Thesis Document

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• Nancy Cheng

  December 27, 2010 at 6:40 pm · Reply

  Daphne, I was really glad to see your effort on your thesis report. It is well organized with appealing graphics. I liked how you define a clear purpose for your building. Your last sentence of the thesis section is the key. You could emphasize upfront that your building “has the potential to instill a knowledge of food, nutrition and sustainability”. Small typo: *they food that they bring home” should be “the food that they bring home”.

  SITE: If you further refine your site diagrams, they could help you be more insightful about starting your design. The figure ground is a good start to show the change of texture between industrial and residential fabric. Can you explain the asset of the industrial adjacency versus a more residential location: is the freight (rail line?) important.

  Think about extracting layers of information that can be used in considering and presenting your design: tree canopy, water drainage.
  I would do some of diagrams at an enlarged scale: Building Types & Access (locating the bus stops and transit lines (from Trimet), barriers, one-way streets.) Perhaps you can use Microsoft Bing’s tilted bird’s eye to create an axon of the massing.

  Glad you have found the Zoning relevant to the site. What do the boundaries of the zoning areas tell you about the neighborhood? Your text makes me curious with what kind of infill development would be “similar in character”, “compatible with the neighborhood and enhance the area”. What aspects of the existing fabric would you want to respect? (i.e. setback, massing, entrance transition patterns, roof profiles, etc. Are there some buildings in Portland metro area that provide design cues for how to create a contemporary building in a humble fabric?

  PROGRAM: Components make sense, descriptions are colorful. Could you create character profiles of the major stakeholders?
  Please split out the number of units (i.e. 8 offices @ 120, etc) and include support areas (restrooms, storage, service access, parking, etc.) Is the restaurant kitchen the same as the demonstration kitchen?

  PRECEDENTS: I find the examples visually appealing. The Mobile Food Collective is especially interesting as a concept. What aspects would your building share with it. I am very curious whether the Gary Comer Youth Center garden works well: the circulation paths don’t really look like they would hold a wheelbarrow, there doesn’t really seem to be a dirty support area for tools, bags of compost, etc.

  Please add a Bibliography, noting how key works are shaping your thinking.

  Thanks for your serious effort this term. We look forward to how you can translate this into your project.

  – Nancy