the ‘friends of knox place’ collective is built on a mutual desire to influence and encourage our engagement with public space to ultimately form a sense of place.

the public arena is a surface for communication pushing the boundaries of contextual public space . the public exists within temporal spatial inhabitations. this being either by choice of participation or as heterogeneous participants within an undefined context. by facilitating encounters and avenues for participation we allow others to find a different way of engaging with the city. we have generated reference points that connect virtual space with real space creating various entry points through which to connect with particular spaces. the urban interior is a setting for informal non instrumental social interaction or play. through the simple action of communication and participation experience and knowledge is exchanged and accumulated.

when harnessing the concept of ‘DIY’ we are able to empower the individual to make informal connections with the urban surface, altering its everyday function, forming non commercial alternatives to consumerist lifestyle. by implanting informal accessible structures we enable a community of people to engage with the space and each other. our design intentions are embedded in the concepts surrounding a gift economy, by sharing knowledge and experience through interaction and collective occupation a community is formed that in turn influences how we claim space. the concepts of participation, experience and community investigated as part of ‘friends of knox place’ has become an ongoing and opened ended approach to understanding our occupation of space – an integral consideration when addressing the design of our urban interior.

an urban farming community, whereby one can learn the entire food process from seed to the food on their plate and which would then become a platform for events.

‘activating’ Knox Lane, a static laneway alongside Melbourne Central utilised only as a delivery point for Coles and a shortcut into or out of the centre. Melbourne’s streets and the diverse network of lane and passageways are all public space, for all to make use of; a use with a standstill instead of a passageway from origin ‘A’ to destination ‘B’.

throughout the semester we explored ways of bringing awareness to and making claims on these spaces. project aim was to reverse each of Knox Lane’s characteristics; to make it a usable, claimed and occupied space with an aim to create a platform everyone can contribute to and benefit from. we want to build relationships between the public and their public space, while also building a community – building relationships between people. examples of these relationships are shown through our testings a ‘public birthday party‘, ‘because its public space‘ and ’50 first dates‘.

our proposition for Knox Lane evolved into an urban farming structure, following the initiative of many other such frameworks on a global level which encourage locavore and sustainable living.
our proposal consisted of a number of components, the first being an elevated pallet garden (elevated due to the erratic Coles delivery truck timetable and the farm’s daily sun requirements) on scaffolding on either side of the laneway. in order to equip the garden with adequate system functions, we investigated different irrigation systems, compost materials and methods, plant and herb planting requirements and different compact, sustainable and hands-on growing methods.

rounding up the circle of consumption comes the proposal for a dining table which spreads into a kitchen, providing facilities for people to learn from each other about the preparation and cooking of food… and then finally a social platform on which to gather and enjoy the food.

one of our testings including placing various seed packets around the city, as an invitation and a means of capturing curiosity. this has become one of our project’s key points; enabling people to engage on their own terms.

Xiaoan Sun, Yunquan Zhang, Yan Gao.

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By concluding the previous works we have done in this semester, we get three key words which are most related to our projects: attract, share and communicate. In the last project, we put the three key words together and connected to the knox lane way, finally comes this idea: a swap market. A simply introduction: swap market means you can swap anything (from yourselves) for anything (in the market), without any extra charge. Swap is a kind of event which can attract people, share things, and communicate with others.

Basically this project can be divided into two parts: the lane way design and the display box design.

Lane way:

By doing the site analysis, we find that this lane way is narrow and used as a delivery passage. So that means while trucks passing by, that place will become crowd. In that case, we need to avoid to use the ground area. So we decided to put the swap market on the wall, make it looked like a gallery.

Display box:

The display box is used as a container for the swap stuffs. It is light, transparency and can be used in both day-time and night-time (LED light inside). And a lock for the overnight safety. There is a recording notes for people write down the name of the stuff they swapped beside each box.

The swap event is held from 10am to 9pm on Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. During the open hours, boxes are not locked. People could take stuffs in and out freely for exchanging. Simply explain the process would be: browse – swap – record. Managers are needed there all the time for giving helps.

