“Even more than Architecture” – Richard Coyne

1. Is it justified to compare the number of hits of a YouTube video to number of citations of an academic article? The author mentions there is a difference in content type but other than that there is limitation of access which means YouTube is a free service but most journals are too expensive for a curious uneducated person (uneducated only in that specific field).
2. The author states that architectural research has a relatively small audience and architectural researchers may start to skew their outputs to appeal to a wider audience. Is it really necessary for architecture researchers to deviate from their principles just to attract more audience?
3. Comparing design approach to deliberate introduction of an object to a community that had never before seen such a device: Shouldn’t designs be based on needs? History proves that introducing products that are ahead of their time which are not based on needs are doomed to fail.

An “Artificial Science” of Architecture – Philip Steadman

1. The author states that both John Cristopher jones and Christopher Alexander were leading protagonists of ‘design methods movement’ but distanced themselves from their earlier positions. The reason why is not mentioned and it might be interesting to know. Also, again in this context it is mentioned that deep contradictions in Alexander’s approach was the reason he abandoned the method. Again, nothing about these contradictions are is explained.
2. From 1960s to 1970s, there seems to be a shift in application of computer-aided design (CAD) from generating plans to representation of designs. What are the differences between these two approaches?
3. The outcome of all the three pieces of research in the article was not either a design or a development in design. Therefore, is the outcome of artificial science of architecture suitable for a research studio project or M.Arch thesis?

Architects/designers are told that they have a very important role within society. They are held responsible for doing and providing improvements/enhancements to the lives of the people. Doing good and enhancing lives involves understanding how humans operate and why they do the things that they do. Occupying a stimulating environment can help enrich the experiences of the space, ideally enhancing the lives/well being of the occupants as well. Many built works are very understimulating therefore may result in restlessness or feeling drained. When focused on the visual it ultimately ignores the inbuilt human need for sensory variety. (This may be due to the lack of “designer friendly” data) At some level, nature engages with majority of our senses, and produces a minor sense of arousal/pleasure.  This study is an initial attempt to research the relationship of a biophilic environment and the engagement of the occupants. Visual data will be produced in hopes to encourage designers to design more for wellness.

Utilizing wonderment, and awe to break up everyday rhythm to pursue wellness. (Not entirely sure how to word this quiet yet, working on it.)

The aim of this study is to explore the subtle yet ever present relationship between Dwelling and Dweller, so as to magnify this condition and procure a more acute sense of how are physical surroundings impact our individual identity and daily rituals. The work will utilize myself as both the investigator and the investigated, with my current residence (59 Englewood Ave.) acting as the site and instigator of the research. Broader subjects expected to be confronted through this experiment will be topics such as Routines/Habits, Familiarity/Nostalgia, Self-Reflection, Comfort, and Utility/Functionality.

Investigations into the Dweller Dwelling relationship will be conducted via extensive reading, writing, documentation, and many forms of making. The work produced and discussed will help piece together fragments of  everyday life and their physical connections to home, so as to begin generating fantastic responses and events surrounding these newly realized threads. As of now the proposed product of the research is a series of imagined interventions/events within the home itself that will engage both Dwelling and Dweller in curiously imaginative and pattern altering ways. It should be made clear that the proposals are not intended to enhance the quality of life for the resident or improve the buildings performance in any particular way. The purpose of the interventions are to manipulate habits, instill fascination, and generate self-awareness relative to the home.

The larger concern fueling the research is a general dissatisfaction with the current residential relationship. More and more commonly it seems  dwellers take less pride in, know less about, and interact less meaningfully with their homes. This is not only troubling when considering the field of architecture but also in regards to our personal identity. By manipulating things that stand so firmly in the typical reality of our everyday and augmenting them so that they have far more fantastic and intense rolls in our lives, we can begin to reflect and appreciate  on our homes and on ourselves.

