Final Project Collages

Studio 6 Brooklyn Stack Housing Collage

Why Bring Awareness To Greenwashing?

As an architecture student whom others can possibly relate to, I have always relied heavily on using vegetation as an aesthetic and "organic" factor into the project with the belief that it made a difference. Of course, it is always visually pleasing to look at, but it is both economically and environmentally a hazard to include within a project. The adopted term of "greenwashing" gives this illusion of being environmentally and sustainably friendly to both a community and to a client, but it is simply not sustainable to incorporate within a community. 

Giving off the misleading impression of being impactful, it presents a public hazard. In UN Sustainable building initiative, it continuously effects greenhouse gas emissions therefor increasing the need for usage of energy within the building and usage of water to maintain the vegetation found around the design while increasing the emissions of the building that is being released into the environment.

This design gives off a Panopticism effect in both aspects. Both from the community looking inwards and the project itself while hosting many of its amenity spaces. While the project itself is highly unreliable sustainably, if it were existing, this concept is slightly hidden with the projects initial goal of rerouting the BQE underground, seeminglessly redirecting one pollution source from another and using this strategy to blindfold the public. As well as the concept being derived from living in a post pandemic time period, elevating the residential massing's from the ground floor, creating a clear separation from public vs. private; But, creating this constant state of being  surveilled by most of the residential units, looking into what should be most of the semi private spaces underneath (i.e., public plazas, commercial and museum spaces, etc.

Although there maybe cons about this project, theoretical wise, it is still creating a sense of authenticity for its neighborhood at what would essentially be defend today as not only a modern design, but something more autonomous and economically functioning for its public. Providing much needed public and commercial spaces for the area, while creating a new circulatable connection  onto the new Brooklyn queens Parkway.

All of this, but at what cost?

Theories:

Authenticity

Panopticon

UN Sustainable Building Initatives

Sources:

Michel Foucault - Panopticism

Buildings and Climate Change Summary for Decision-Makers 

Noblest Ornament of the City

These architectural styles were constructed on the premise of employing God as the designer's major basis in bringing authenticity into a place of worship throughout their period. Using natural, pure, and organic shapes to depict noble ornamentation and architecture instead of ignoble architecture, or more known as impure patterns developed by man. And with two very distinct designs from two very distinct cultures, the aesthetic difference between these design cultures is obvious. Both designs were based on the notion of employing fundamental mathematical shapes to construct structure for churches and places of worship, such as fundamental squares and circles for domes, returning to the concept of humanism.

The structural appearances, such as employing the notion of tectonics for the Lincoln Cathedral, of adopting and applying these architectural concepts in conventional materials, construction, and the shape of the structure’s conception, are where these parallels break away. As a result, most of these geometrical shapes, such as spiral towers, pitched roofs, and dramatic arches, are graphically depicted as its key qualities in midst of their development. I have incorporated Blobitecture as a more contentious concept for the Sultan Ahmed Mosque. Since the beginning of authentic architecture theory, it has been recognized that a dome when viewed from afar, should be used to show the public that below this structure is where the "temple" or "Altar" should be, or, in other words, it is characterized as the major tool symbolizing God. However, this idea is repeated and repurposed throughout the whole design. Although attractive and traditional, it serves no other function in terms of quick recognition than to carve out internal areas for the installation of distinctive mosaic blue tiling. When most places of worship are seen, they typically show one dome as a visual backdrop for where the primary component of the altar is placed. This is virtually lost in context in the blue mosque.

The panopticon notion is something that most church designs highlight across all spectrums. Many of these buildings of worship are not only designed geometrically in terms of their construction but are also apportioned in this abstract fashion within their society, according to humanism. When it comes to choosing a location for these churches/mosques, they frequently put them in the heart of their towns, often on top of a valley, so that they can look out over the entire area and become its focal point. The integration of many of these spiritual aspects, such as minarets and spiral towers, heightens the hierarchy as well as the sensation of being watched within society.

Theories:

Authenticity

Panopticon

Blobitecture

Humanism

Tectonics

Sources:

Michel Foucault - Panopticism
The architectural Theory of Viollet Le Duc

Architectural Principles in the Age of Humanism - Rudolph Wittkower