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For the last project of this semester, we processed the whole thing in the lane way. according to the aim of our studio ” claim the city”, we need to do something to attract people come to this space and let them to claim this space. For our group, we have 3 parts in the whole project. 1. let people know this space 2. ask them participate in this space 3. let them use this space. we will install some new elements in the interior and exterior to create new environment to apply people occupy this space.

we have several infrastructures like break the graffiti wall and demolish the door which connect to the restaurant road. (function: to free the space and lead people come in). install a moveable stage (function: for daily use, stage solve the height difference problem and afford people have a resting area. for special booking, stage can be used for event like concert run way fashion show) install a roof ( function: darker the space for projectors and generate ” interior” space connect the lane way and melbourne central) install some benches, the benches is also moveable, it can be pulled up and down in case the track comes into the lane way ( function: resting) install lights in the interior (function : shadow game) install some boxes (function: seats + stall cushion +bar) install projector (function : face wall + special use)

for daily use we have shadow game in interior and face wall in exterior. people can join this two activities and upload their information in our blog. it is a process from action and reaction. for special booking, people can book the lane way in our blog to hold some events. we apply our infrastructure to the them.

shadow game video

portfolio

Our group started off exploring the different ways of claiming the city by defining our individual interests and joining them into a larger project. Our interests consisted of DIY/low budget; occupy space, encounter and small claim. We began by experimenting through various DIY informal urban practices and developing different proposals. The chosen proposals were the ones that provided the most feedback and could best relate to our interests.

Our group’s objective aimed to create a space that invited the public to experience and interact with our installation and maintaining on low budget. This brought the natural world into the space; softening the harshness of the city. Sensing Spaces involved nature and the human’s five senses. They were inspired by Element logo [1] that involved nature and side influenced by Ernesto Neto [2]. He created immersive multi-sensory installations that invited viewers to engage in. Our project included three different proposals that were interdependent of each other.

The main proposal was setting up a tree netting installation around Knox Place and inside Melbourne Central, inspired by Tomás Saraceno,

“Interdependencies of systems to ponder ecological questions beyond the natural world. His work involved conceiving environments that anticipate new socio-cultural platforms for interacting and experiencing our surroundings.” [3]

This tree netting included sound, light and plants that enabled the public to interact and experience the installation. Consequently, we decided to create a vertical garden to beautify the space while changing public’s perception towards the city. We also proposed creating DIY furniture to create a space for the public to socialise, relax and interact.

The results of our interventions led us to discover that people tend to misinterpret the use of laneway as an uninviting space. By bringing nature into the city, we hope to create a new revolution of laneway for the public.

Portfolio

Material Site Testing      
          

Noise & Laeway Public Survey
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

[1] Element Logo Statement http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20091022074027AAuZ4kA (Accessed 7^th June 2011)

[2] Ernesto Neto Anthrodopinohttp://www.designboom.com/weblog/cat/10/view/6526/ernesto-neto-anthropodino-at-the-park-avenue-armory-new-york.html (Accessed 7^th June 2011)

[3] Tomás Saraceno http://calendar.walkerart.org/canopy.wac?id=4488 (Accessed 7^thJune 2011)

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

According to the studio topic Claim the city, the laneway project aim at creating a place for others to make their own use. For our group, the process to get to it is separated into 3 parts: know- renovate the appearance of the area, attract people to come in; experience- create interactive elements for people to participate, whose feedback can be reflected at the same time; claim- inspired by the current installation, people can occupy the space actively and give it new meaning.

For the former works during the studio, we are interested in indirect encounters and act-react. So we decided to use virtual technology (video, projector and blog) as well as physical installation (lighting) to change both the subject and object of the act-react into people themselves to create indirect encounters.

After breaking down a part of graffiti wall to free the space; installing a stage works as pass way to lead people in; building a roof to connect the laneway visually with main part of Melbourne Central, the project is physically divided into exterior and interior part. Virtual event Face Wall happens in exterior space while physical installation the Shadow Game takes place inside. When required, the whole space can be booked for special use such as concerts and runway or anything else.

My Illuminated World is an ongoing project which will gradually merge into the crowded, casual and modern atmosphere of Melbourne central. And it will be the first corner in Melbourne central where people can make full use of freely not only in daily life but also on internet.

Video

Further vidoes
Earlier intention

Shadow Game

Infrastructures

.ENCOUNTER.OCCUPY.CLAIM.SURFACE.ACTIVATE.HEIGHT.

-One of the main focus’s of the design near entrance to the Element shop to draw people in.

-Anyone can upload their footage or photography into the booths for anyone to view, encounter and talk about.

-When people are waiting to view the booths they can occupy themselves by watching skateboarders do tricks off the rail.

-3 booths each side of the laneway.

