rsThirdYear

Week 1: All Hands on Deck!

January 25, 2021

Group of students eats lunch — 3rd-Years enjoying lunch on the Great Hall!

Neck-Down Week

The 2021 Spring Semester 3rd-Year’s Rural Studio experience began with Neck-down Week. Neck-down Week is a tradition where Rural Studio students and faculty mend, clean, or maintain local parks, past and ongoing projects, and Morrisette Campus. Neck-Down is a week that requires less brain and more brawn. This week, the 3rd-year group painted, dug holes, completed farm work, laid bricks and much, much more. Neck-down is a great way to be introduced to the spirit of Rural Studio and the tradition of hard work ingrained in the Auburn University Creed.

Student paints ceiling — Drew Haley painting the ceiling of the pod bathrooms.

Student digging hole — Drew Haley painting the ceiling of the pod bathrooms.

Welcome to our Studio

Spencer House is where most of the 3rd-Year students live. It also serves as the 3rd-Year Studio, dining hall, and hangout space. Spencer is where all of the design magic happens. During this first week, the 3rd-years divided themselves into three design teams: The Interiors team, Enclosures Team, and “MEP” (Mechanical, Electrical, and Plumbing) Team. Each team has its own studio room in Spencer House. Here’s the team breakdown:

Interiors team – Drew Haley, Austin, and Sadie

Enclosures team – Logan, Juyeon, and Ashley

Mechanical, Electrical, and Plumbing team – Wendy, Kirby, and James

Thanks for following along with the 3rd-year experiences here at Rural Studio! Keep on the lookout for updates from our first week on site.

Tags: 20kophelia'shome, neckdown, rsThirdYear, ruralstudio, spencerhouse, thirdyear

Rural Studio is Inside Out

September 30, 2020

The Studio has been making the best of COVID-19 obstacles by prioritizing outdoor work for the past six weeks! Working outside has given students and staff the ability to learn about construction processes while also maintaining healthy and safe work protocols. Luckily, Rural Studio has quite a few tasks to accomplish around Hale and Perry County to keep them busy.

Perry Lakes Park student team at the end of a long work day

In the first couple of weeks of the semester, everyone came together (socially-distanced, of course) to clean up Morrisette campus. This work included laying and tamping gravel in the driveways, demolishing some old mock ups and a couple unused storage sheds, power washing the Great Hall and Fabrication Pavilion, and helping Eric on the farm.

Students have also been helping out at Perry Lakes Park, which has been closed for maintenance for the past few months. The Studio hopes that, after a little bit of work, they can help reopen the beautiful park to the public. Jobs to be completed were: replacing rotting boards on the bridge, walkways, and tower; replacing structural members underneath the walkways; rebuilding walkways that had been hit by fallen trees; and replacing rotting deck boards on the tower. This work is still in progress, but they expect to have the majority of the tasks complete in the coming week.

As the semester progresses, students have been working toward creating a balance between studio work and site work. On designated “studio days,” 3rd-year, 5th-year, and graduate students have been meeting with their faculty at new open-air pin up spots on Spencer House’s porch and under the Fabrication Pavilion. Next week, 5th- and 3rd-year will transition away from studio-wide work toward focusing on their own class projects. The 5th-years will soon choose their project teams and 3rd-years will start making more progress on 20K Ophelia’s Home!

Tags: auburnuniversity, community, morrisette, outdoors, perrylakespark, rs3rdyears, rs5thyears, rsfarm, rsfifthyear, rsgraduates, rsThirdYear, ruralstudio, safety

3rd-Year’s Final Watercolors

May 4, 2020

Check out 3rd-year history class’s beautiful elevations and details of Gaineswood in Demopolis, Alabama, the Pollen Mansion in Montgomery, Alabama, and the Perry County Court House in Marion, Alabama. These buildings were meticulously hand-drafted and water-colored all semester long.

Final drafted watercolor of Gaineswood — Joo Young Lim

Tags: drafting, gaineswood, habsdrawings, historyclass, perrycountycourthouse, pollenmansion, rs3rdyears, rsThirdYear, ruralstudio, watercolors

A Second Look at Kenworthy Hall

April 20, 2020

This week, Dick Hudgens gave his students another opportunity to draw Kenworthy Hall, a plantation home built in 1860 right outside of Marion, Alabama. The 3rd-years found HABS drawings online and used these documents to draft and watercolor a longitudinal section through the home. Here are just a handful of the students’ incredible sections:

Tags: dickhudgens, draft, draw, historyclass, kenworthyhall, marional, rs3rdyears, rsThirdYear, sketch, watercolor

A Bittersweet End to the Inaugural Cabinet Class

April 17, 2020

plan perspective of Ophelia's Home focusing on millwork — plan perspective of the millwork in 20K Ophelia’s Home

The spring semester has come to the end, and what a wild four months it has been! At first, the Cabinet Class endeavored on a new adventure into the land of CNC routing by setting out to design and fabricate the millwork for 20K Ophelia’s Home. Typically, the 20K Home is outfitted with off-the-shelf cabinetry units for kitchen and bathroom storage from the big box stores, i.e. Lowe’s or IKEA. The quality of the cabinets purchases is usually reflected in what the Studio can afford. To improve durability of these particle board cabinets, we decided to create cabinet designs that would be both more affordable and sturdy.

plan of Ophelia's Home kitchen cabinets — kitchen gallery cabinetry plan

section of Ophelia's Home kitchen cabinets — kitchen gallery cabinetry plan

Despite all of the obstacles created by the COVID-19 pandemic, this has been an exciting semester filled with discovery and empowerment for the Studio as well as the students. The first half of the semester focued on learning about the CNC router and its accompanied technology. By March, initial design for all of Ophelia’s Home storage was nearly complete, and the students built a physical mockup of their cabinets.

elevation of Ophelia's Home nook cabinets — nook rendering

Remote learning, however, began at the end of Spring Break. Yet, the students continued to move toward a final design of storage spaces, which included the kitchen, bathroom, utility room, and bedroom closet storage. This week, the teams presented a presentation of their final project: a book that explains the context of their cabinetry designs and a stylized guide of instructions on how to build the cabinets. The class hopes this this books will be used to continue the exploration of millwork when studies resume in Newbern. Hopefully, the adventure will continue very soon!

perspective of Ophelia's Home bathroom cabinets — bathroom rendering

Thanks to all those who helped make this class a success, including Dylan & Keith from Wood Studio and John Byler from Dudley Hall’s shop in Auburn. This semester’s great work would not have been possible without your help! Most of all, thank you to the Rural Studio 3rd-year students who persevered through tough circumstances. Great job to all!

Tags: 2020, cabinetclass, cabinetry, cncrouting, millwork, OpheliasHome, rs3rdyears, rsThirdYear, rswoodshop, ruralstudio, ruralstudiowoodshop, springsemester, thirdyear, woodshop, woodstudio