The course sought to assert the relevance of the fabrication skills at our disposal as potentialities for social and environmental relevance. Through the re-appropriation and re-imagining of existing urban conditions, the students designed and fabricated working prototypes that embraced the messy reality of our city and promoted community involvement. The students began by identifying a quality of the urban condition that included the latent capability for improvement and worked toward fabricating an adaptive, responsive and environmentally viable solution. Specific emphasis was placed on testing and exploring through hands on research the possibilities of detailing and fabricating connections using unorthodox materials. At the conclusion of the course the students produced a full scale urban intervention and observed and documented their relevant successes or failures.

Material workshops were held to encourage the students to explore constructions from inflatables to parametric agglomerations using quotidian materials. Ultimately, the goal for was for the students to come out of the course with a healthy respect for two core concepts: firstly, an increased skill in the use and applicability of the fabrication skills we have developed for solving design issues using unorthodox materials in unconventional settings; and secondly, that there is an opportunity for architects to regain lost relevance by inserting themselves through unsolicited proposals into the public consciousness as steward’s of urban well being.

Students:
Jared Dignanci, Farzin Lofti-Jam, Ehsaan Mesghali, Katerina Petrou, Paul Tran, Wassim Shaaban, Maryam Zamani

Assignment 01
Part of the Atlas of Urban Connections project (TBD), the first assignment involved designing and fabricating a joint to connect something, anything, to a vertical street extrusion (such as a tree, street sign, light pole, etc…). The members of the Public Works Department in NYC are masters of improvisation, you can see it walking down any street here, and there is a lot to learn from their successful and not-so successful techniques for attaching to existing sidewalk infrastructure. This assignment was prepared to introduce the student to the capacity to breaching the gap between the pedestrian and existing streetscape objects, with the goal to test flexibility, safety, durability, adaptablility while exploring different possibilities for potential synthesis with existing urban forms.
Wassim, Katerina, Paul

Jared, Farzin, Ehsaan, Maryam

Assignment 02
Using Graffiti Research Lab’s projection bombing tutorial at Instructables, the class set up a mobile power station using a 75V marine battery, and set off around the neighborhood near Columbia to experiment and throw up some interactive light projections.
The last year has seen some truly inspiring displays of the potential light can have as an interventionist tool, and the class studied this problem using three main strategies: 1) messaging independent of site, i.e. you only need a blank wall, 2) site dependent projections, like those following the curving, horizontal bands on the Guggenheim, and 3) flexible projections that can adapt and interact to a number of different sites, taking advantage of the unique characteristics of each. Care was given to create projects that both actively and passively engage those passing by the site.
Wassim, Katerina, Paul

Ehsaan, Maryam

Jared, Farzin

Assignment 03 (FINAL)
Building off the first two assignments, the final assignment sought to synthesize the work and concepts of the class into a larger installation that could still be completed in our very tight time frame, but started to explore the core ideas of the course, in effect becoming a proof-of-concept, working model. By attempting to capture a broader audience for architectural interventions, a number of questions presented themselves and the students were challenged to anticipate a range of possible eventualities – how will it be used? Can its use be changed? Is it durable? Is it waterproof? Can it safely stand up? Fabrication was considered less from a formal quality, and more from a use, durability, improvisation and public participation viewpoint.
Ultimately, A successful project would accomplish three things: 1) display ingenuity in fabrication technique and material 2) re-imagine or re-design a specific urban site/condition to take advantage of its hitherto hidden potential, and 3) have a performative component, in that the intervention has a temporal quality that while engaged promotes public interaction.
Wassim, Katerina, Paul

Maryam, Jared, Farzin, Ehsaan

A rare spotting in the wild. Assignment 01, build a parasitic attachment to a vertical streetscape extrusion.

Begin with a shareware 3d koala model and open in Poser Studio.

Pose the bear to allow him to hold onto the street sign but allow the sign to bypass his head.

Export from Poser to Rhino and run the “reducemesh” command to simplify/facet the form.

Properly scale the model.

Export from rhino to 3ds max.

UV map a texture onto the model of images from the proposed site.

Export from 3ds max to Pepakura designer and unfold geometry.

Print and cut templates.

Assemble.