-Graffiti print on one side of the wall not only for an urban aesthetic  and “theme” purpose, but to also give inspiration to those who want to claim the space and contribute to the collage on the skate ramps in the other section of the lane way.

-Skaters and anyone who wants to learn how to skate need a space that they can use freely with out being told off!

-Graffiti on skate ramps done by people, their way of claiming that space in the city.

-Skate ramps can be folded up for when the truck occupies the space by making deliveries.

-Roof design, incorporating lighting for evening and night time

-Half pipe ramp.

As a group, we aim to create a space that invites public to experience and interact (relax, socialize, play etc) with our installation. The installation consist of bringing the natural world into the space; softening the harshness of the city. Also, we aim to create a space (social playground) that allows public to create their own relationship and interaction with spaces around them.

Inspirations

Exterior Proposal:

• Tree Netting [1]

• Vertical Community Garden [2]

• Hanging plants [3]

Interior Proposal:

• Pilar Netting [1]
• Hanging plants [3]
• Sound speaker + USB plug

• DIY Social playground [4]

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[1] Yarn Bombing in Germany. http://twistedsifter.com/2011/05/picture-of-the-day-yarn-bombing-in-germany/ [accessed  29/05/2011]

[2] Space Saving Vertical Earth Gardens. http://greenupgrader.com/11625/space-saving-vertical-earth-gardens/ [accessed 29/05/2011]

[3] Fedor Van Der Valk ‘String Gardens’. http://trendland.net/2011/06/01/fedor-van-der-valk-string-gardens/# [accessed 29/05/2011]

[4] Ernesto Neto. http://amesadeluz.blogspot.com/2009/01/ernesto-neto.html [accessed 31/05/2011]

• the name of your project as the post entry’s title
• add your names straight under the title in the text field, like: an urban interior design studio project by abc def, ghi lmn,…
• upload one key image, that is able to describe the project best (imagine your project gets published and you can only choose one image, which one would you choose?)
• write by a 200-300 word statement about your project, clearly articulating its intention, design components, and strategies.
• create links in this statement which refer back to posts of some of your earlier projects, but only to those which have been critical in developing this final project (make sure yo tick in the ‘link window’ ‘open in a separate window’)
• embed a pdf version of your group portfolio as an online publication; the portfolio this portfolio should include your final project and all your developmental work and all other projects from the semester.
• upload a short video (3-max 5 minutes) communicating the core ideas of your proposal, have the title of the project at the start of the video and add your names at the end.
• upload any further videos like to add
• assign the blog entry to the category 00_final projects // each student’s name // and 5 keywords as tags

ALSO make sure you submit by thursday june 16, between 10.00-12.00 your final version of your portfolio as a printed and bound document, not in an A format and not bigger than A3. You have to submit the document in building 88 to yukari yamaguchi our admin officer.

feel free to look at earlier studios for examples of blog entries, especially writing, and portfolios, here is one!

*** TONIGHT***
// NEW GROUNDWORKS
PROFESSOR DAVID GISSEN
Associate Professor, California College of the Arts
Wednesday, May 25 // 6:00pm in RMIT 8.11.68 (!- not 6:30pm as in our Friday sessions -!) Building 8, Level 11, Lecture theatre 68, to the right of the lifts // 360 Swanston St, Melbourne

Presented in collaboration with Kerb Journal

This lecture offers an overview of my interest in an anti-naturalistic
approach to nature within the discipline of architecture. An anti-naturalist approach avoids positioning nature as either an external or internal essence — a concept found within aesthetics that emphasize natural systems, flows, and processes. In place of neo naturalism, I often examine those natures that are produced within and through the trauma of urbanization and its history. Things such as mud, dankness, and smoke interest me as counter-natural substances. Such natures are generally, but not absolutely, threatening, troubling, stagnant, and inherently difficult to absorb into both nature and architecture as a thing and idea. I label these troubling forms of nature “subnature” and remain intriqued by their potential agiational relationship to the natural within architecture. In explaining these concepts I will often
turn to a variety of historical and contemporary work that rethinks the
concept of “ground” in architecture from this anti-naturalistic perspective.

