A Sculpture For Living

Happy New Year

2009-01-02T11:24:00.004+11:00

Aerial from east. Shadows at 12.00, winter solstice.

Eye level from west. Shadows 3pm, summer solstice.

Eye level from north-east. Shadows 9am winter solstice.

Living room interior. Shadows 9am winter solstice.

The really big wall is gone, the literal containment of space in the courtyard is now 'implied'.
Same plan, rotated so open edge faces NE.

Crude collages

2008-01-17T22:39:00.000+11:00

Made by tracing the sticks we set up. Feels right to me!

Site Workshop photos

2007-12-31T10:12:00.000+11:00

Documentation of the Site Workshop on the 8th & 9th of December.

DAY 1:

DAY 2: (Rained out)

What we did:

The 1:50 card model was used to orient the project in reference to the site context.
The location and height of the perimeter wall was traced out at 1:1 on the site using garden stakes, pine dowels and orange string.
The rooms were then also drawn out at 1:1 using orange spray paint.

How it informed the design:

Tracing out the height of the wall at 1:1, I was mildly shocked by the height of the wall, but also given more confidence and conviction in the appropriateness of this maneuver on this site.
The scale of the plans has since been revised after spraying out the rooms, resulting shift in the overall radius of the hexagon from 13m to 14m.
The orientation and location of the house has been revised in response to the views from the site, particularly out toward the fields to the East.

Thanks heaps to everyone for pitching in - especially Bianca and Scott!

See the original post of aims here.

Model Photos

2007-11-24T20:19:00.000+11:00

Thanks to Cec for making the model.

Meet your new selves!

2007-11-24T16:38:00.000+11:00

These are some little scale people I got to drop into the model. They have great personalities and I've given them names.

Martin: "I'll fix that now"
Rose: "And I'll help"
Lily: "A little to the left"
Adelle: "I'm only here for the weekend, so don't make me do anything."
The Architect: "I'd help, but I don't want to get these shoes muddy"

The model is done and ready for you to have once I've photographed it.

Sun Studies

2007-11-05T18:33:00.001+11:00

Equinox - 22nd March

Summer Solstice - 22nd December

Winter Solstice - 22nd June

These are animated gifs, you need to click on them to make them work. The time of day is in the bottom corner.

Cec's first day!

2007-11-05T16:13:00.001+11:00

Cec is making a big awesome model of the house. Starting today. She has to call me 'C.E.O' and I get to call her 'temporary intern on probation'. She doesn't get business cards.

Courtyard Flip

2007-11-04T17:36:00.000+11:00

I was thinking about some of the issues with the glass walls facing the courtyard. Firstly the house would be environmentally poor, secondly you would have nowhere to hang your art, and thirdly there would be no privacy for the bedrooms. I had this idea that these walls facing the courtyard could be 'flipped' copies of the exterior walls facing them, as in the windows start at the bottom and progressively erode away the entire wall toward the centre.
This will no doubt make more sense when I've actually drawn it, but in the mean time, this photo by Doug Aitken kinda sums up the image I have in my head.

Image: Doug Aitken, The Movement, 2000

SITE WORKSHOP

2007-11-04T10:47:00.000+11:00

I am proposing a one night, 2 day 'site workshop' as a way to develop the finer spatial and material aspects of the design. Lily and Martin you have to come, because this is about your spatial perception of scale and proximity. I have also invited my smart, talented, and fun friends Bianca and Scott to collaborate with us on this 'exploration'.

The idea for this grew out of my realisation that I've never quite grasped the alternative spatial possibilities of interiors. When planning out a house for BKK for example, I'm pretty much on auto-pilot, doing what fits the requirements, but rarely anything more - like exploring an 'idea'. This combined with the blunt instruments architects use to design space - namely the 2D drawing board - meant that even if I sat here and 'really thought hard' about it, I'm unlikely to get anywhere without being there and 'feeling it'.

It's going to be a lot like a trust-building retreat for a building, as opposed to an organisation...

For the material exploration I propose to bring samples of the proposed materials: bricks, plywood, concrete, plaster & mirror, to see how they might sit on the site and to test ways of fitting them together.

For the spatial exploration, I propose to bring more sheets of ply for constructing mock up sections of the spaces & furniture etc, string lines and props for marking out the scale of the building & courtyard and whatever else i can't think of right now...