I’m pulling the last 100 tweets from within a half mile radius of latitude 40.800808 x longitude -73.965154 (otherwise known as the desk in my bedroom where I’m typing this now). And right off the bat I can see that the tweeting frequency of some of my neighbors is impressive, out of 100 tweets there were only 42 different users, all of whose profile images are displayed above based on the frequency of their messaging. Voyeurism is something built into New York’s dna, the simultaneous repulsion and attraction of surveillance that was so effectively conveyed in Rear Window. Sometimes when riding the train, on the rare occasions when you’re sans earphones, you can’t help overhearing fragments and context-less snippets of random stranger’s conversation. Most of the time they’re pretty banal, on the order of sports predictions and office gossip, about nothing interesting but still interesting. And that’s what makes the hidden, invisible conversations going on in this five block vicinity so fascinating to me in a way I can’t really describe. 100 random tweets hold no mysteries, but the 100 tweets of the people around me do. A secret knowledge that gives added meaning to the ruby aficionado I see walking down the street or the Mavs fan at the bar, all faces that are part of a huge story that can never end. I’ve started following ThatsOro.

Click more for the code. Based on great examples here and here.

import twitter4j.conf.*;
import twitter4j.internal.async.*;
import twitter4j.internal.org.json.*;
import twitter4j.internal.logging.*;
import twitter4j.json.*;
import twitter4j.internal.util.*;
import twitter4j.management.*;
import twitter4j.auth.*;
import twitter4j.api.*;
import twitter4j.util.*;
import twitter4j.internal.http.*;
import twitter4j.*;
import twitter4j.internal.json.*;

ArrayList<String> username = new ArrayList();
ArrayList<String> imgs = new ArrayList();

double lat;
double lon;
double res;
String resUnit;

PImage twitimg;

void setup() {
  size(990, 480);
  background(255);
  smooth();
  noStroke();

  ConfigurationBuilder cb = new ConfigurationBuilder();
  cb.setOAuthConsumerKey("XXXXX");
  cb.setOAuthConsumerSecret("XXXXX");
  cb.setOAuthAccessToken("XXXXX");
  cb.setOAuthAccessTokenSecret("XXXXX");

  lat = 40.800808;
  lon =73.965154;
  res = 1;
  resUnit="mi";

  try {

    Twitter twitter = new TwitterFactory(cb.build()).getInstance();

    Query query = new Query();
    GeoLocation nyc = new GeoLocation(lat, lon);
    query.setGeoCode(nyc, res, resUnit);
    query.setRpp(200);

    QueryResult result = twitter.search(query);

    ArrayList tweets = (ArrayList) result.getTweets();

    for (int i = 0; i < tweets.size(); i++) {
      Tweet t = (Tweet) tweets.get(i);
      String user = t.getFromUser();
      Long id = t.getFromUserId();
      String url = t.getProfileImageUrl();
      String msg = t.getText();
      Date d = t.getCreatedAt();

      username.add(user);

      imgs.add(url);
    };
  }

  catch (TwitterException te) {
    println("Couldn't connect: " + te);
  };
}

void draw() {

  int k = (frameCount % imgs.size()); 
  String pix = imgs.get(k);
  String users = username.get(k);

  PFont font;
  font = loadFont("FuturaLT-ExtraBoldOblique-18.vlw"); 
  fill(0);
  textFont(font);
  text(k + " " + users, 0, 35);

  fill(255, 200);

  rect(0, 0, 220, 45);

  twitimg = loadImage(pix, "png");
  image(twitimg, random(width), random(height));
  //text(users, twitimg.x, twitimg.y);

  fill(255, 1);
  rect(0, 0, width, height);

  fill(222, random(50, 150));
  textSize(random(10, 30));
}

Inspired by both razzle dazzle camouflage and my middle school trapper keeper, this barrier entry presents a strong graphic face to the street. While the concept of camouflage may certainly seem like a contradictory tact for a protective barrier whose sole purpose is to remain unhidden, by using bold, angular geometric forms to blur the barrier’s edges, this in fact increases its perceived range. The illusory effect of the forms induce nearby traffic to slow down, producing a safer, more bike and pedestrian friendly thruway.

