#10 Earn Lalipat Sirirat

[y3s1-20182019]

Phase 4 - Refinement

Take me home

After exploring and designing the whole system of arrangement, I decided to further develop and refine the little details in the project. I set up a scenario of ones exploring in the spaces, what he sees, all the rules, way of constructing, and how it affects the quality of this living space. After done with all the refinement, I have raise a question of the impact on the environment between what I have design and the generic block of building, so that I could further study on the differences between both.

To recap everything, Stefan was born in the village of Wae Rebo, he was used to the duality of life between the two village. Wae Rebo, where he live collectively and harmony with nature, and Kombo, where he live independently in isolated dwellings. But After he grows up, he moved to bangkok, a very crowded city for work. He was very overwhelmed by the intensity of city life, so he began searching for a place to live where there’s an integration between the different sides of living spaces that he used to find in his hometown

Then he found this space right in the middle of Bangkok:

A place where explore a wide variety of shades between urban and non urban living. Since it provides all the range from very secluded to very open, he can switch back and forth anytime he like. With all those reasons he decided to move in right away

Stefan continues to walk towards the centre. The experience changes as he walks in. It starts with a normal path with roof on top, as he gets closer to the middle, the roof start disappearing until it’s fully open air. Also, the floor starts to become porous and leave a connection with the ground below.

Not only that, with the outer area having such informal arrangement and small rooms, it create this unfold of space where Stefan sees a lot of the spaces colonized by user, and it tends to be more permanent.

As he walks further into the centre, the space and opening became larger with lesser folds. But there are still people colonizing spaces, but not as permanent as on the outer rim spaces.

In the middle, since the rooms are already large and has its own collectivenes, the colonization of spaces are never kept permanet since open spaces should be kept clear.

He walked explore further and reach a construction area, he noticed they use all light weight material, they carefully build them, assembled onsite by bolted them or use dry reversible joinery so that it doesn’t destroy the existing tree and can be easily deconstruct.

He reached the centre walk down the hole and bumped into another guy working in garden. “Are you a gardener?” Stefan asked. “No No, hahaha, I live here, we have this rotating routine, this week i’m on planting trees. Since city work is shaping us to work just in our profession, I think it’s good to be able to do something else once in a while. These physical activity makes us feel more active.”

The man suggested “You can go check out the workshop, you can customise your own knock down furniture, you know, meet people, arrange and personalise your room, well not permanently. When you move to another space you would want to take it with you and leave it open for someone else.”

To conclude, as a designer, I have design a system of space arrangement, not one fixed building, a system that can be adapt to any free space in city. A space that creates a community of various type of people so that they can explore each other, communicate, and co-live. Also provide a choice for people to be able to switch back and forth between isolate and communal living. A construction system which has less impact on land and allows user to connect nature in the middle of the city.

I have propose this project as an alternative residential space in city instead of stacked up condominiums. 

But before ending this journey, I’d like to ask a question. 

My proposal and the generic block building. Which one has more impact on the environment?  

In my project, I have propose this extreme way of distributing space so that we can see an actual difference between both. One doesn’t destroy existing tree, has light weight but uses a large amount of land. While another destroy some existing trees, very heavy but only in certain amount of area.

[y3s1-20182019]

Phase 3 - Endemichomes

Integrating Non-Urban to Urban

Concerning about how the rise of urbanisation has restricted people’s lifestyle to live in such isolated way, I’m designing a system of space arrangement integrating the non-urban lifestyle to urban lifestyle so that people would have a more choice of choosing their own lifestyle. Arranging in gradients from the most urban (secluded/mono-functional/less nature space) to the most non-urban (collective/multifunctional/connect to nature) space. So that all the spaces in my project would have all shades of grey to support all the various lifestyle of various type of people.

From the study of Wae Rebo and its duality between non-urban and urban from Phase 1 and the experiment on extremisation of Wae Rebo concept in urban context, I have came to a conclusion to combine the two earlier phase and continue with it on my Phase 3

Urban Context

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The place I chose to continue with my contextual study is Bangkok, a very rowded city, This city can be relatable to Kombo, an urban version of my case study, Wae Rebo.

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I studied the Asoke district which is located in the centre of Bangkok, spaces are extremely crowded and full of high rise building, the lifestyle of people living here can be very segregated. People live seclusively, in there own condominium, and has less connectivity towards other neighbour in the city.

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Here I found a free space in the Asoke area which is about 6000 square metres and I decided to place my project right here.

Research 

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Here are the compare and contrast between the urban and the non urban way of living. With the 3 main keywords extracted from the case study, collectivity, multifunctional space, and connecting to nature. You can see here that between the urban context and WaeRebo, the lifestyle is extremely different, it’s like on the edge of each side of a rope. So, What I tried to to next is study the gap between these difference, so that I would be able to create a gradient from one to another

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In here I divide all the actions up according to how lifestyle nowadays divide them into rooms. Then, I use the idea of extremisation to stretch the possibility of how far can a very single secluded mono-functional space turns into a very extreme multifunctional collective space.