All of it will be documented in models, photos and video as a reference for the next stage of zooming in on the design.

Please add suggestions for other stuff to bring or do in the comments.

Where: The Site
When: Saturday & Sunday the 8th & 9th of December

Super Excitement!

Concrete ideas

2007-07-29T13:25:00.000+10:00

Sorry to be thinking about interiors at this stage but we are. Decided that concrete would be the way to go for benchtops, hearth etc. only to find that Simon from BKK is already in bed with Melbourne's foremost concrete benchtop artist at 'Concrete Blonde'. Martin thinks he can do it himself but Lily wants a quality job, not dodgy.

Model: Roof options

2007-07-23T12:16:00.000+10:00

For Lily: me working old-fashioned like. Also note the 'wireless' playing in the background.

Roof Type 1: Flat, falling back to courtyard.

Roof Type 2: Low folds, falling to box gutters.

Roof Type 3: High folds, falling to box gutters at perimeter.

Roof Type 4: PREFERRED. One fold up, one fold down, opens out to view and compresses over kitchen, falls to box gutters at perimeter and fold line.

(Dodgy) Plan: 9th July

2007-07-09T12:56:00.000+10:00

As Lily and I were discussing yesterday, what we've set up here is not the conventional 'architect-client' relationship where I 'sell' my designs on you, but a collaboration. So ordinarily this would go straight in the bin, but I know you won't freak out and think I've lost it, so here it is. And just in case you are, read this big disclaimer:

DON'T WORRY, I KNOW IT'S CRAPPIER THAN BEFORE, I HAVE ALREADY MOVED ON.

Then again, maybe you like it?

Le Corbusier on 'plans'

2007-07-07T13:44:00.000+10:00

"To make a plan is to determine and fix ideas.
It is to have had ideas.
It is so to order these ideas that they become intelligible, capable of execution and communicable. It is essential therefore to exhibit a precise intention, and to have had ideas in order to be able to furnish oneself with an intention. A plan is to some extent a summary like an analytical contents table. In a form so condensed that it seems as clear as crystal and like a geometric figure, it contains an enormous quantity of ideas and the impulse of an intention."
- Le Corbusier, Towards a New Architecture, 1923

I thought this was a really nice quote that fits well with your response to seeing the plan. The thing that pleased me the most about your comments was not that you liked it - which of course is great- but that you understood what it meant without my needing to explain it. I was amazed at how accurately you understood the subtlety of what i was trying to get across just through the arrangement of lines on a page, and that those lines could summarise so much of our ongoing conversation.

Plan: 2nd June, 2007

2007-06-02T12:16:00.000+10:00

Link to a big one to print out (1:100 at A3 full bleed)

FYI: Primary School, Gando, Bukina Faso

2007-05-09T11:07:00.000+10:00

Hey is this near to where you were in Africa? The villiage is called 'Gando', it's 200kms from Ouagadougou in Bukina Faso. It's a project by Diébédo Francis Kéré, an architect actually from Gando, who then studied in Germany and has now returned to work on community projects for his villiage. It popped up in the high-brow archi-mag UME 21. I reckon its super awesome; local materials and building techniques for an environmentally sustainable outcome, but with really modernist planning.

'Shifting' materiality theme

2007-05-01T09:59:00.000+10:00

I've been thinking about this subtle shifting brick wall and how that idea might be translated throughout the house using other materials like paving or timber lining to the walls or ceiling. My only reservation at this stage is it's a fine line between wacko and elegant when things start to get wonky...

Tennis court dimensions

2007-04-28T21:33:00.000+10:00

Official measurements from the Court and Enclosure Dimensions pdf on the Tennis Australia website. Minimum Total Playing Area (that's TPA for those in the biz) is 35.75m x 17.07m. And preferably oriented North-South. What surface were you thinking club champ?

Glazing as scaled up brick pattern

2007-04-25T12:12:00.000+10:00

I liked this scaled-up stretcher-bond pattern in this glazing by the short-lived student practice Architecture Group from New Zealand. Rothingham house, 1951.