When I first saw this image of my block from the 40s, I knew it was something I wanted to share. Sure, part of it was a sense of pride, that our seemingly nondescript, uptown block once held a moment in time that was deemed important enough for someone to capture. And further, that that historical memory was saved, and became indicative of the history of the subway and the city. Properly fitting amongst a slideshow of once momentous occasions such as crowds cheering with Fiorello at the opening of the 34th St station and documentary photos of the surprisingly frequent automobile on train accidents. But it was also the content of the image.
The included caption was such:

1940: In a view north from 106th Street, only the supports of the old Ninth Avenue elevated line remained as the push to go underground continued.

As the subway ceded elevation in favor of the earth, the Amsterdam avenue elevated train disappeared. I can only imagine the revelation as light and some semblance of uninterrupted silence returned to the street. This image captured a frozen moment of transition, where the elevated train could be either in the act of disassemblage or erection, and with it the hope of revitalization. The newness and flux of urban change was just as relevant then as now, and should serve as a reminder that the present isn’t static and transitions are as true in the New York of 2011 as in 1941. However, that truism seems to have become forgotten in a city where there are now over 25,000 buildings and 100 neighborhoods classified as historic and under the jurisdiction of the NY Landmarks Commission, complete with all the associated zoning regulations and limitations on new building.

The QR code was translated into a laser cut ready file via F.A.T. lab’s QR_STENCILER utility. Using marking chalk, the stencil was painted on the street near to where the original photographer stood in 1941. All in all, this rudimentary, proto-augmented reality was created on the cheap in under four hours.

The removal of the overhead train tracks and the introduction of smart phones in the neighborhood are both changes to be resisted or encouraged. The means of accessibility to this installation are still beyond the means of many people in the area, and as ubiquitous as they may be among some, phones that can read a qr code are still not available to all. In that way, the moment in the original photo and this street marking can define a line through two points, the past and present, collapsed into one and defined by and within the smartphone. The direction and ultimate meaning of that vector is dependent on your own personal point of view. My initial inclination was to create a fantastical image to represent the street in 2081, but that would be devoid of meaning and furthered severed from people’s daily reality. By referring to a historic, shared reality, ultimately then, the means of this technological view of the past is as much of a harbinger of potential futures of the neighborhood as any fantasy image could ever hope to be.

With a budget under $300, the installation is realized as a spatial prototype for how a fleeting work can provoke an increased engagement between users and public space. Built with over 200 led lights and conceived to take maximum advantage of a temporarily repurposed historic building, the work becomes as ephemeral as a passing comet, creating a new constellation in the night sky, visible from the streets of Brooklyn for one night only.

Following from the dispiriting failures of 001, 002 proved to be more successful, and not only because of it’s pumpkin orange color, but because it wasn’t cleared of books within 6 hours and the empty shelves themselves weren’t removed after 10 days. I attribute this mostly to an adjustment of tactics and location. Every block has its own subtleties and micro-urban climates, one block is boarded up with for “rent signs” while the next is a thriving pocket of activities and street-level engagement. By moving to a location 8 blocks further south, 002 was placed nearer to a major thoroughfare – 96th street – and received a more steady stream of mixed pedestrian traffic leaving the express train stop on Broadway and by virtue of being closer to street level retail (a large CVS), educational (a school and church) as well as the residential apartments along 97th street. 001 just didn’t get enough foot traffic and frankly felt deserted. I thought being near a hostel and school would generate some interest, but the hostel is an imposing Victorian Gothic structure with a decidedly prison-like bent reflecting its previous use as a nursing home for “Respectable, Aged and Indigent Females” and unsurprisingly generates little sidewalk traffic and even less urge to stop and inspect some books in a phone booth.