Design

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I used all the research I've done to design a system of space arrangement. The system would be spread horizontally only, this means there will be no second floor. The system is all about putting all the secluded mono functional space on the rim of the land and it can gradually change to more collective as it gets into the centre, and the centre will be the most collective area, where it can be a free space where people can do anything in it. 

Already mentioning about collectiveness and the multifunctional space, the main keyword that has been derived from Phase one is connecting and concerning to nature. The section and the diagram here shows that the use of single stories housing also benefits the land in the area. Since it is single stories, we can still keep the existing trees in site, and wouldn't have to destroy them. Also since, the whole structure is elevated, It is noticeable that the root of the trees and soil in the ground wouldn't have to be damaged as much.

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The path on the outer rim would be covered with roofing, making the resident living in the space feel covered and not as connected to nature much, but as it gets into the centre, the overhead roofing starts to open up and space became more open aired and more connecting to the tree. 

Furthermore, the axonometric here has shown clear idea that the distribution of space between my project and the surrounding residential building is quite different, so this raised a question towards me that, would the space have the same function as a tall building? Since the whole point of having high rise building is to accommodate the increase in population.

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So, in order to clarify that my project has achieve that same goal as high rise building and provide lots more choice for residents, I have done a calculation on density of the surrounding building and compare it with my own project

The result was quite satisfying, the number of density(square metre per person) of my design and the existing residential building doesn’t have much differs at all. This can result that the design I have developed is able to accommodate the increase in population in the urban and also provide a style of living from the non-urban.

Extra studies

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This is an extra document I’ve done to answer some of the questions that may be in people’s mind. The question is that “Who would ever want to sleep, shower, or go to toilet with other people?” Of course these 3 actions can be seen as a private thing to do, that no one would ever want to do it with others, that it would be uncomfortable for anyone to reveal their personal space with others. 

The result of the survey shows that of course, there will be more people leaning towards uncomfortable with the sleeping and taking shower with others, however, it also shown in the survey that there are people who is very comfortable with doing those actions with other. Some people may be uncomfortable with working in public space for instance. Not all people are comfortable in the same way. So, here I wanted to clarify that we can’t stereotype people into just one category. 

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So here, I have envisioned 4 type of people and how they can live in the space I provided. The introverts are able to stay in their own corner, while some others can stay in-between seclusive and collective, or some can go fully collective. The amount of space acquired by different type will be different as well. 

This idea of gradient space arrangement also let the introvert to be able to explore collectivity in a subtle way. The result is that my project allows all type of personality to be able to fit in one place.

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This is also an extra document I have done. This is a graph of my own experience toward the collective space. As you can see the graph is not a linear line, it is rather fluctuated. This shows that during the process of experiencing in the collective space, there will be many factors that affect your mood. And since it is fluctuated in not black and white way but rather different shades of grey, this would be a great argument that my space allows people to go back and forth between being collective and seclusive because it provides all the different shades of grey.

Atmosphere

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Here is the section cut of the whole project, and the atmosphere of the different stage of spaces. As you can see, the first one is very seclusive, has less natural lighting and no connection towards nature at all but as gradually change to the centre area, the room became more open, the space became bigger and it can accommodate more people.

Flexible Project

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To conclude my overall project, I have designed a system of space arrangement, not a fixed one building. In this case, the asoke district, is just an example space where my project can be located. This design is very flexible, it can be adapted to any shape and size of free space available in urban area.

Here I have an example of how the design can be integrated to another plot of land.

[y3s1-20182019]

Phase 1 - Contextual Studies

Wae Rebo, Indonesia

a study of an isolated village in the Eastern Flores, Indonesia. It is located on top of the mountain, in the middle of the forest. It consist of on 7 houses called “the round house” with just a population of only 300.

In the year 2008, In was rebo village, indonesia, there was a reconstruction of the traditional house. Odi, a man living in the village took his son out for gathering material for first time. His son was very tired complaining,

Odi said, this is what we do here, we walk to places, to get water 200m away, to field where we grow coffee and we do have to gather material from the surrounding area. This village is very isolated, in the middle of rainforest , on top of mountain. We only use material around us, and carry it back all the way to village. It's a cycle here we take one tree down we grow another one. in 80 years, we can replace the house again

When they went back to the village Odi taught him some of the traditional rope tie. Odi said, we don't use nails or any tools at all, we connect joints using ropes or vines. We also don't have any machine to help build the house, every measurements has been eyeballed. 

The wood used to build the house can be gathered around that area only

- ground floor - tenda : the primary living space - central hearth/kitchen/bedrooms - 1st level - lobo mehe : open space for material and crops storage; - 2nd level - lobo lentar : open space for storage of crops; - 3rd level - lemparae : open space for storage of seeds; - 4th level - hengkang kode : ritual space. ritual offerings after the completion of the house.

Hierarchy - have one spiritual leader and one house leader per house

Men - coffee plantation - find food and water resource

Women - spreading coffee beans for drying and doing other domestic chores

Children - stayed at other village for school during weekdays - come back to wae rebo during weekends

After the house finish building, Odi and his family participate in the ritual. Sacrifice chicken for blood. With his curiosity, his son asked why blood?

