Week 28 Developmental Journal

[26.3.2020] Flight arrival 18:30

Definitely not working tonight.

[27.3.2020] Pre-organisation

I decided to rest for a day. I did not put any pressure on myself to "produce" work today but I went through my notes for my Unit 4 project nonetheless to get reacquainted with previous work. By the end, I came to the conclusion that I would prefer not to directly continue on my line of thought, but instead start out with a new line of research. As I have pinned down the concept, I want to look at the site next. Combining the old and new elements might help spark new ideas, and help me out a conceptual rut.

In my last individual tutorial, Sarah and I talked about potential sites, one of which being Leicester Forest East Service Station. My reason for choosing it as the target site isn't that complex:

1. Bridge feature with restaurants and shops seems quite interesting and caught my eye
2. It's located on M1 and is frequently used i.e. it is "relevant"
3. Large truck parking area
4. Looks in need of a renovation (it has the look of "old public buildings that are repeatedly re-painted and repaired to conceal the rotting insides")

[28.3.2020] Observing Leicester Forest East

Looking at the appearances and trying to understand the atmosphere of the environment. Skim reading basic information and deciding what the relevant subjects that I will investigate.

• mapping the facility
• mapping relevant environment
• understanding the current issues
• understanding the historical and social context
• understanding legislative restrictions
• observing preexisting aesthetics

[29.3.2020] Mapping Leicester Forest East

Mapping the site gives me several information:

• rough feel for scale
  • number of parking space
  • size of the site
• distribution of space
• flow of movement

It also helped me memorise the site so I won't be dependent on the map every single step along the way. 

Notable features:

• "dual" setup -
  • separate fuel stations (diesel+gasoline+electric) 
  • separate Starbucks drive-throughs
  • shared main retail and dining area
  • inn on west side

According to research and deduction, separate facilities are more versatile and quickly accessible for drivers (therefore drivers in need of fuel wouldn't need to negotiate a junction for refill on one side, and drivers who want to get a quick coffee get drive-thrus on their side). However, shared amenities means easier management as stock and staff wouldn't need to be split, and it also saves space and construction (budget).

• The bridge -
  • apparently a pain in the butt because it imposes restrictions on the expansion of the road; it's also hard to renovate or maintain as it would most likely require road closure
  • nostalgia - popular in the 60s, lots of those serviced bridges were closed down over the decades
• Trucks are on the outer circle, furthest away from the main facilities
  • disadvantage: far from main facilities 
  • advantage: access to unbuilt land

[31.3.2020] Creating diagrams + reading up on history of Leicester Forest East Service Station

(See sketchbook pages in "Research")

I found the rise and fall of "serviced bridges" in service stations surprisingly interesting. The 

Safety and durability are crucial consideration especially in this case, given all the relevant restrictions:

1. safety hazards and bridge-
   The terrace and promenade in the original 1964 design became included in the indoor space for fear of safety hazards (eg. things falling on the road could cause severe traffic accidents or road closures). I want to incorporate open-air features on to the bridge, so I will have to be cautious.
2. low maintenance and versatility- 
   As stated before, it's hard to repair/renovate serviced bridges.
   
   Moreover, the existence of the entire station is in question due to traffic concerns (between two close junctions+ no hard shoulders+ inability to widen the road any further to accommodate the massive traffic+ plans to let M69 flow into M1, on the current spot that Leicester Forest East Service Station is standing on)-- there was a plan to close down the station in 2012, which got postponed to 2017, but turned out never to have taken place.
   
   There's currently very little incentives for any private sectors to invest in such a spot, so I came up with some reasons that could justify my reconstruction/refurbishment project
   1. potentially profitable (busy junctions)
      private companies have opted to build at busy junctions for the high visitor numbers since the 1980s (although it is very much discouraged now). Increasing the attraction of the station might just bring in more visitors/revenue.
   2. reviving nostalgia/cultural heritage of early service stations
   3. improving the quality of life of the ever expanding night shift population.