DAVID GISSEN, Associate Professor, California College of the Arts, is a
historian and theorist of architecture and urbanism. Recent work focuses
on developing a novel concept of nature in architectural thought and
developing experimental forms of architectural historical practice.
David is the author of the book Subnature: Architecture’s Other
Environments (Princeton Architectural Press, 2009), editor of the
“Territory” issue of AD Journal (2010), and editor of the book Big and
Green (Princeton Architectural Press, 2003). His essays are published in
journals such as AA Files, AD Energies, Grey Room, Log, Volume, The
Radical History Review, The Journal of Architecture, The Journal of
Architectural Education, and Thresholds; magazines Architectural Record, Metropolis, Domus, ARCADE, Cabinet, and Constructs; and books Models and Drawings (Routledge, 2007), Design Ecologies (Princeton Architectural Press, 2009), Writing Urbanism (Routledge, 2008), The Ethics of Dust (TBA/Venice Biennale, 2009), and The Religious Imagination in Modern Architecture: A Reader (Routledge, 2011). His curatorial, experimental historical, and design work has been staged at the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, National Building Museum, Yale Architecture Gallery, Maryland Institute College of Art, Toronto Free Gallery, and The Museum of the City of New York.

Gissen lectures on his work internationally, including recent invited talks at Princeton University, The Royal Danish Academy of Art, The Bartlett School of Architecture, The Humanities Center of the University of California Santa Barbara and “Postopolis!” LA, sponsored by The Storefront for Art and Architecture. He is the recipient of various awards and grants including Graham Foundation grants, the Richard J. Carroll Lectureship from Johns Hopkins University, and the Chalsty Award at CCA.
/

** ON FRIDAY ***
//THE ARCHITECTURE OF THE DISASTER
TERESA STOPPANI
University of Technology Sydney / University of Greenwich, London
Friday, May 27 // 6:30pm in RMIT 8.11.68
Building 8, Level 11, Lecture theatre 68, to the right of the lifts // 360 Swanston St, Melbourne

This lecture considers the irruption of the designed destructive event in the order of the project of architecture. The artificial disaster brings onto architecture destructive sudden forces that operate against it with an intensity and a speed that are different from those that are at play in it. It imposes on architecture the man-devised, forceful and violent interference of a project that is alien to that of architecture.
The violent orchestrated event in space is interpreted here as a paroxysmal – explicit, sudden, violent – actualisation of the forces that contribute to the shaping of the environment. Design and planning are about space definition and form making, while the destruction inflicted by the disaster concerns the undoing of form, of planned orders, of structures (be they societal, urban, economic, national).

Through a series of examples, this lecture explores those practices which – in architecture and around architecture – work on and with the energy released by the disastrous event. It aims to understand the effects of the planned disaster on the wider questions that the discipline of architecture needs to ask, and suggests that silence – or, the project of silence of architecture – is an act of design too.

TERESA STOPPANI is Reader in Architecture at the University of Greenwich, and Visiting Professor in Architectural History and Theory at the University of Technology Sydney. Her research focuses on re-readings
of the city through unorthodox approaches to urbanism and architecture, and includes the book Paradigm Islands: Manhattan and Venice. Discourses on architecture and the city (Routledge 2010). Recent writings include: considerations on Piranesi’s architectural space as open and dynamic, proposing ways of how this may engage with contemporary spatial practices (Footprint, 5, 2009); an exploration of the significance of dust in Walter Benjamin’s Arcades Project (The Journal of Architecture, 12:5, 2007), proposing reconsiderations on obsolescence and uncontrollable space; works on the map and the grid which reconsider space as apparently measured and ordered, but subject to new configurations (Architecture Research Quarterly, 12:3-4, 2009). Forthcoming publications include a study of the complex relation of architecture with the artificial disaster (in Space & Culture, ‘Spaces of Terror and Risk’, 2011), and an exploration of the connection between
the material and the critical in architectural representation, through a study of lines and erasures in the graphic works of G. B. Piranesi (in I. Wingham (ed.), Mobility of the Line, Birkhauser, forthcoming).

