1st place : Cornell Baird Prize
Through iterative processes of design, the studio focused on the transition of material and program. Using concrete and wax, the material research study began to discover the intricacies of solid and void. These design traits were carried to the Petrified Hollow Shelter—winning 1st place for Cornell Baird Prize. The shelter was further adaptive to construct a house with strict programatic and user needs, and finally the capstone of the studio, the Museum for Madrid. The Museum focuses on wall as program and void as circulation to create a unified experience through a series of vertical light wells and dark subterranean plains. Urban carpets capitalized on the nuances of material study to connect the urban fabric of this old city’s neighborhoods as well as previous design research and processes.
The Museum for Madrid depicted in section demonstrates the crossing of circulation paths as void and presence of specific views.
The placement of enclosing gallery walls and urban carpets mirror their respective street alignments, while the ramp spirals slowly upward to unify the walls and distance the specific angularities of the site.
The heights of the walls do not overshadow the urban fabric of Madrid but invite and enclose the visitor upon approach.
The material studies are composed of cement and wax. Through a process of quickly cooling, hot wax hardens into organic shapes in cold water. Later, the wax is cast in hardening cement cubes. The cubes of cement are segmented and extruded into slides. The wax is later melted out to finish the reciprocal process.
The process of cutting and separating varies the depth and scale of negative space.
For the Baird Prize, the Petrified Hollow shelter shades the visitor with the clustered walls. The use of the puncturing void creates specific program for sleeping, resting, or star gazing depending on the walls relative depth.