Precedent: MacIntyre's Coil House, 1953

2007-04-25T12:06:00.000+10:00

On this side of the world, also in 1953, Peter MacIntyre designed this courtyard-ish house, which, similarly to Aalto's summer house, responds to the landscape by cascading down the slope and avoiding a few big gums. Lily and Martin both picked out this one from the Monument 'Classic Houses' issue.

Precedent: Aalto's summer house, 1953

2007-04-25T11:58:00.000+10:00

Aalto's own summer retreat house in Muuratsalo, Finland, designed in 1953. Similarly to a lot of the other precedents, this house is a semi-courtyard house, with the rooms arranged in an L shape around a brick courtyard. Aalto used this house to create an essay in ways to compose bricks; different bonds, grout depths, tiles, etc. Richard Weston describes this house as "by comparison with conventional summer-houses, both traditional and contemporary, the design is remarkably introverted. The rooms have small windows and the normally direct relationship to nature is mediated by the courtyard, which defines a man-made place within the forest..."

LandVic Maps

2007-04-25T10:24:00.000+10:00

From far to close, these (feint) drawings are from the LandVic Interactive Map, a government database which collects all the Australian property and title information. They have 10m contours, which are pretty vague but good for putting together a terrain model of the surrounding hills. Combined with the survey which will have much more detailed level information we can the accurately determine what views are possible from what parts of the site.

Sketches

2007-04-25T09:26:00.000+10:00

Views from house site

2007-04-24T16:58:00.000+10:00

Looking east across adjacent field.

Panorama from north round to west from on top of car where house might sit. The surrounding hills can be

Looking north over adjacent valley. Photo taken from north-west corner of site above road.

Up.

Weird tree

2007-04-24T16:51:00.000+10:00

I wonder how you could use this mid-growth-conjoining tree near the site as a starting point for architecture? You probably wouldn't want to on second thought. Too weird and a bit creepy. Like an ingrown toenail.

Details, textures and nature on site

2007-04-24T16:48:00.000+10:00

Photos from site visit in April '07.

Position of house on site

2007-04-24T16:19:00.000+10:00

The white box indicates where the house is to go as discussed at the site visit. Quite a few trees will need to be lopped, but hopefully they'll be good views from that spot. We'll be able to test that with the survey and a detailed site model. Photos are from the site visit in April '07.

Looking south-east from road near creek crossing.

Looking west from approach access onto site.

Looking west from centre of site.

Looking north-east from field west of site, close.

Looking north-east from field west of site, far.

PRIVATISATION

2007-04-12T22:38:00.000+10:00

Everythings bloody privatised these days! I saw on the news just this morning that in Qld the cost of water has been put up by 15%, not because people are using too much, but because they're being good greenies and not using enough! making the water company lose money.

So I know it's a bit annoying, but now I've even privatised this blog, as soon the work on it will become a bit more sensitive. Now only 'registered' users will be able to view it and make comments. As the 'administrator', I'm the only one who can do the inviting, so if there's someone you want to show the blog to, send me their email address and i'll have them on here STAT.

Precedent: Rogers House, Wimbledon

2007-03-26T13:07:00.000+10:00

Thanks to Matt's comment on the Free David Hicks post for pointing me to the Stories of Houses blog, and particularly to this early house by Richard Rogers. I like the plan because its kind of ambiguous as to whats inside and whats out. As far as I can work out, its two pavilions sitting on a paved plinth - but in reference to this discussion on courtyard houses, what is cool is if you invert that you get one big continuous house with two courtyards cut out of it.

Images: Richard Rogers, Dr. Rogers House, 1968-69

Free David Hicks!

2007-03-06T16:06:00.000+11:00

That's so weird, i just made that same Guantanamo gag half an hour ago about this proof shot of a house we've just finished in Drysdale... And this is what the rest of it looks like if you're interested. I didn't work on it mind you.

Images: BKK Architects, Balla House, Drysdale, 2007

Familiar

2007-03-05T22:01:00.000+11:00

When I saw this (David Hicks' Cell) in the paper on the weekend it seemed strangely familiar. I realised it bore strong similarities to the built in minimal bedrooms of the original Lily Cube design.

Bored!

2007-02-28T11:40:00.000+11:00

Ok I can tell everyone's getting bored of precedents, I know I am, but I've got a scheme cooking at the moment, which I'm not yet ready to go public with. I've got to get it out soon though, as the ideas have woken me up at 3am the last 3 nights and won't let me sleep until I've drawn them up.

