Lecture Week 4..

Today's lecture really cleared up this assignment, albeit a bit to far along for my liking, but I understand what we have to do a lot better now. It's not just far off 'Blade Runner' or 'The Fifth Element' futures that all the archigram nonsense had convinced me we were thinking of, it's proper, short term future, conceivable futures.

It is essentially a story with;

• Create Characters - people who live in this future, understand how they live
• Create Scenes - the places the characters live in, what does it look like
• (Assignment 2) Set - places in which they function

So we have to be able to tell this story. I'm beginning to get my head around what we need to do.

It is a 'fiction' but it needs to be grounded in facts and realities.

fic·tion

 [fik-shuhn]

noun

1. the class of literature comprising works of imaginative narration, especially in prose form.

2. works of this class, as novels or short stories: detective fiction.

3. something feigned, invented, or imagined; a made-up story: We've all heard the fiction of her being in delicate health.

4. the act of feigning, inventing, or imagining.

5. an imaginary thing or event, postulated for the purposes of argument or explanation.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/fiction 

 I hadn't considered this design at the scale of a 'character' yet. The need to understand their motivations, their movements, how are all their needs provided.

Yasu then went on to talk about the way that people can change architecture, and the unpredictable nature of users. It's fascinating to think that a group of people can completely change the building you design and create.

     

The Hong Kong Shanghai Bank by Norman Foster, as well as being a wonderful Norman Foster building has this almost symbiotic relationship with the locals who use it as a shelter to eat lunch under. It's like an unexpected multifunctional space.

I liked this diagram, it made me think of architecture as more of an organism. I can create something unchangeable on the outside but that doesn't stop it from adapting and changing on the inside.

This is something to consider for the next assignment, especially in terms of sustainability, a high level of adaptability and flexibility is necessary.

But the final idea of the 'factory home' hit a nerve somehow. I understand the sustainability of this multifunctional and adaptable building but I feel like it would really cage us in. It's also more sustainable to be able to reduce travel and have all your needs in the one building, similar to the concept of a decentralised city. Yet I don't think I'd be comfortable with a future like this and therefore I find it hard to envisage a future like this whether plausible or not.

I don't know how people live in this sutainable village of Woodfordia but I need to understand how the big picture works before I can think about the smaller scale issues.