The 21st Century Ger
A recent front page article published by the University of Pennsylvania’s PennToday about ongoing research that I am involved in at the Center for Environmental Building and Design at PennDesign. Read the full article here More details to come in further posts covering my recent trip to Mongolia with UNICEF, as well as updates on […]
The Vizcaya Mansion Grotto
Last May I was lucky enough to be included in a team, along with Courtney Magill and led by Frank Matero, to travel down to the Vizcaya Mansion in Miami, Florida to have a discussion of the conservation of the grotto there, the ceiling of which was the canvas for one of Robert Chanler’s few […]
Comcast Pennovation Challenge
I have had the pleasure to work with a fantastic team (Kevin Martin, Jono Sanders, Grace Moore, and Chelsea Meyers) of integrated product design students at Penn on what would evolve into the winning proposal for Comcast’s Pennovation Challenge. Our premise: to address, target, and provide early-stage mitigation and monitoring tools for the aging and […]
Environmental Diagnostics at Fort Union National Monument, Part 3: Pilot Monitoring Methodology
Since my last visit to Fort Union National Monument, I was tasked with devising a long term monitoring methodology to record critical data on, around, and within the adobe ruins. No small task. Select walls had been pre-selected in previous conservation plans, particular from the early ’90s, as well as from our last visit and […]
Environmental Diagnostics at Fort Union National Monument, Part 2
In June, the Penn Architectural Conservation Lab, under the direction of Frank Matero, assembled a team to revisit Fort Union National Monument. Each member of the team, comprised of current graduate students as well post-graduate fellows (myself included), had a specific focus. Topics ranged from surveying and analyzing the current structural bracing present on the […]
Interactive Emergy Diagram & Accounting v.1.0
In my time after graduation I have continued to work on some research with Prof. Bill Braham at PennDesign regarding calculating and visualizing the environmental accounting for the Delaware River Valley region. I have been asked to help visualize some of the data and calculations being done to provide not just a more palatable interpretation […]
Optimized Program Design
A ‘fast and dirty’* study for my current studio project, done early on in the design process, that aims to size the environmental features of a prototypical building section. This analysis uses Honeybee and Ladybug for Grasshopper and DesignExplorer to map the resulting patterns. In this case, a residential(north) and office(south) space are bifurcated by […]
Interpreting & Reacting to Forces: Structural Form Finding Excercise
This was a short exercise in studying the literal interpretation of flows on a site. This was a precursor study for the current studio project this semester. The site for the project is on an abandoned pier in Elliott Bay, Seattle. Although the climate is rather benign, the increased exposure of the site on the […]
Investigating Ignipetal Force at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello
In identifying the state-of-the-art available at the time when Thomas Jefferson was designing Monticello, including its subsequent renovations, it was discovered that he was aware of the mechanics of intentional, convective ventilation. In correspondence with John Carey on the 4th of July, 1791, the topic of ignipetal force was discussed at length. It is hypothesized […]
Modeling Responsive Panel Bending: pt2
I applied the same methodology used in part 1, modeling the bending of a single panel face, to an entire panelized surface as a form-finding exercise. Given various bending degrees the surface begins to deform more drastically. The coloration of the panels are indicative of the deflection from the original surface position.