[1.4.2020] Reading up on Legislation

To create as practical a proposal as I can, I decided to look up on any restrictions on road-side constructions. It turned out at the end of the day that there aren't any official guidelines later than the 2013 circular. The guidelines are fairly straightforward. I had wanted to make sure if there are any limitations on the "height" of roadside structures, but it seems like the Department of Transportation leaves quite a lot of things up for discussion. The only thing I found regarding heights directly is under the section of wind turbines and public art, which stated that

• visual distractions should be minimised (A11)
• Wind turbines shouldn't be located where motorists need to pay particular attention to the driving task, such as the immediate vicinity of road junctions, sharp beds, and crossings for pedestrians, cyclists and horse riders. (A12)

Similar examples of visual distractions being discouraged aside from in the case of wind turbines is the serviced bridges being deemed too distracting in the past. Knowing that most designs will be up for discussion rather than according to a strict guideline gave me permission to do the vertical design I'm thinking of.

Next doubt id over open-air spaces on the bridge. As stated before, open-air and busy serviced bridges is a health and safety risk to road users, and is against regulations. I found some examples of open-air space on bridges that could potentially work though:

I know that a road bridge is very different from a serviced bridge but it made me think that perhaps posing some distance and barrier (the green belt in the above case) between the walk way and the edge of the bridge could solve the problem.

[2.4.2020] Organising relevant legislation

[3.4.2020] Primary development + Catching up on Workflow

[4.4.2020] Rest Day

Taking a day off and let things brew in my mind.

[5.4.2020] Workflow and University Progression

I continued to fill up my Workflow content. 

I spent the rest of the day calculating the fees of each of my uni choices and looking into the accommodations, environment, scholarship opportunities etc. to help me decide which to pick as my firm choice eventually.

Tasks:

• Make sure you have created a post titled ‘Project Overview week 27’- Define your Project Concept, Site, Form, Structure, Material, Scale, User, and Programme (one sentence per heading).
• You must upload your sketchbook work PDF and Design sheet PDF to the Digital outcomes section of Workflow.
• Create a post in your contextual practice section titled ‘Project development questions week 28’

Results:

(Incomplete due to virus outbreak)

Visual Development

I continue to try think outside the box. I looked at my recent researches on basketry and thought the forms of fish traps and weaverbirds' nests are interesting. Both used tunnels to prohibit movement: one prohibits the fish to leave and the other prohibits intruder to access. They reminded me of Turrell's Boullee Boola in terms of its form. I thought it could be interesting to utilise the "prevention" idea to create something similar to Turrell's structure.

Concept Development - exploration on "what" I'm designing

These pages are the documentation of the progress of my development and justification through the day. Here's the rough outline of the progression:

1. I chose the social design route over the Fine Art and Polar Expedition routes
2. I looked into the Reddit page of night truckers, nightshift workers, and nightshift nurses to understand more "first hand" what their complaints and experiences are.
3. I decided that I want to create a "facility that facilitates routines". 
4. "Night Shift Dinner Club"
5. I narrowed the scope down to targeting only night shift truckers.
6. I thought about the possible program and funding behind such a facility
7. I thought about the possible site: Service Stations or Company's Truck Parking Lot.
8. I distinguished between Long Haul Truckers (sleep on the truck and out for days to months, still usually go sleep at night) and Local Truckers (those that could work "night shift")
9. I focused on the latter
10. I looked into what some common shift hours are among night truckers.
11. I decided the key elements I will include in my design are artificial sunlight, dietry and lifestyle counselling+ dining hall and gym-like area.
12. I narrowed in on what it is I'm designing from the angle of funding, level of luxury
13. I was suggested to look into London's "Cabmen's Shelter" and I found the direction to go into.
14. I decided the most suitable site and subject would be to redesign a service station.

Idea from a Conversation with a Stranger

Done with Chelsea Project this evening after setting up the KX windows gallery.

I walked to the boat bookshop on the canal because I didn't feel like going back yet. I ran into a girl studying graphic design. She talked to me about her tree-house project and we discussed if it's possible to flat pack treehouses. We then talked about my project and she advised me to focus on perhaps one specific time in the nightshift workers' day. 