Indigenous urbanity – issues at stake in the delivery of a metropolitan cultural centre

Dr Anoma Pieris
Senior Lecturer, Architecture

The Australian public sphere as a material physical manifestation is mimetic and spectral; formally and spatially capable of assimilating cultural difference but as yet under-cooked in the delivery of a real context for social action – a phenomenon most evident in its capital city. Consequently, the claims made by Indigenous actors on this space through acts of resistance and occupation appear incongruous and uncanny- as with the Tent Embassy- a stubborn reminder of those excluded from the national imagination. In contrast, Redfern in Sydney is an example of the making and remaking of Indigenous claims through urban occupation, a struggle that the architecture of the Pemulwuy project finds difficult to represent. While Indigenous communities may adopt radical urban strategies against the norms and forms imposed by an alien culture, their desire to be both audible and visible in this environment necessitates specific compromises.
This paper looks closely at four examples of Indigenous cultural centres from North America that engage with metropolitan briefs in specific ways- ranging from clandestine insertions into existing building envelopes to purpose built museum facilities. It situates this research within a broader debate on the ‘right to the city,’ and its advocacy by David Harvey in 2008 in the face of the Global Economic Crisis. It asks, “What is at stake in the institutionalisation of indigeneity against historic incidence of resistant occupation, and a desire for occupation, moreover, that is not ontologically urbane?”

Anoma Pieris is a senior lecture at the Faculty of Architecture Building and Planning. She is an architectural historian by training with a specialist focus on South and Southeast Asian architecture. Her recent book, Hidden Hands and Divided Landscapes: a penal history of Singapore’s plural society (University of Hawaii Press 2009) focuses on the intersection between urban history and colonial prisons through the lens of construction labour. She teaches design in both the undergraduate and postgraduate programmes.

1:00 PM THURSDAY 26 MAY 2011
JAPANESE ROOM
FIRST FLOOR, ARCHITECTURE BUILDING

Kate Lucas
Research Support Officer,
Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning

Room 207, Old Commerce Building
University of Melbourne, VIC 3010
AUSTRALIA

T: +61 3 90354402
E: klucas@unimelb.edu.au
W: www.abp.unimelb.edu.au

** Please note I am only in the office Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays **

Site analysis:

SkateLab, Atlantic Beach Florida

-use of print on skate ramps

-use of narrow ramps which would apply to my design

Black Pearl Skate Park, Cayman Islands

-consider how it looks from above

-use of curves and depth

Marseille Skatepark, France

-further use of designs on actual ramps and bowl

we will do this by:

-creating a virtual forum through a blog system that generates interest and interaction.
-breaking down the existing physical barriers and making the space more accessible and inhabitable.

an important aspect of our overall design and intentions for knox place is the re-design of  the end of the laneway and the door way connecting the interior and exterior laneways. in doing this the laneway will be accessible to the heavy traffic flow shown in the video below.

recreating new entryways opens up knox place for opportunistic occupation and engagement.

http://knoxpl.wordpress.com/

Don’t focus on material thinking or form, but what you want to enable as a practice / activity; the rest will follow.

As the alley is quite dirty and smelly because of all the rubbish bins that located near Coles loading dock, we decide to put something that smell better in the area. Inspired by Ernesto Neto, we decide to use coffee grounds to give a better aroma. We suspend it by putting it in the stocking or nylon.

For the area near the entrance to Melbourne central, we decided to put recycle water bottles on the wall so that people can put their message in each bottle. These bottles act like time capsules that people can put their personal message inside.

***

We want to embrace recycled objects that are handmade, unique, custom and sustainable

During our process of development as a group for the lane way, we have decided to combine each person’s idea to develop more into our project. As a group, we thought a lot about using recycle materials such as bottles, plastic cups, etc. Influenced by all these methods, we have decided to strive towards ‘going green’. Our biggest influenced was from an artist named Michelle Brand, she uses recycled plastic bottles to create an elegant chandelier.

“Once a plastic drinks bottle is empty, it is perceived as redundant and then thrown away. I wanted to challenge this wasteful paradigm.” – Michelle Brand

we proposed to add creeper wall plants; we supposed it is sustainable because it can survive within these type of environment. Our aim is to attract attention using the plants during the day and lighting up tea light during the night. We want people to experience a lane way with a different perception; welcoming and harmonious.

Proposed Materials: recycled plastic bottles, fishing string, creeper wall plants, tea lights.

***

The inside is divided into two parts. One is bricks and another is ivory painting part. When peoeple come in there, they will feel painting wall does not finish the design and lonely compared to bricks wall. So we made melbourne map using grasses. Through this material, we can be complementary people’s request that they want natural environment instead of the bleak street. Another thing is a bag light. It would serve as a guide because we designed it is hung at both inside and outside through this lanway so, people can follow easily by variety color bags. Also, people can use this as event lights. We tested the candle light on last Sunday and we found out if we made emotional atmosphere at here, people would have some events for night time. Actually, when we made it people reacted the candle light as taking pictures.