An “Artificial Science” of Architecture – Philip Steadman

1. “In craft production and vernacular architecture new tools or buildings are produced by copying old ones, and the craftsman or woman may be unaware of why or how they function, just that they do work in practice. ”
   I’m slightly confused by this statement. Shouldn’t the craftsman understand how and why certain tools function because they are replicating it?
2. “One might even venture the proposition that more can be learned about the process of design of artefacts by studying those objects directly than by studying designers in action.” However these artefacts were chosen by the designers. Would studying the designers methodology also help give us insight in their process as well?
3. “Martin and March’s theoretical built forms were not just a random selection of geometrical solids: they were chosen carefully the way in which they satisfy the same two generic functions, while making use of land in distinctively different ways.” Does this mean that their findings only pertain to a specific category then? And may not be completely applicable to every building?

“Even More Than Architecture” – Richard Coyne

1. Coyne begins his article about how it is important and critical for the discipline to borrow from others. It “supports healthy and vital architecture research”. I think this is an important thing to keep in mind, coordinating with other fields helps broaden our field as well as others. Allowing designers  of all kinds to be able to really take on their responsibility within society.
2. “…the issue of what constitutes architectural research is decided dramatically by who i prepared to fund its projects, which journals or venues will it be published in…” Would this mean that some research may be bias or no?
3. “Study one and you’re studying them all.” So this would mean that if I were studying medicine, then I would understand architecture, art, sociology, etc  as well, but rather in a medicinal point of view?

The unpredictable crisis can happen suddenly and rapidly.  Millions of people are affected who forced to move out and who hosts the waves of displaced people. Refers to UNHCR, 65.3 million are affected, in a daily base 33.972 people obliged to escape their homes because of conflict or persecution and seek to resettle to have their basic needs such as food, house, and clothes. 21.3 million are registered as refugees, 16.1 million refugees under UNHCR Commission and UNRWA registered 5.2 million Palestinian refugees, over the half of them are under the age of 18.

The Jordanian social fabrics rapidly changed and still do due to the surrounding conflicts as a consequence, and it significantly reforms the cities and creates new genuine metropolitan.  Jordan hosts 2 million Palestinians, 130,911 Iraqis and 1,265,000 Syrians census result in Nov 2015, 657,422 registered as refugees as well as other nationalities. The population of Jordan is 9.5 million, over 35% are non-Jordanian. Historically; waves of Circassian, Chechen, Turkmen and Armenian resettled in Jordan and became Jordanian minorities.

The diversity shapes the Jordanians’ social networks where it can be found Palestinian grandmother, having a substantial Iraqi`s friend, and teaching Syrian students. The research will aim to define a space of possibilities, a place of survival and hope which has intellectual power of forming refugees’ settlements and design applicable assumptions of how the host countries can respond to the rapid influx of refugees through resilient strategies, inclusive urban design and social changes management.

The study will be located in the hosted cities of Jordan where social changes are in the urban fabric. The Research formed as an investigation of what and how it was, the current and how it will go through on what will be designed and managed. In Jordan, there are cases of previous precedents of settlements which it will be the start of historical research, mapping, and photography beside some informal interviews the areas to find the potentials and the gaps and reorient the cities towards a vision of responses to the rapid changes within its context by the refugees.

Questions to ask:

Who is “Us” and who is “Other”?

What fixes boundaries of us and others? What constructs it?

Who has the power?

Who is the audience?

Steadman:

1. Leslie Martin and Lionel March’s approach to land use and built form studies is a rigid example of building analysis that is predisposed for a certain type of answer. If this type of strategy provides a way to a theoretically ‘perfect’ design, why have these perfect design strategies not become the profession of architecture?
2. We are a growing population in a finite expanse of space. How can tools like ‘Spacemate’ work to act as a type of defragmenter allowing us to use space in both a more efficient way as well as a more human way?
3. The term bio-mimicry has been growing in popularity in past years. Although there may be highly refined examples of the adaptation of form and function found in nature, what are the caveats of implementing these findings past a research level?

Coyne:

1. The amount of generated knowledge that we have is ever expanding. As Coyne states, there are digital tools such as the Internet and keyword searching that are meant to increase the pace at which we consume knowledge.  At what point do we hit the speed limit on learning and how will that change how we research?
2. “Design-led research seeks to understand the world through direct intervention by the researcher, rather than through detached observation.” Doesn’t design research do both of these to a certain extent?
3. The question of ‘Identification of need’ is used by Coyle to relate design research to systems theory which follows a more linear research trajectory from need to research to solution. Does this help to bridge the design and science disciplines?

