UNSW Built Environment Architectural Studies: Derek Georgeson

So the semester is almost over, and it’s been a fairly busy one. I’ve been doing some work experience with an architectural firm two days a week. It has been great to get some feel of what the field will actually feel like. The positives I’ve found are that the work is busy – I never have nothing to do, and that it can be as slow or as fast as you please (unless there is a deadline due) at which point the office ramps up a bit for the week. The lead designer has become my mentor and encourages me to try different things, but he has a design sensibility which kerbs my works to always look good. This is some of the rendering work I’ve done for them… This particular work isn’t aiming for photo realism but more to convey a sense of lifestyle and place, particularly for the cold Sydney mornings we are currently feeling.

Within the design studio we are having a bit more of an abstract semester. The first projects led us to look at a series of Villa’s from the Modernists and Post-Modernists. The aim was to analyse what made those designers tick and work out the driving force behind these inspirational works. Following that exercise was a design segment where we used famous paintings to create narratives, and then form a series of internal spaces based around those narratives. My own work revolved around madness, reality and journey. Shown here is an axonometric of my work and then a view of one of the rooms contained within the spiralling staircase:

On the side I have a series of General Education courses which have me learning about science, religion, science fiction and everything in between. They are interesting and fairly engaging so I can’t complain too much about them. And finally, I am taking a history course, which is exceptional in its range of learning and helping me understand and value works of architecture, particularly renewing my view of Sydney and Melbourne, using a historical pretext to look at various Classical styled buildings. Part of the course involves going to places around Sydney and sketching them so I thought I’d throw in a sketch I did of the NSW Lands Department building, design by James Barnet:

Outside of uni my Taido grading is coming up soon, I just had my 21st birthday so that was a pretty memorable night, and I’ve been going to various exhibitions including the first ever Sydney Readers Festival, and if the weather clears up I plan to spend this weekend looking at the 17th Sydney Biennale. These are great fun to go to with architecture friends as we can talk about the work from what we know, or just trash the work for fun.

UNSW Built Environment Industrial Design: Samuel Adeloju – Australian Design Award Silver Medalist

Last Friday night three recent graduates of the UNSW Industrial Design Program were lucky enough to be invited to the Australian design  community’s night of nights, the Australian International Design Awards. As one of these fortunate graduates, I was lucky enough to be rubbing shoulders with designers of some of the latest and greatest new products designed by Australian companies and design houses.

As a finalist in the Student Design category, sponsored by James Dyson and Dyson Australia, it was a privilege to be involved in the awards and the media coverage that came with it. We have all been featured in articles in the Sydney Morning Herald and on Channel Seven’s Today Tonight and I am confident that this exposure and encouragement will ensure that we all continue our passion for design and innovation.

My product, The Longreach Water Rescue System, was awarded the Silver Medal for the Student Category. Longreach, is a man-portable system that allows for the rapid conveyance of temporary, water-activated buoyancy devices to a drowning victim’s location. It is designed to allow a victim to remain buoyant while rescue personnel prepare the appropriate response to the situation. The rescue package uses hydrophobic or rapidly expanding foam to provide buoyancy once the package contacts the water. This allows the package to be vastly smaller in size than any currently existing buoyancy device. Equipped with a light for attracting attention the Rescue Package can be propelled over 150m. Longreach is also equipped with Para-Flares for night-time Illumination. Longreach is designed to be simple to manufacture and easy to handle. Ideally used by emergency services personnel or a ship’s crew, Longreach has the potential to significantly reduce the number of drownings at sea.

At the awards night, I met a number of my peers from across the country. It was great to see the passion that we shared for design and problem solving and it was great to be able to quiz people about their unique and interesting designs. It was also good to see people who were not familiar with the awards or our designs, coming up to ask questions about their functions, construction and benefits.

I was also approached by a researcher from the ABC TV show, the NEW INVENTORS, who has arranged for Longreach to appear in an upcoming episode of the show. As I work towards getting Longreach ready for production and explore different opportunities for my product, all the media and industry encouragement I have received reaffirms my belief that Longreach has the possibility to greatly benefit the wider community. In the mean time I know that there is a long way to go, but that this big kick-start that I have been given is not to be taken lightly and will not be wasted.

Hopefully you will see Longreach on New Inventors soon, and in production soon after that.