But on the other hand, maybe I shouldn't do anything until I've been to the site?

Materiality: Salk Institute, Louis Kahn

2007-02-28T11:24:00.000+11:00

I love this combination of timber and concrete. Of course this is in-situ ashen concrete and probably maple wood, you could probably fake it with ply and cement bricks to get that beautiful combination of colour and textures.

Images: Louis Kahn, Salk Institute, La Jolla California, 1969-74

Precedent: Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Frederick Romberg

2007-02-28T11:06:00.000+11:00

This is the perfect example of all architecture needs to be. Square plan, elegantly squat roof and spire, basic but good quality materials, beautifully simple detailing (notice how the roof is held up by fine steel columns which are pulled off the corners to let the domestic timber window frames run past), a wonderful setting, and a warm soft light in the interiors.

Images: Frederick Romberg, Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Canberra, 1961-63

Precedent: House at Lake Connewarre, Kerstin Thompson

2007-02-28T11:00:00.000+11:00

When I first saw this house published I didn't really get it, there didn't seem to be enough, I was bored by it. But now I realise thats what's good about it, it's really un-pretentious, almost un-authored. It uses almost banal standard construction and materials and is draped over the site without any resistance or big gestures. But the plan and its subtle clever cranks makes it seem so liveable.

I also heard it was pretty cheap for the winner of the best residence in the national awards.

Images: Kerstin Thompson Architects, House at Lake Connewarre, 2004

Courtyard House 3: Court-house with Gararge, Mies van Der Rohe

2007-02-28T10:51:00.000+11:00

The ultimate unbuilt courtyard house to complete the trilogy. A rare occasion when Mies went 'off grid'.

Image: Mies van Der Rohe, Court-house with Garage, 1934

Courtyard Houses 2: Baker House by Robin Boyd

2007-02-28T09:57:00.000+11:00

Although there's a few things I'm not into about this house - mainly the 'country' overtones of Boyd's interest in the 'Aussie homestead' as a type - I really like the plan as it seems to both engage with the landscape beyond, while also defend against it.

The outer walls are very much of the landscape - quarried out of local slate - while the interior outer wall is set well back creating this great blurred threshold under the huge roof.

The other cool thing about this house is the interior courtyard covered with flyscreen - a bug-free outdoor room.

Images: Robin Boyd, Baker House, Bacchus Marsh, 1968 - Sorry they're a bit crap.

Courtyard Houses 1: Hill St House by Roy Grounds

2007-02-28T09:36:00.000+11:00

The first in a series of many precedent posts. I've been interested in the courtyard house as a way of engaging with the idea of the house as a 'sancturary'. Maybe I'm taking the word to mean 'citadel', but I think there's something appropriate about having a well defined envelope that more intimate spaces are then carved out of, perhaps as a strategy for resisting the harsh environment beyond.

I've also been thinking a lot about Lily's art, particularly the frequent use of primitive geometries like circles and cubes. Grounds combines both these ideas, the citadel and primitive geometries, but with a delicate, almost Japanese quality of space.

Images: Roy Grounds, Hill St House, South Yarra, 1954

Sculptural Space

2007-01-21T22:09:00.000+11:00

Thirty spokes will converge in the hub of a wheel; But the use of the cart will depend on the part of the hub that is void.
With a wall all around, a clay bowl is moulded; But the use of the bowl will depend on the part of the bowl that is void.
Cut out windows and doors in the house as you build; But the use of the house will depend on the space in the walls that is void.
So advantage is had from whatever is there; But usefulness rises From whatever is not.

From the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tze

Response to: Artwork

2007-01-21T17:19:00.000+11:00

Original Post: Artwork

It's hard for me to speak about art, and I try not to pretend to know what I'm talking about, but I can try and relate it to architecture.

What I think about when I see (photos of) Lily's land sculptures is how diagrammatic they are - like abstract scientific diagrams of a magnetic field - but then obviously made from organic (Murray piece above) or domestic (as in the huge records installation) components. So the components are familiar, but not the arrangement. I love it how those sunburnt campers up on the Ovens river thought your underwater rock cairn was 'extra-terrestrial'.

Image: Iron filings in a magnetic field.