An “Artificial Science” of Architecture

Philip Steadman

Question 1: Steadman States, “One might venture the proposition that more can be learned about the process of design of artifacts by studying those objects directly, than by studying the designer’s actions.” He goes on to relate this to the study of composition in literature and critiques of paintings. Can one truly understand how an architect designed a structure by purely analyzing the finished product? There are many different factors involved within the design process. One could analyze and critique the structure on a “surface” level, but could they really understand the design at a deeper level than that?

Question 2: “Spacemate” is an interesting tool developed for the analysis of structure. Was it ever adopted by anybody other than Berghauser Pont and Haupt?

Question 3: Morphospace could be implemented into the design process at the conceptual level to allow one to find new forms that were not yet thought of. At the time of this research paper, were there any other generative models that architects were using to find form? Or was this the first “form finding” tool?

“Even More Than Architecture”

Richard Coyne

Question 1: Coyne discusses how he would give his students texts by Kafka, Calvino, Hegel, Poe, Joyce, etc. but he would never give them texts about microclimate, servicing, planning, structures etc… Is this a problem within architecture?… That students are learning to become designers but the other elements that shape architecture are de-emphasized? Is this because institutions know that once entering the professional field, students will learn the more specific or technical aspects of architecture. Or is it more so that institutions are more interested in creating designers?

Question 2: It is interesting when Coyne starts to talk about what needs to be researched and if it needs to be problem-solving. Does architectural research need to solve a problem?

Question 3: I’ve written in previous posts about architects and their role as a multi-faceted designer. Somebody who needs to be disciplined in many fields of study. Are architects masters of design and amateurs in other fields? Or are architects diverse in that one may be a master of design but mediocre at environmental analysis, whereas another architect might be a master of environmental analysis but not design.

“An Artificial Science of Architecture” by Philip Steadman

1. I find the conception of the “Science of the Artificial” quite interesting and very relevant; however I start to have doubts when it begins to set up a guide for how to design. The role of “Artificial Science” in my opinion be that of a functional and historical analysis, not rules regarding the future of design.
2. I found this reading very difficult to care about. I believe this was a result of the intense descriptions of the scientific methods undertaken during the research and the relatively dry results that followed.
3. The biological analogy of allometry to the built environment was a very curious idea, but was totally undercooked. The work seemed to just be a categorizing of  buildings considering a space to wall ratio, with illumination acting as the driving force. In no way did they suggest or research a proportionally growing or living space, which is a far more interesting subject.

“Even More than Architecture” by Richard Coyne

1. Yet again the phrase “Master of None” has been used in regards to the Architect. Is our pursuit of outside knowledge leading to a perception in the field that we have no overarching skillset? We are masters in the field of Architecture, why are we not accepting of this role?
2. Researchers are having to take away time from their research in order to publish or post their work. I feel as though to a certain degree this is actually a positive, despite the time removed from research you begin to set hard deadlines and produce a series of documented process points that can keep people more genuinely  engaged in the research and ensure a culmination to the work.
3. Have keyword and other internet search techniques weakened the thoroughness of research. When one is able to immediately consume a quote or single chapter of a book, is the research then diluted to merely what you initially desired it to be and not truly genuine research?

Reading 1

Murray Fraser, “A Two-Fold Movement.”

1 “…. The world of the lake and the river, a typology without history”. Aldo Rossi indicated that he discovered his architecture by investigating the city with all its designed characteristics. In the project of the cabins of fishermen, isn`t this a study of past events occur in the geography and the topography of the design location which is part of the design research?

2- The work of the Shigeru Ban in the temporary cardboard cathedral considered as design research with “R” or “r” where he designed a solution of material and structure by searching and experiments in comparison with “Radical Reconstruction”?

3- What were the design influences of the Koolhaas work of the Netherland Dance Centre, Can we consider the reflections of his publication of the Delirious New York?

Reading 2

Jane Rendell, “A Way With Words.”

1- Is the concept and the strategy of the critical spatial practice applied in the education system “design research studio” the same as the practice especially the self-reflection?

2-Is the role of the audience included in the system of multidisciplinary of the research design of the social aspect? What is the educational system of the urban planning in comparison with art and architecture, can we considered as one of the disciplinaries or not?