I found the time and space between work and home quite interesting. It's an informal, transitional space and might actually coincide with the the change of day to night (sunrise/sunset).

It's much easier to think of a design after deciding what time exactly I will be interfering on. It is still undecided whether I will adopt this setting but it's a start.

Sketchmodels for the woven birdfeeder

I was worried about how to anchor the rods while I'm weaving. And I (very stupidly) realised only before I went home that I could simply weave a base into it, which will also solve the problem of trying to weigh it down as I can simply put something heavy inside the cone-basket thingy.

Chelsea Physic Garden Visit

I talked to Ian regarding the limitations of the design and now I know nothing at all goes over the beds and I need to make something completely free-standing in the middle of a brick amphitheatre. I am worried that no birds wouldn't go feed on the birdfood in such an open space but I don't have any alternatives. It was also a point of discussion whether I am allowed to put real birdfood in the baskets (because the birdfood could make a mess and the seeds might contaminate their beds with unwanted plants), but I will have to leave that up to him and Gabriel to decide.

I found it unreasonable to put clay models on a birdfeeder that could very well be functional despite Ian stating that it is only supposed to be a model.

Design Museum Visit - Moving to Mars

The exhibition I saw for the day is tangentially related to the theme of "Midnight Sun" in the sense that life on Mars means one must adjust to a circadian rhythm (24h and 37 minutes) other from that of earth. In some ways, Mars is quite similar to Antarctica. They are both desert-like and has extremely low temperature and a life-less surface. It has been quite interesting to see what ideas people come up with to deal with the extreme condition on Mars.

I found several ideas quite inspiring:

• Comfort vs. Function
  If the life on Mars is completely depleted of luxury, it wouldn't be worth living, but merely surviving. The activities considered "luxurious" in space are often just a necessity on Earth. They include showers, warm food, spacious interiors etc. A lot of amenities were designed to accommodate these needs but were cut in earlier spacecraft constructions due to insufficient budget
  
  Luxury and comfort makes life worth living. Sometimes, just surviving isn't enough even in harsh circumstances.
• Composition of Mars architecture - rethinking form
  
  Moreover, the Marsha designers also put the stair cases on the outer side of the rooms as the outer areas have a stronger radiation level and people tend to spend shorter time on stair cases than rooms. Other rooms are also composed with the same logic.
  
  In a multi-regional structure, the placement of each room should be considered with level of comfort, the temperature, the brightness etc.etc. and never simply there without a reason.
• Material and building method
  a lot of materials are invented specifically for Martian construction and for different reasons. I found the range of materials intriguing as different designers came up with radically different materials to achieve similar effect, and each also has their justification as to why their method is superior. The designers agreed that it is best to use local Martian soil for the outer shell of the building, but wanted to use different binding agents or even use heat to consolidate the structure. 
  
  
  

Museum Visits

Science Museum- medical section

It's fascinating to see the evolution of medical equipment, procedure and education through time. I did struggle to find relevance in the exhibition however. Perhaps I can categorise the emotion I felt at the exhibition a sort of melancholic contemplation. Seeing human bodies broken down like a machine is a sobering experience and made me appreciate the miracle of life itself even more. Moreover, the suffering patients had to endure through history because of the level of medical knowledge they had available was quite monstrous. The suffering and horror which is quite removed from my vicinity resulted in a sort of sublimity similar to how I felt about the stories from Polar Expedition. Perhaps there is something inherently beautiful about trauma when no one is currently suffering from it, as morbid as it sounds.

Natural History Museum- minerals

I have been practising becoming more visual - to think about the formal qualities of a form itself more while still maintaining my interest on conceptualisation. The stones collection has been inspiring in that regard. I didn't like architecture that simulates organic forms but had an industrial process, as I found it rather dishonest. The varied forms of the minerals reminded me that there are merits in strangeness itself as it stimulates imagination. Some of the forms are so alien it's hard to believe it had been made that way naturally, but they are also undeniably not artificial. 

I will take inspiration from the forms themselves and perhaps research into how they were formed in the first place, so I could learn something from it.