Man with Launcher Launching Device

UNSW Built Environment Industrial Design: Sascha Dal Santo

Hi everyone!

I wasn’t lying when I ended my last blog post by saying this session is going to be a crazy, busy, non-stop-work session – think that’s just an understatement!

So far this session, we’ve been entering a few design competitions as part of our submissions for our studio design work. We were lucky enough to get involved with the 2010 Electrolux Design Lab, in which we had to design a kitchen or washing appliance for small living spaces for the year 2050.

I focused on cooking with my project, in which I designed a compact kitchen which contained all the necessary and imperative kitchen supplies.

It was a very full-on project but still fun at the same time, as we got to go as creative as we could think in terms of picturing how we will live in 2050.

Final Presentation for 2010 Electrolux Design Lab

Consumer Insight Identification – 2010 Electrolux Design Lab

Final Presentation for 2010 Electrolux Design Lab

We’ve also been pretty busy with our final year research reports, spending a lot of time researching our project topic areas and developing concepts on what we may produce for our final Industrial Design Major Project.

Overall, this session has just been crazy busy – many apologies to anyone who runs into a stressed Industrial Design student!

UNSW Built Environment Landscape Architecture: Riley Field

Hi all…

The second half of the semester has become slightly more intense and I’m finding I’m not so much sleeping like a baby anymore. Design studio has really bumped up a notch.  It is one thing to analyze existing site conditions as we did for the first part, now using this information to inform design process is something slightly trickier. I think group work is a great experience and really does test people. It can become very interesting at times, especially in design where it is so individual and opinionative. Nether the less it’s all about preparation for non uni life. Some amazing work has been produced, as we reach the final stages of the design process you can see different group ideals coming through strongly in their work. It is evident that every group has a different spin on what has been initially proposed.

I think everyone is looking forward to the break, hopefully it will give me some time to write a significant chunk of my thesis. After the break we have our trivia night which will raise funds for our graduation exhibition. I urge you all to get involved, would be a good chance to mix with the other years and a number of professionals from the industry. Look out for the invites!

Attached are a few pics from studio, which shows a few good looking Landscape Architect students deep in thought a week before the interim review. Good times…

UNSW Built Environment Architectural Computing: Nikolina Borak

Half way through this semester and ready to pull my hair out but there is only another half and another five assignments to go. The second half is always easier because you have become comfortable with your subjects and you now know what is expected from you. My Digital Collaboration Studio class is the most stressful but also the most insightful. The image below is just from one of the assignments that needed to be completed, we had to remodel the UNSW campus and then place our models in a gaming engine to be able to walk through our buildings in real time.

New College Village (Postgrad Housing) UNSW

My other classes are going steady, my Textiles in Interior Architecture class is all about how textiles can be used in design and the importance of textiles in interiors. Multimedia in Design Presentation’s final assignment is group work but it is interesting to work with people that are not in my course because I am able to learn things about other courses.

Looking forward to enrolling  for my graduation project next semester but before going too far ahead of myself I am looking forward to going on an Europe trip for end of semester break to calm my nerves ad prepare myself for the most important semester in my course.

UNSW Built Environment Architectural Studies: Patrick Griffen

Over the summer break I participated in an elective design studio called ‘Project X3‘, which was basically a multidisciplinary design workshop. It was an intensive 2 week course where I was working in a team of students from various degrees, from UNSW Built Environment, COFA, and Engineering. We worked together to design an accommodation facility for a rock climbing company in China; ‘China Climb’ in groups of 5 or 6. I found the experience of working with interior architects, engineers and industrial designers interesting, challenging and a great way to get some experience in collaborative design. Out of the 7 designs presented to the client, ours was chosen to be carried to the next stage of design fabrication and construction. Hopefully the project will be built sometime in the next year or two.

Project X3

With a little break between my summer courses and Semester 1, I began the 3rd year of my degree. This session my subjects include a design studio, an environment course and modelling visualisation course. The design studio this session involves designing an apartment/restaurant complex on a site in North Bondi beach. I’ve spent the first few weeks analysing the site and considering the factors that will influence the outcome of the design process such as views, solar access etc. The work load is quite demanding and there is also a much higher expectation of quality in our work.  At this stage I’ve made a series of design models outlining my current progress.