In an attempt to encourage sharing and free distribution of the initial selection of books, I didn’t mark the books in any way. But in lieu of the entire initial selection of 001′s books being carted off within a few hours, I tested out being more explicit and treating the books more like a library. Almost like a Dewey decimal number taped to the spine of a library book, I added a visible logo to the bottom of each spine. I hoped this would prevent the books from easily winding up in the hands of sidewalk book resellers, but I fear that the marking implies an ownership that prevents a casual exchange of taking and leaving their own books. I observed a number of people reach out and pick up a book, flip through it, but then return it to the shelf. Some even doubled back for a second look and to engage in a closer inspection of the shelves, but they still refrained from actually taking a book. Perhaps feeling hesitant to, I don’t know, steal/vandalize (irony) something that’s out in public? I can see how there might be a stigma there, to not just keep walking straight along the sidewalk with your head down, but to stop and engage with the street. I intentionally wanted to avoid any directions, like a sign that would say something along the lines of “hey this is for sharing books, you can leave some here” and I still want to avoid anything that seems overtly prescriptive, but after seeing people hesitate when confronted with 002, perhaps there is a more subtle way to gently describe an intended use.

Even as they are rendered obsolete by the ubiquity of smartphones, I’m interested in pay phones because they are both anachronistic and quotidian. Relics, they’re dead technology perched on the edge of obsolescence, a skeuomorph hearkening back to a lost shared public space we might no longer have any use for. Something to be nostalgic for, in the way I can’t think about a phone booth without conjuring up images of an old, impatient woman banging on the door to one while I was inside using a calling card to ask for money. And of course they are nuisance, basically pedestrian level billboards that only blight certain neighborhoods (good luck finding a payphone in Tribeca, while there are eight separate phone kiosks on one block between 108th and 109th streets and Columbus Ave). But they can also be a place of opportunity, something to reprogram and somewhere to come together and share a good book with your neighbors.

All the books were donated by local residents and the plywood was milled by Kontraptionist.

EDIT FEB 21, 2012: Hi folks, if you’re reading this and you’re interested in getting involved, get in touch!

I’ve used genetic algorithms for form finding with a previous project, and that time I was using a tenuous connection between catia, modeFrontier and Robot. So I was excited to see grasshopper begin to natively implement an evolutionary solver with Galapagos. As an initial experiment I started with a classic, something simple – I wanted to find a tessellated form that would enclose the maximum volume using the smallest surface area. I’d like to think that this would produce something unexpected, but it’s pretty much the definition of a sphere. I set up the parametric model to wiggle all over the place with various triangulated densities and differing number sided polygons at each joining segment. My hypothesis was that the form would tend toward symmetry and evolve into the aforementioned spherical shape. I believed that the polygons would tend toward the most sides possible to more closely approximate a circle, later generations evolving away from a triangle toward an icosagon. (Just like on Flatland!)

A couple of observations: Galapagos pretty quickly found the overall shape – smaller radii at the extremes and bulging in the middle – the beginning of a sphere. However, while it tended toward bilateral symmetry, it kept a kink in the first segment that prevented the shape from being perfectly symmetrical. I think the solver got stuck in a local minimum as opposed to a global minimum. Perhaps with a higher mutation level or letting it run for a longer amount it could have jumped out of this. On further checks I found that it was correct, after 30 generations and over 2500 iterations, the surviving croissant-like shape of the optimal designs did have a better SF:V ratio than a perfectly symmetrical design. Perhaps it had something to do with the setup of the parametric model or the way the facets resolve themselves at the extremities?

But in general my hypothesis was proven correct. Which leads to the initial problem with Galapagos. There are a lot of opportunities with this type of experiment and people more clever than me will surely do them, but when you can only solve for one objective it becomes difficult to create truly complex solutions. For instance, with my surface area/volume problem there is only one true pareto solution. Eventually Galapagos will find it, or with enough time and a calculator I could calculate this myself. There is one single, optimal solution, it’s just hidden somewhere amongst a number of parametric sliders. Unless you start getting into multiple, competing objectives, then the pareto point becomes a curve and there are multiple valid solutions, each one involving certain trade offs and a criteria for selection. Say you wanted to find a form with the minimum srf area:volume ratio, but also that form had to have the fewest structural members, or provide the most shade on June 21st, or spatially provide the most potential revenue stream for a project stakeholder. That’s when it gets really interesting and opens the possibility for a design space that includes high performing, unexpected results. It’s a great start, and I can’t wait to see Galapagos evolve.

Download the grasshopper definition for version 0.8.0004 here: http://gracefulspoon.com/downloads/Grasshopper_GALAPAGOS_TEST.rar