fallsemester

Soup-er Shelter

Soup Roast is Rural Studio’s final review and celebration for the completion of the fall semester. Every year, each team presents their work to a panel of reviewers made up of faculty and visiting architects. After tons of great design feedback, everyone ends the day with a celebratory soup dinner! Let’s look at what the C.H.O.I.C.E. House team did to prepare. 

During the weeks leading up to Soup Roast, we continued to design the form of the shelter units, paying special attention to how light will enter the consolidated core. When aggregated, these units will connect along their long sides, meaning there can only be light coming in from the two short ends. This may be fine for the two end spaces, but the core is left void of natural light. Our solution is to design a roof monitor, which is a separate piece that can be attached to the top of each unit and allow light to enter the core.

The roof monitor will be small enough to prefabricate, but large enough to give the units some extra height and presence from the exterior while also creating tall, bright, and inhabitable spaces on the interior.

On the day of Soup Roast, we presented to the panel of reviewers, including Kim Clements, Joe Schneider, and Nicole Abercrombie of JAS Design Build and Jake LaBarre of BuildingWork, all from Seattle, WA, as well as Auburn CADC faculty, David Hinson, Rusty Smith, Mackenzie Stagg, and Betsy Farrell Garcia. We were given great feedback on the roof monitor, and about how to better marry the modular function of the unit to the overall form of the aggregation.

The team ended their week by presenting their work to the C.H.O.I.C.E. board of directors and other team members. It was great to have the chance to meet with the client again, and everyone left the meeting full of excitement about the future of the project! 

After a soup-er week, we are ready to let the new ideas simmer over the break. But don’t worry, we’ll be back in January and working again at full boil!  

A Post Roast Toast

Howdy! The end of the semester is here! The Moundville Archaeological Park Community Pavilion team presented their latest work at the Rural Studio’s Annual Soup Roast. In preparation of the big event, the team spent some time cleaning up the site and envisioning what the space could be and where the boundary of the site should be. After narrowing down their designs, it was time to meet with the client and introduce them to what they had been working on all semester and get some feedback. Discussing the possibilities of their proposals and walking through the site with the clients left them energized and more confident moving forward.

Soup Roast!

The day of Soup Roast, students, faculty, staff, and guests bundled up and rode in a caravan to Moundville first thing in the morning. This year was a little different, as smaller, more in-house event, but still a celebration of the work done this semester by all the students. For our guest reviewers the Studio welcomed back Seattle-based architects and builders, Joe Schneider, Kim Clements, Nicole Abercrombie, and Jake LaBarre. AU professor David Hinson, and the Front Porch Initiative team, Rusty Smith, Mackenzie Stagg, and Betsy Farrell Garcia, were also able to join and provide helpful feedback for all of the projects.

team presenting design at soup roast review
iteration 1
iteration 2

We started in the orientation building at Moundville Archaeological Park to present the project and then headed to the site to discuss more specifics of the design. The two proposals showed iterations of the addition of a ground platform and roof aperture, including some initial ideas about ground surface and materiality of the pavilion. Afterwards, we got to relax and hear what the other teams have been working on while patiently awaiting a DELICIOUS soup dinner at the end of the day made by Chef Catherine Tabb.

Gettin’ Serious

The day after Soup Roast, Joe, Kim, and Jake continued the project discussion with us and provided some much needed feedback, helping us get more of a direction and understanding the scope of the project. Playing with the surrounding landscape helped us understand the impact of our ideas within the pavilion. Now, it is time to zoom in on the pavilion and learn as much as we can about the structure!

See just how zoomed-in we mean in the next Moundville Pavilion team blog!

Moundville Mud Pies For Sale

Analyzing the Pavilion’s Structure

After Fall semester break, the Moundville Pavilion team focused on moving the design forward and shifting the narrative from the physical boards to a digital presentation for Halloween Reviews. This process included looking back at all the work we have done up to this point and learning how to begin talking about the narrative of the project. Some of the first steps we took were to understand the previous team’s motivations through their drawings and to diagram them.

The pavilion is designed to shed water and protect while also allowing light in and emphasizing views outward

Pumpkin Carving!

Wednesday night, the Studio participated in the College of Architecture Design and Construction’s Annual Pumpkin Carve tradition (in Newbern!) by trading our pencils for carving tools and having fun with our neighbors.

Dressed for Success

By Friday, the costumes were sewn, or in some cases taped, and the presentation was ready. The team created a familiar scene for the viewers, a Girl Scout (Caitlyn) selling cookies (Collin) at Publix (Jackie), while her mother (Brenton) supported her entrepreneurial spirit. The Studio welcomed Marlon Blackwell, Meryati Johari Blackwell, Jen Pindyck, Emilie Taylor Welty, and the Front Porch Initiative team to participate in the festivities and provide feedback that will help the team move forward. Forward to what exactly? Well, you’ll just have to catch us next month on the Moundville Pavilion team blog!

Howdy from the 3rd-Years!

These kids have been here for about month…and haven’t stopped sweating since. The 3rd-Year Studio is such a small, diverse group of students who work together in Red Barn and live together at the Morrisette campus. Throughout the semester, they create their own blended community — full of fresh baked pies and domino games — and work hard at becoming better architects while learning about the people and this place that’s their new, borrowed home.

Instead of the paper and pens of syllabus week, the 3rd-years had shovels, gloves, and paint brushes for what is called “neck-down” week. This first week, everybody participated in small jobs around our campus and became intimately familiar with existing Rural Studio projects.

And after neckdowns, the 3rd-years had their first assignment; the Sawhorse Race. The students split up into teams to design, build, and test a pair of sawhorses. They also measured their tool trailer in order to design an organized and efficient system for tool storage.

The students then participated in two lovely days of water coloring and charcoal sketching in the annual workshop taught by Frank Harmon and Dan Wheeler, learning to use drawing as a way of seeing.

This semester the 3rd-years are going to build a home for our neighbor Ophelia! What a privilege and honor! Ophelia currently lives in a site near two previous Rural Studio projects, and this past week the 3rd-years documented her current home and property extensively to try to understand the constraints and opportunities they may face during the project. The presentation team has interviewed Ophelia, getting to personally know the women that the students will design and build for.

The 3rd-years are also participating in Rural Studio’s first quilting elective! Local artist Aaron Head lead an indigo dyeing workshop using locally grown and found indigo, poke weed, and osage to hand dye natural fabric and wool… and themselves. They will use these materials throughout the semester to piece together a quilt that displays beautifully abstracted renderings of Ophelia’s current home.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The 3rd-years are excited for what’s to come.

Let’s get it.