Something remarkable is happening this fall 2011 term with University of Oregon School of Architecture and Allied Arts students in Portland and Oregon College of Art and Craft students in the UO Architecture 4/584 Architectural Design course. Along with instructors, Nathan Clark Corser (AIA, LEED AP, Design Principal of IDC Architects), Karl Burkheimer (OCAC and head of that college’s Wood Department) and architects, Peter Anderson and Mark Anderson (Anderson & Anderson Architects, San Francisco, California) students participated in a completely hands-on building project from start to finish. This is a collaborative project….stay tuned. We just want to give you a preview of what has been happening on-site.
Here is the general course description to give some background information:
What is the place of Arts and Crafts in the 21st century? How can a school for craft better serve its faculty, students, visitors and patrons while projecting its mission and purpose to them and the broader community? The Oregon College of Arts and Crafts (OCAC) has initiated a tutorial class to address these questions. Those OCAC student’s charge is to investigate an architectural design/build methodology, informing a design practice with a hands on approach to making. AAA students in this studio will work in an interdisciplinary manner with the OCAC instructor and students joining together to envision and design a campus augmented and enhanced through the planning for new entries, pathways, new structures and future expansion(s). Within the context of an ambitious current master planning approach and recently completed signature buildings AAA and OCAC students will help define and refine the spatial quality, experience and character of this forested hillside campus. This investigation, design and building studio will be comprised of three primary components that we are inextricably linked together; 1) a site analysis and planning exercise looking to improve site entries, connectivity, place making and wayfinding; 2) a modular structures design and development component sufficient to demonstrate direct applicability to current and anticipated future programmatic needs at this site and, lastly; 3) full scale tectonic design and prototyping modeling and built assemblies sufficient to ascertain cost and substantiate constructability.
A model of the south-facing wall.On site at the Oregon College of Art and Craft.