More Johnson: 'Building as Work of Sculpture'

2007-01-21T13:41:00.000+11:00

'The third aspect, the most difficult, is the Building as Work of Sculpture. Architecture is usually thought of as different from sculpture and indeed not much great architecture is great sculpture. Pyramids: yes; Taliesin West, no. Stonehenge, perhaps; Versailles, no; the Guggenheim Museum, maybe. The Parthenon, certainly not. (Columns and entablatures see to that.) Frank Lloyd Wright roofs, arcades, colonades, all speak of architecture, not sculpture.'

- Philip Johnson, What Makes Me Tick
Extracts from a lecture at Columbia University, 1975.

Image: Philip Johnson, Crystal Cathedral, Garden Grove, L.A, 1980

Chapple Vale in Google Earth

2007-01-21T13:08:00.000+11:00

Here is the site in GoogleEarth. It would be good to put up a .kmz file which properly locates it, but Blogger is only letting me upload images. The satelite imagery is pretty lo-res around there anyway.
P.S- Check out the LandVic post for more detailed site info.

Getting tanked

2007-01-20T22:27:00.000+11:00

According to this 36 month Victorian rainfall map from the BOM, your site is in one of the wettest parts of the state. The good news is that new water tanks are cool as! This ones called the 'Bagel' from Tankmasta. It's meant to go underground but i think its too special to bury...

'Spatial, not sculptural'

2007-01-20T22:22:00.000+11:00

I've been thinking a lot about this idea of the house as a sculpture. I think I know what you mean when you say 'spatial, not sculptural', but I'm finding it hard to move on from there, as I maybe see spatial experience (emotion) and geometry (science) as inherently linked.

I had a good look at the Donald Judd at the NGA when Amy and I were up in Canberra after christmas. That's the same piece above, but it was placed differently, sitting on terracotta tiles at 60 degrees to the room - to line up with the triangular grid in the ceiling I think. And lit more sharply which created more reflections around it on the floor.

The thing I like about it, and why I think it could be relevant and useful for this project is for proximity. You are always explicitly aware of the position of your own body in relation to the piece, and I think its this that drags you around it, up to it and back from it. Material and formal properties aside, is that the effect you hope this sculpture in the landscape to produce?

Maybe we need to dig out your masters on how work effects how people move in galleries Lily?

Image: Donald Judd, Untitled (six boxes), 1974, collection of the National Gallery of Australia

The 'Crutch of Serving the Client'

2007-01-20T21:41:00.000+11:00

"Then there's another very bad crutch that you will get much later in your career. Please, please, watch out for this one: the Crutch of Serving the Client. You can escape all criticism if you can say, 'Well, the client wanted it that way' ... Where do you draw the line? When do the client's demands permit you to shoot him and when do you give in gracefully? It's got to be clear, back in your own mind, that serving the client is one thing and the art of architecture another."

- Philip Johnson. From a lecture to students at Yale, 1954.

(I wonder whether this blog will turn out to be a good idea?)

Image: Philip Johnson guarding a model of his AT+T building, New York, 1984

News Flash

2007-01-20T18:35:00.000+11:00

I got accepted for the Smart Geometry conference (the 'Bi-mon-sci-fi-con' of architecture design computing) in New York which starts next week on the 26th of Jan. Amy's going to tag along for all the fun too.
So I've been a bit slack lately, but I've been busy and busy thinking- mainly about what kind of sculpture this sculpture for living might be... I will now attend to your posts. Nice job with all the pictures BTW.

Check out this page on the SIAL website for my report on the conference. - RH 26.03.07

Current Barwon Heads House.

2007-01-04T18:01:00.000+11:00

Our current house, built in the 50's of double-skin concrete brick, has been fun to play with but has stubbornly held on to its former character. The concrete has been a great insulator and it has a solidity that is palpable when you live in it. Here are some photos of it's current state along with the studio in the back.

Artwork

2007-01-03T14:20:00.000+11:00

Here is some of Lily & Martin's most recent sculpture and painting

Lily's peice in the Ovens River (Jan 2006)

Lily's piece on the Murray S.A. (May 2006)

Some of Martin's 'Couple' series.

Site Photos

2007-01-03T14:00:00.000+11:00

Whilst our architect was at home making further online castigations, we were on the site, getting a feel of the layoutand a sense of the flora,fauna and architectural history. (Apparently the site was a butter factory up until the 1940s-more later). Here are some pics (as demanded).