Another subject I’ve been working hard at is ‘Design Modelling and Visualisation‘  which focuses on of communicating designs through mediums such as computer rendered images. I’ve been learning how to use the software ’3Ds Max’ to render photo-realistic scenes, which includes modelling objects or buildings then calibrating colour, texture, materials and lighting. The result is a visually impressive looking image which can sometimes be difficult to distinguish from a photograph (if it is a good render). I plan to use the skills I’ve gained in this course in my design courses to present my ideas.

Between huge assignments, I’ve been going surfing and continuing to enjoy the lifestyle of living on campus. There’s a lot more work to come, 3rd year is really interesting so far, but also really intense.

UNSW Built Environment Alumni: Minu Lee in Korea

I must admit, coming to Korea has been one of the biggest transformations to date.

Last month in Seoul was the coldest in 100 years and this month was the worst in 40 years, crazy stats.

It wasn’t all weather though. Coming to a new country, new university, new home, have all contributed to a brand new experience.

Apartment living is the norm here, where house means apartment. I live on the 11th floor at the southern part of Seoul, a metropolitan city that is divided by a long river (Han river) that stretches east to west, out onto the Yellow Sea. The house is obviously smaller than what I had back in Pymble, no corridors, no rumpus, no separate dining room, smaller kitchen and smaller room; but I seemingly had no problems at all adjusting to my new home. The fact that I no longer have my brother next to me probably played a big factor in adapting to a smaller house. He is back in Sydney, working during the day and doing the masters program at night.

Poor bro. It’s the first time he’s been on his own now that my parents are back in Seoul with me. As much as I consider myself lucky in that respect, I still don’t get to see them a lot throughout the day. This leads me on to my university life

The masters program in architecture at Seoul National University requires students to be at the university every working day from 10am till 6pm. It is very rare for me to leave at 6pm due to ongoing projects that I am part of. With regular seminars and design studio finishing late, I would get home around 10-11 most nights.

10 academics majoring in architecture each have their own research lab with distinct specialisations; architectural design, history and theory, Korean traditional architecture, environmental sustainability, urban design, architectural urban space and so on. I applied for a professor who runs the research lab called ‘Lab for Architectural Urban Space‘.

The lab has 20 researchers including masters and PhD students and is the second biggest lab in terms of research works and members. The lab was established in 1999 and conducts researches into spatial analysis, interpretation of architectural and urban space from social and cultural perspectives, and design and maintenance of educational facilities.

I’m only touching the surface at this stage; using the visual access and exposure model to analyse different types of space, learning to read and understand axial maps and so on. Looking into a more quantitative side of analysis into architecture and urban design is interesting also.

In all, the masters program, for me, consists of 3 separate works. First are the courses that I have to take each semester, as I have done throughout my time at UNSW. This includes a design studio, and two other faculty electives. Second is a study that I have to do on my own, related to space syntax, as well as other researches related to the field. The outcome of this study is a written thesis at the end of the program.

Third work is what I have spent most of my time on since I started the semester. It’s essentially carrying out the projects that my professor gets, as a team. There are 5 different projects running at the moment, and my team was allocated to work on organising an international design competition for a new social housing complex in Seoul. Some projects that the lab gets relate to the realm of spatial analysis and some don’t. This project obviously has no relation as it is about starting up the competition, organising briefs, setting guidelines, hosting design presentations, inviting external jurors, participants and so on.

The project is in collaboration with the government so the load is not as heavy as it sounds. As the only member of the lab to speak decent English, my main role is to translate the competition documents, organise QnA sessions, and communicate with overseas jurors and participants through mail and phone. As well as the domestic competitors, overseas participants for this competition are Riken Yamamoto from Japan, Architekten Cie and MVRDV from the Netherlands.

I have had quite a few experiences working part time back in Sydney, but working on something of this magnitude is definitely new and exciting. The work is fun as I get a chance to practice my Korean, and get paid for it at the same time!! It’s not a lot, but enough to make up a big portion of my university fee.

I am looking forward to working on other projects later on that would especially help my portfolio.

One thing I was quite surprised at was the amount of exposure that this university gets from overseas. I was going through some of the projects conducted by this lab previously and came across Jon Lang’s profile. He was here last year as an external panel for another housing competition in Korea.
Last week I was asked by the Korean Architectural Accrediting Board to go to the airport to greet Paul Berkemeier who arrived here few days ago to oversee the architectural education system as well as the accrediting board. I knew him as an architect but didn’t realise he taught at UNSW, so I was pleasantly surprised. We had a long chat from the airport to the hotel where I was supposed to check him in and it was great fun. It has been a while since I spoke to someone who can speak Australian, and not in broken American accent which seems to be the norm here so thumbs up!

