structuraltest - Rural Studio

Howdy from the Patriece’s Home team! The trees are turning green here in Hale County and the 5th-year projects are emerging from Winter with pent up energy and an excitement to build!

A computer modeled image of the house with wood interior porches and light grey medal siding.

three students look at drawings on a table

Since their last blog post, the team completed a soil test at their site and starting identifying the home’s location on the site. They’ve also been busy developing a landscaping strategy, pushing forward with a zero eaves strategy, and designing warm, wood-clad porches.

one male student holds wood while another male student swings a sledge hammer to drive it into the red clay soil.

two students and one reviewer point at drawings pinned up at the fabrication pavilion.

Rural Studio students have a myriad of consultants and reviewers checking over the designs and advising the projects. Recently, the Patriece’s Home team had a visit from Pete Landon and Cameron Acheson of Landon Bone Baker Architects in Chicago, IL. The students received feedback on how they could consider detailing the column and headers of their wood-clad porch.

a screenshot of a zoom with the team, their professors and two reviewers. A plan with wheelchair clearances is displayed on the shared screen.

a screenshot of a zoom with the team, their professors and two reviewers. Plans and elevations with artificial light are indicated on a shared screen.

Next, the team met Cheryl Noel and Ravi Ricker of Wrap Architecture in Chicago, IL, for a successful code review of the home, The team then proposed the home’s lighting strategy to lighting designer Thomas Paterson of Lux Populi, from Mexico City, Mexico. He advised the team that the light desired in a home at night is not the same character of light desired during the day.

A computer rendering of the house with light gray siding is photoshopped on an image of the site.

A computer rendering of the house at night is photoshopped on an image of the site.

An exploded axon on the home shows the daylight inside the house.

An exploded axon on the home shows the fixed light inside the house.

The students decided to take a trip to the 20K Model Homes at 2:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. to review the amount of daylight the windows provide and test what ideal nighttime lighting would be. For Patriece’s Home, the team is designing wall-mounted lighting to cast general light into a dark room and layered task lighting to illuminate highly used surfaces and spaces.

two students use paper and a light bulb to mock up a pendant light over a table.

a student used a light bulb to mock up a light above the kitchen sink.

two students use light bulbs and cardboard to mock up lights on a porch.

Patriece’s Home most recently met with Rural Studio’s structural engineer, Joe Farruggia from Chicago, IL, for advice on when it is best and most economical to use laminated veneer lumber (LVLs) instead of dimensional lumber in the headers of the home. The team is also getting extremely detailed in the design of the cabinet and electrical plans, imagining how to design spaces for the hundred-year lifespan of the home.

A scan of sketched elevations of the home's kitchen cabinets.

Three students, and two Advisors talk next to a table with construction drawings.

The Patriece’s Home team is sprinting toward Pig Roast, Executive Review 2.0, and graduation, all in the next three and a half weeks! The students will begin buying materials, moving dirt on site, and constructing a full-scale mock-up of the home’s details. Stay tuned! Thanks for checking in on the project!