We would like to access this view over the valley from the North East corner if possible.

Assemblage on site.

West view.

South East pan to South.

North view.

Obviously the size of the trees on the block is going to be an issue.

Coming and Going.

Shopping List

2006-12-30T21:16:00.001+11:00

Stuff we need to get on here... Please.

Photos of your art
Photos of your house / studio as it is
Site Photos

We can use all this to evaluate the language of the precedents and attempts.

Ephemeral Installations

2006-12-22T10:35:00.000+11:00

Stop picking on Martin's contributions Rory. I have included the 'leaves' because this is what I have been driven to in the past. Every house I have lived in has been hostile to ephemeral installations. These sculptural activities bring me more pleasure than 'stuff' yet the spaces have never been condusive to the work. Even worse is the fact that they have to share the space with furniture and the general crap of living. It should be a house full of spaces inviting installations but just as happy if there is none there. - Lily

Homer's Dream Car

2006-12-21T19:05:00.000+11:00

Classic styling, all American power, drink holders everywhere, musical horn, and look, it's got a separate bubble for the noisy kids in the back, just like the Carnegie House!

So Proud & Pawson

2006-12-20T21:52:00.000+11:00

Wowo i'm so proud of you guys for scanning and posting and commenting and writing. this thing is awesome already.
Also, did you like your dinner last night? Because tomorrow I'm gonna serve up some more PAWSON. I think you're headed there already...

Culture

2006-12-20T20:15:00.000+11:00

Whilst we do not want to live in a De Chirico builiding (definitely no arches) we wouldn't mind the mood that is evoked by his spaces. Interplay of light and shade etc.

Language:Reflected Forever

2006-12-20T19:56:00.000+11:00

This came up in conversation. 'Reflected forever' in relation to the bathroom ceiling idea. These also reflect the minimalism that we envisage the project embodying in general.
Agnes Martin The Islands c.1961
acrylic and graphite on canvas

Agnes Martin Untitled 1959
oil on canvas

Precedent: Trahan Church

2006-12-20T19:32:00.000+11:00

Further to Steven Holls reflected light which, Rose in particular, all of us loved. We loved these windows that aren't windows, the "windows that let light in but don't have views" that there has been so much talk about, used in this church (by Victor Trahan) in Louisiana. All of the orifices into the sacred space are designed to refract light as it enters without any visual access to the outside. We think this idea would particularly suit the main bedroom as a place of sanctuary and rest.

Precedent: The Carnegie House

2006-12-20T19:10:00.000+11:00

McGlashan & Everist's Carnegie House in Sorrento has aspects that we have talked about. Particularly the seperate 'pavillions' that are connected only by covered walkways. Lily and I have pushed around the idea that the main living area might be dislocated from the studio and the girl's bedrooms. The size of the components is also not daunting.

Design: Tennis Court

2006-12-20T17:18:00.000+11:00

The tennis court always seemed to stick out in the brief as a big issue, potentially compromising the intimate scale imagined for the building.
The idea is to introduce heaps of extra poles for the fence, instead of the standard 8 or so, and dot them around the perimeter in clusters to put the tennis court in a dialogue with the surrounding forest, as in Aalto's staircase in the Villa Mairea. The idea for the fencing is to make it out of standard cyclone mesh, but of different guages collaged together to read like camoflage, the same technique Gehry used to generate the text (which has since been removed) on the Santa Monica Place shopping centre carpark in L.A.
Images: Alvar Aalto, Villa Mairea staircase, 1937 & Frank Gehry, Santa Monica Place shopping centre carpark, 1980

Interest: Dualities

2006-12-20T16:58:00.000+11:00

Not quite the country or the coast
Too far from the city to be desirable, not far enough to be inaccessible
Geographically remote, but culturally connected (internet and magazines)
To design something challenging, or something nice?