3- Compare the activity of writing and the description of the spatial qualities of the art and architecture with the Picasso`s expressive concept of the artwork?

A two-Fold Movement: Design research as dialectical critical practice

1. Is critical practice a direct consequence of limits of architecture to instrumentally deliver a specific social or political transformation?

2. Retroactive manifesto places people and their messy urban lives at the heart of architectural discourse, but who is the audience of “Spaces of Possibility in Palestine”? It seems that this work’s subject has the potential to discuss the issue with public, however, its medium avoids the project to go beyond architectural discourse.

3. Is subjectivity of work of Koolhaas similar/close to superiority of a fully three dimensional town-design in Eliel Saarinen’s book?

A way with words: Feminists writings architectural design research

1. Making problematic artefacts versus application driven design, can help to understand the problems of architectural design, and to understand what architecture can do for problems outside its realm at the time. The second one investigates what architecture might be, but where are the limits of this extension?

2. Site-writing is an evident of structural similarities between architecture as a medium and textual media. How today’s forms of design research can use literature to find new structures for architecture beyond the poetic use of literature?

3. The discipline of performance studies has been well connected to feminists writings in architecture because of the conceptual depth to the thinking through performativity. What is specific about feminist notions which pushes its writing more than other fields of architecture in using performativity?

‘A Two-Fold Movement’: Design Research as Dialectical Critique Practice, Murray Fraser

Fraser says, “design research is to act as a mechanism for a wider critique of architecture itself,” (220). Critique of what? How can a thesis do this?

“Counter-space is carving out new cultural and urban realities against the forces of power,” (Fraser, 225). What power? Is this truly important to the majority of architects? Is this present in every-day designs or are these just contemplations for academia?

“The narrow mindset of existing social hierarchies needed to be replaced […] by more inclusive hierarchies, and need a full-frontal critique of official architecture and the power relations it aims to produce and reproduce,” (Fraser, 231). What is an “inclusive social hierarchy” in architecture? How is it represented? What works show this?

A Way with Words: Feminists Writing Architectural Design Research, Jane Rendell

“It [architecture] engenders multiple modes of operation, which explore the boundaries of disciplinary knowledge in order to reveal and expose the workings of power,” (Rendell, 119). Does the workings of power need to be exposed, or is it already apparent? Why is it important to reveal/expose power? Why is this important to architecture?

“[…] the architecture design process is not solely an activity that leads to the making of a product, but is rather the location of the work itself,” (Rendell, 123). How do you design an architecture product without a specific location for it? Is it then meant to be built? If so, where is it’s “place”?

“Across the area of experimental and critical writing, new possibilities are being invented, often performative, which question the distanced objectivity of academic writing styles, this includes artists producing text-based works,” (Rendell, 130). Conceptual artists, such as Joseph Kosuth (below) have done this. How have architects done this, and why?

Joseph Kosuth, C.S. (Neon) #6, 1989. neon, transformers. 8 1/2 x 104 inches (21.6 x 264.2 cm).

“Shifts in Perception through Tactile Sensations”

“Touch is the sensory mode which integrates our experiences of the world and ourselves.” – Juhani Pallasmaa

The bias that vision holds over the profession of architecture suppresses all of the other senses. In Greece, optical refinements were implemented to create the illusion that a structure was visually “perfect”. The hegemonic eye, with its ability to absorb information faster than any other sense, has allowed designers to create buildings that “look” good, but might not necessarily “feel” good. Pallasmaa once stated that “touch is a parent of our eyes, ears, nose and mouth.” Tactile sensations can affect a person’s social behavior, self-perception, enjoyment and comfort within a building. Three dimensional space can be deceiving through our lens of vision. However, the tactile and haptic sensations that we experience do not misguide us. It is important to explore how tactility can be leveraged to enhance our perception of space, while diminishing the ocular-centric bias that we hold today. How do these tactile sensations affect the way we behave in space? Does the materiality of objects within space evoke tactile responses that affect our behavior? The provocation of these questions would be produced by creating an environment where tactility is the driving force of design. The measurement of the users reactions would be documented via. video and audio recording. These responses (good or bad) could then influence how the space is reacting tactilly or haptically to new users in real time.