of conversation and collaboration begins to happen while this building is filled with the artifacts. In the development of the building massing, I turned back to my original explorations with plaster to create artifacts that played with not only form, but with material as well. I experimented with combining charcoal, dirt, sand, clay, and resin to create these forms. I tested densities and translucency as well as how the varying materials could create the subtractions of the built form.
Marker of Environmental Change
Set in the backdrop of the anthropocene, an object is introduced as a marker of environmental change. In an initial research phase, the object is inserted in the natural environment, and its transformations as a result of raw forces are documented.
Running parallel to this is an architectural implementation, where the object--as a building-- becomes the documentation of change. In the object, stratified layers are created by its occupants: artists and geochronologists, who create permanent changes by leaving behind artifacts that both impact the structure and document their presence. This project explores the competing forces of permeance and change through the impact of a building’s occupants on its architecture.
Advisors: Gille Saucier, Gregory Neudorf, Christian Joakim
While experimenting with the form I used using dirt, clay and sand to create the subtractions. On the left you can see the result of the subtraction of clay on the plaster.
This process demonstrated the interaction of materials to create the object, layer after layer. Similar to a borehole being an index of events that have happened over time, these artifacts are an index for the experimentations that have happened.
In the subtraction of the dirt, clay, and sand, their absence is an index of their presence.
All of this lead to the built form on the right where, through a series of steps of pouring, casting, waiting, and subtracting, the implications of the experimentation that have happened during this time are shown.
Architectural Implementation
Similar to the anatomy of the borehole, this building follows that ideology in its stratification. In the earth’s layers, the substrate material densifies the deeper they are. This stratification informed the layers of programming in the building. Shared spaces: libraries, maker labs, machine rooms, and lecture halls create a densely programed base on the lower floors, while more spacious and specific programming like chemistry and research labs occupy upper levels.
Playfulness in the building form is a catalyst for activity (right). The stratification of materials is evident through the densities and openings throughout this extruded borehole.
Conclusion
In this project, the object, a building, explores the competing forces of permanence and change. In the initial research phase, the physical form of the object is changed by raw environmental forces, while in the architectural implementation, the object becomes a building which is changed by the residual artifacts created by the building’s occupants. The stratified form of this building thus becomes a marker of change over time.
Level 1
1. Reception/Atrium (CP)
2. Makers Lab
3. Meeting Room
4. Library/Catalogue
5. Cafe
6. Displays
Level 5
1. Ampitheatre
2. Gallery Space
Level 6
1. Clean Chemistry Lab
2. Machine Room
3. Computer Lab
4. Admin
5. Storage
6. Gallery Spaces
Initial Process
The process began by collecting pieces left by nature. Ferns, twigs, acorns, and leaves that were displaced by the forces of wind storms and heavy rainfall. Documented here are a few of the artifacts collected over a 4 month period of time.
Through a series of tests in experimentation, I began to explore the process of capturing certain moments in time by casting the artifacts into plaster creating, the object. Then, testing the limits of this newly combined plaster and artifact, by using competing forces to shape the object. Here you can see two explorations through the process of fire on the left, and snow on the right.
The result of this exploration of the two objects resulted in the study of memory, of fire and ice and the superimposition of these two energies. This process lead to the site research where this form of exploration was continued.