Issue: Imposition

2006-12-20T16:52:00.000+11:00

Although Lily and Martin claim they want something 'imposed' on them, they already have very clear ideas of what they want, especially regarding materiality and dimensions. This process of blogging will hopefully direct what is imposed into being something they can actually stand to be in. This is not to say I will take on all the ideas they suggest - as in design by committee - especially if its a Doric style portico and false stone facing.
Image: Howard Roarke tearing off the changes made to his masterpiece by the board of directors. The Fountainhead, 1949

Precedent: Stephen Holl

2006-12-20T16:26:00.000+11:00

Lots of talk about 'windows that let light in but don't have views'. This image doesn't quite capture whats happening in this interior by Stephen Holl, but essentially its a double skin wall, with windows cut into the outer wall, and openings in the inner wall that don't line up with the outer wall openings. The back of this inner wall is painted in a colour, which then spills out from behind the gaps as subtle indirect coloured reflected light.
Photo: Stephen Holl, D.E Shaw Offices, 1992

Precedent: The Eames House

2006-12-20T15:24:00.000+11:00

Ok, I honestly don't know how I got this one so wrong. I was so excited! I was sure I'd hit it! It's only for that reason that this makes it on here, I've got no issue with ditching it. But, for the blog - which will remember every false move - here's why I like it:

Standardised. I still find the transformation of whats just an industrial shed into a rich collage amazing.
Creative Space. This to me is the ultimate creative space. Everything is at hand; books, materials, equipment, space, light etc. Maybe all the little trinkets would annoy me a bit though.
Refinement. This houses invites constant refinement. I've always loved your house down at Barwon, and to me its like your 'life project', constantly being refined and modified, walls built or moved, bathrooms cast, furniture accomodated etc. But I had no idea this maintainence was such a burden!
Flexibility. The structural grid is interpreted and interrogated throughout the house, through colour, layout, patterning and furniture. Objects can sit on or off the grid without either being pretentious or appearing intentional.
Landscape. It's nestled in within huge trees, but is of a foreign language and doesn't try and imitate. The landscape is dumbly (but in a good way) introduced into the house just as potplants and ferns.

For a contemporary extension of the ideas of the Eames house, see French architects Lacaton and Vassal. They use off-the-shelf greenhouses and industrial sheds to address the issue of 'space' in low-budget housing.
Photos: Charles and Ray Eames, Eames House, 1949-50

Precedent: Heide II

2006-12-20T14:53:00.000+11:00

I still find Heide II the closest precedent to what we've talked about to date, particularly for its type as a house/gallery. This doesn't make it exempt from criticism though, here's my list of pros and cons:

Pros:

Engagement with the landscape through walls framing views.
Material language. Concrete blockwork and timber decking.
Flow of space.

Cons:

Treated too much as a sculpture itself, not to be reconfigured or modified.
A space-planning failure. Great gallery, but an awkward house.
Material language may also be a bad thing, associations with depressing 60's housing.

Images: Heide II, McGlashan Everist, 1965

A note on the medium

2006-12-20T13:20:00.000+11:00

I think having this discussion on a blog is good for a few reasons. Firstly, its going to force us to carefully and succinctly articulate our ideas - which may help the problem of talking about the same thing, but meaning different things. So until the day comes when we can plug directly into someone elses brain, this will have to do.
Secondly, I think its good because as far as I know it hasn't really been done quite like this before. There are plenty of examples of architects using social software to communicate and collaborate within a team. For example by using workflow tools (so bored), or the tracking of emails to follow a design conversation as done by the architecture firm Terroir (a bit bored), or the research done by SIAL into Wikis for design collaboration (not that boring); but none of these 'digital conversations' are between the designer and the client.
This is interesting because it can potentially break down the 'imposition of genius' of the architect on a client, by making the conversation transparent, and including them in this conversation. But what happens if the client expressly requests this imposition?

A note on the title

2006-12-20T10:41:00.000+11:00

This blog takes as its title a revision of Le Corbusier's dictum of a house as 'a machine for living' (Towards a New Architecture, 1931), but instead of being informed by purely functional requirements, acknowledges the need for something more 'spatial'.
Photo: Villa Savoye, Le Corbusier, 1929-31

'A Sculpture For Living' begins...

2006-12-20T10:30:00.000+11:00

Following the inaugural meeting over dinner last night, 'A Sculpture for Living' is now up and running. In an attempt to bring the page up to speed with the discussion, I'm going to try and add all the stuff thats been talked about up to this point, even though much of it may have been abandoned already.
Photo: Rory, Martin and Lily by Amy. 18.12.06