Reflection on Research Week

I now treat the research week as a brain-storming session. I was confused with how to conduct research when I haven't done any conceptual development; it felt awkward to try to do all the research at one go instead of sandwich it in between developments. It's helpful to just keep an open mind instead of pin-pointing what I want to find from the research - more of an exploration than an expedition, so to speak.

Reaction to Night Club and sleep/nightshift research

Health is in fact a social privilege. The under-privileged doesn't have as much access to medical information, and even if they do, don't have the means to improve their situation. One such example is night shift work. Disrupted sleep schedule can be lethal in long term but the workforce is not properly informed or assisted. The Liminal Space's Night Club installation is one that addresses such problem from a practical standpoint at a contained scale. 

I believe this is a facet of social division/issue that is not often addressed, and that the night workforce is a group under-represented. I want to create a Utopian/Dystopian model of a radical social structure or workplace architecture that draw attention to the 24 hr worktime world we are approaching. 

Pinning Down the Theme

Research Directions

Nature

• Circadian rhythm
  • its change through the invention of artificial lighting
  • disrupted in other ways (eg. midnight suns within arctic circle)
• The impact of artificial lighting on the natural environment

Symbolism

• Literature tradition
  • poetry etc (do not go gentle into the night)
  • Othello
• Mythical/religious tradition
  • Greek
  • Biblical
  • Indo-Chinese
• Fine arts
  • Impressionism
  • Colour theory
  • Blackness
  • Ethnicity
  • Dutch, baroque
  • Hopper

Science

• Keeping informed of any recent developments

Design

• Space for nights
• Design for nights
• Illumination designs
• Urban design for nights

Social

• the Night Shift

Initial Ideas (pre-organisation)

Miscellaneous ideas: 

1. Design for nighttime
2. Museum
3. Design for travelling
4. Philosophical discipline
5. Giants - the larger than life
6. Architecture as nature (building shelters and expansion and adapting environment for own good = animalistic natural instinct! restraint is more humanistic)
7. Invisible architecture
8. Living growing cities

1. Giants

• relative scale
• folklore
• biblical stories
• god or deformity (perfection or fault/damage)?
• damage
• skyscrapers, monuments - grandiose, why uncomfortable?
• Der Wanderer über dem Nebelmeer by Caspar David Friedrich - self-absorbed
• romanticism
• sublimity
• out of scale - the elephant in the room
• larger than life people (Dylan as god, Kubrick as god... whoever as god. God as god.)

2. Nighttime

• navigation without visuals
• planes
• one continuous stream without sleep - there are no "days", it's a neverending piece of abyss
• sleep - dreams
• time
• Midnight sun and polar night
• the arctic circle
• nightlife
• nightshifts - night time lit up - natural rhythm disrupted - a distinct group of people who live in a different world

Discipline

• Belief as a designer -
  equality
• Approach/skill -
  public architecture

Interest

• Theme/area of interest - 
• Why it matters in context? - 
• Why it matters to me? - 

Critical Aim

• What is the purpose? - fulfilling needs that aren't met, with an emphasis on the emotional
• Explore...
  Investigate...
  Develop...
  Improve...
  Challenge...

General Organisation

Keeping a small journal with me throughout the project has proved to be very helpful to me so I will continue to do so. Perhaps I'll be even more rigorously chronological this time- using it as a diary, as this will take the pressure to immediately put things down on Workflow off.

Workflow Management

1. Establishing a connection between Research and Development: Why did you choose this source?
   
   In an effort to connect Research section and Contextual Practice, I had resorted to putting short reflections after my sources. These reflections can muddy the distinction between the two sections. Perhaps taglines or one short sentence about the date and purpose would be enough. Try to leave the reflection/ review of the sources to Contextual Practice.
   
   
2. Organising citations:
   
   Think about ways to organise a bibliography (full list) and individual citations (in sections)
   eg. Thematically, chronologically, alphabetically, according to discipline, according to formats
   
   Keep updating the list! It goes to the end of the project!

Random notes:

Post-politics- not believing in politics is also a political belief. Law-making.