The photos I attached are of Seoul National University, which is situated on a mountain within the metropolitan. Department of Architecture (building 39), which as part of the engineering faculty, is situated on the higher part of the mountain so it’s chillier than downtown Seoul, but has great scenery and better air quality.   You can see my lab and the desktop image on my computer which shows how much I miss home, despite all the fun I’m having here.

UNSW Built Environment Landscape Architecture: Riley Field

Hey everyone.

My names Riley, I’m currently in my last year of the Landscape Architecture degree. I suppose for all the young ens coming up through the ranks everyone has warned you of how tough it gets. I won’t lie, it does get pretty tough but at the same time it isn’t as bad as people make it out to be. Yes, I am sleeping, like a baby. Then again I guess I’m more relaxed about it than some others. Not to mention any names…Ali.

The last four weeks have been actually really interesting. We had a field trip in our second week down to the nations capital. Professor  James Weirick’s lectures were truly inspiring to say the least, and I never realised the complexity underpinning the design of Canberra. We worked hard throughout the day, spotting kangaroos, breaking down barriers and tress passing into various sites followed by class bonding sessions at night in the lovely Canberra Motor Inn.

We returned, some with a greater knowledge and appreciation of Canberra and the Griffen legacy, others with a headache but some great memories. We are now putting our knowledge and our own critical thinking to the test. The class is  working as a whole to cover the vast amount of information needed to design a master plan. Every group is researching a different topic to combine what is a mass bundle of information. Together we are covering every base. Everyone depends on each other which is great to see and makes 4th year a whole lot easier.

At the moment I’m thoroughly enjoying forth year and look forward to the challenges to come, for the mean time anyway.

UNSW Built Environment Architectural Studies: Derek Georgeson

Wow, another summer come and gone. Every year I get up to more and more so the days go faster and faster, so that when I get back to uni life just seems to slow down completely when the lecturer tells you when your first assessment is due.

Over summer I got a job with an architecture firm. I did some work experience one or two days a week for the second semester last year, and was pretty happy just hanging around the office helping out with this and that, but then they gave me a call on my holidays and said they needed a hand with a presentation and that they would pay me to work full time for them. It wasn’t expected, but a wonderful surprise. So a few weeks of my uni holidays I was a 9-5 kinda guy but that was cool because my boss was really helpful, talking me through anything that I didn’t know how to do, and keeping me on my toes by giving me a chance to try things myself first.

Now I’m back at uni and get to look forward to design studios and history. Architectural History and Theory is actually really interesting because right now we’re looking at buildings in Sydney and the historical backgrounds which made them what they are. Its wonderful because I can now walk around the city and look at buildings that I previously didn’t even notice and now I see them and actually look at the little details that make them what they are.

The design studio so far is a precedent analysis. It might sound kind of dull but its really useful and interesting. Trying to work out what the original ideas behind a building were feels a little abstract, but once you’re in the mindset it makes sense. All architecture had an original idea behind it, there was some thought process that took place for the building to become what it is, so working backwards is pretty amazing, trying to interpret drawings to distill what they were inspired by.

Looks to be a good semester!

UNSW Built Environment Master of Architecture: Boris To

Over the last summer break, I engaged myself with a 4 week intensive design studio. The purpose for undertaking the elective was to put my research findings from my last year’s Honours dissertation into experimentation (a process also known as research through design). The brief was very open. It asked us to design a pavilion for the Sydney Biennale 2010. I chose a derelict military guardhouse from the 1800s on Cockatoo island as my site.

Through this design, I explored how an architectural intervention has the capacity to address cultural history, notions of collective memory and memorialisation. The outcome was a landscape intervention of the ruins, celebrating the original geographical conditions of the island and works of the penal settlement. This is also achieved through the sculptural roof that interacts with the macro-climate, inducing experiences that recalls the ghost of the island’s natural landscape. I think this scheme is interesting in that the intervention is also a memorial, which is a form of public art. This demonstrates the capacity of architecture as public art while being a container of art. I am planning to further explore these architectural issues in the my Masters studies.