Odi replies, we believe blood is what a medium which connects us to the ancestors. Son, listen to me. Our lives revolve around ancestors and spirit. We believe they bring good fortune to us. So whatever you do, always respect them.

House is very permeable, sound, smell smoke can pass through the house.

Day - everyone stay outside of house and does their work

Night - everyone huddle in the ground floor of the house

On the next day, It was the day Odi and his son need to leave to Kombo, a twin village bottom of mountain where there are more facility - school hospital water system.

Dad said, Before you start school, I wanted to let you know that life will be totally different down there. It’s true that we people from wae rebo all have houses down there, it’s like living in 2 different world. In Wae Rebo, You will see all the rituals and nature where there is spiritual leader leading us. But in Kombo, you have to listen to the Political Leader. Son, we all are catholic, we need to go to church. And it’s a lot cleaner and functional down there.

After arriving at their Monkey hut house, his son realised it was totally different. The kitchen area is outside of the house, unlike the one up there where kitchen is in the middle. Each family live separately And it eliminated moment and time spend together with other families.

In important ritual like funeral, and offer food to ancestors , people would actually travel up to was redo to attend the event. However, people would also travel back down to Kombo if there were important christian event such as christmas and easter.

On that Sunday, people from wav redo would travel down with a sack of coffee to sell in Kombo. This is when his wife get to see Odi. But on Monday it’s time for for his wife to leave with a sack of rice, sugar, dried fish and vegetable you count fine uo there.

His son asked again, why does mom have to carry a heavy bag of rice up there.

Because there are no rice field up there. Since 2 village on different land, different agriculture. It’s an advantage for us to have sister village to be able to share things among each other. Even thought’s like living in different world, a world parallel to each other, they still depend on each other.

Was rebo used to be very isolated, until there’s Kombo, a 1st network connection that gradually bring the community to the wold.

Same people, same culture, however, in different settings, they behave differently

We could make an analogy of a relationship between vacation house and condo in city. Live as a whole and live separately.

[y3s1-20182019]

Phase 2 - Domestic Devices

Non-Pragmatic Space

We usually design spaces that have function like living room with tv bedroom for sleeping, kitchen for cooking. We only add what is necessary for our life. But what if we instead add a non functional space, a complimentary space where we could escape from the world and truly be yourself, truly understand yourself.

After through a lot of research on the case study of wae rebo, i conclude it with some key points. - Equilibrium with nature, connection to ancestors and spirit, and human senses to these spirit and nature.

Looking at ourself today, we live in a world where everything is very functional very pragmatic. Very similar to the downhill village in the case study, But what we don’t have is another world where we truly connect to nature like waerebo. What if we have an extra space that is compliment to our life?

In this experiment, I wanted to go extreme and try different thing. So I did research on our senses and the element of nature and combine them together to create a space where we could explore nature and ourself.

The Element of Nature includes wind, water, fire, earth, and wood.

Our senses include seeing hearing smell taste touching temperature and balance. The space would deepen and enhance our senses to these element of nature. But this space would be nature in contemporary way, meaning there wont be actual natural element. I did not place things rationally but instead express all of the experiences in integrated way. Not only physically placing object in there but interns of our body senses to experience the thing as a whole.

It will be like entering another world, non pragmatic world disconnected to the pragmatic world, distorted by the reflecting sheet around the room, making it feel like infinity space.

The water you will find inside is the sound, inside the floor will be a water container where you step on it it will create pressure which would create wave of water that will create the sound of water. So when you move, you will hear the sound of water. Also the mist of cool air from above and the steam from the ground. It plays with sense of temperature. In the center of the space there will be a blob of jelly like material where you can meditate, sit, sleep. But this material will feel just like water. Whenever you move, your movement will reflect back to you making you understand more about your movement.

The next one is wood, this is simple, the hanging rope give the sense of walking in the wood. These rope represent a connection that connects you with the spirit above

Next is light, in the center of the room above will be where light can come in, in my personal chinese beliefs, it is meant to be the gate to heaven.

Earth is of course represented by the texture of the ground, soil has soft texture. It will be enhance using sponge so when you step on it it will just go in very deep. Also, the ground will be bumpy terrain representing the uneven of natural ground.

Last is air, of course we can't create wind, so instead i use temperature to mimic the process. Below will be hot air and above will be cold air, so hot air will rise, cool air will sink and replace hot air, creating cycle of wind in the space.

Also since i’ve said earlier about equilibrium, i’d like this space to consume little energy as much as possible so i added solar panel roof to be able to create their own electricity and be able to survive on their own.

All of these have been combined to create a space where people can escape from their outer world and enter their own world of nature, believe. It’s like having their own little contemporary wae rebo.

I’ve also create this mini experiential space where you are allowed to put your head in and experience a similar atmosphere

Wood like feeling

The light that shines from above

Creating water sound effect when moving and the smell of soil

[y3s1-20182019]

Phase 1 - Contextual Studies

An experiment on the material used as roof in the case study (Sugar Palm Leaves)