Final Project

     The final project was about redesigning an old Pullman train depot to a space that is divided into three parts—the gallery, the studio and the residence. It was an adaptive reuse project and the new space was designed for an artist whose spouse has visual impairments. As a result, the residence area was specifically designed for people who have visual impairments. My project title is “transient eternity”, which is also my concept for the whole project. The final project was not an independent project, instead, it was a cumulative project that related back to works that I have done for the whole semester. All the projects are connected and they involved processes of exploring, building, finding, solving and so on. Also, the processes contained a lot of components and the components I found really impressive were the inspiration object, parti development, concept model, gallery design and space plan.

     

     First of the all, the experiences of finding the inspiration was interesting and occasional. The images I took from my first visit to the depot were not really meaningful so I went the depot again to seek more inspiration. Luckily, the climate got colder and there were icicles on the eaves and trains. At the end, I took an image about icicles across the skin of the train (image 1) and I felt there were lots of potential shapes for me to explore. What I learned from this process was keep exploring. The result would come to surprise you if you put more efforts.

    Image 1

Secondly, the process of creating my parti was a struggling part for me. I took the elements and principle from the inspiration image and draw them out. I tried to use different angles or view to make something meaningful, but the results were not satisfying.  So I kept trying and I finally got one that communicates the most (image 2) as it formed contrasts of the colors and also the movement (icicle: stable vs train: moving).My concept--transient eternity was pulled out at that time.  During that process, I think my abstract thinking has improved during this process. In addition, I learned how to simplify something first and putting meanings after.

 Image 2

Next was the concept model. It was the component that I enjoyed the most. I incorporated new colors into my design—yellow and blue since yellow could psychologically represent the “transient” part and blue could psychologically represent the “eternity” part. I followed this idea and I built my concept model. (image 3). Randomly tore yellow pieces and smooth long blue strips were used for my model. The plastic stripe was there to represent the idea of icicles. I love the process of building the concept model, I felt I got more used to abstract thinking and I knew how to achieve my concept by using different aspects or angles.

 Image 3

The process of designing my gallery space was the most challenging but also the most enjoyable part. I needed to incorporate my concept into my gallery space and I did not want to just stay on the aspect of colors. As result, I need to come up with a new aspect of my concept, which was the most challenging part. I felt I was stuck at that time but luckily, I got the idea of water. Water keeps changing among its three states ---solid, liquid and the gas. It keeps changing but the changing exists forever, I felt the idea related back to my concept---transient eternity. . After I figured out the idea, it was really enjoyable to incorporate it into my gallery space. I used the cloud shaped reception desk and lights, the water floor and the transparent glass to represent the three states of water (image 4). What I learned from this process was how to appropriately come up with new ideas without getting too much.

 Image 4

Finally, it was another challenge for me to properly plan the space. Since it was an adaptive reuse project, so I should kept as many existing walls as I can. In addition, the wall around the ticket windows and the stair can’t be moved.  All those requirements formed a trick challenge for me and I also needed to pay attentions to the aesthetics. Happily, I figured the plan out by keeping the requirements in mind and examining it again and again (image 5). The result was satisfying.  This was part I felt I leaned the most. I had some understandings and experience of how to design a space reasonably, properly and also creatively.  

 Image 5

     Generally speaking, throughout this semester, I felt my skills and knowledge have improved and I began to have a clearer idea about what an interior designer should have in order to be capable and competent. In the further, I will keep trying and building in order to be professional.

STIR Competition

The project is about redesigning an old train depot to a gallery space for a fused glass artist called Louise Colson. The inspiration image is about icicles going across the skin of train. It forms a contrast since icicles are stable and the train is supposed to be moving. Then the concept—“transient eternity” is pulled out.

Blue and yellow then being chosen to use into the gallery space because psychologically, yellow is a color that will make people feel fatigued and tired, so it represents “transient” On the other hand, blue is a color that will make people feel calm and peaceful, so it is being chosen to represent the “eternity”. For the color applications throughout the space, Solaria and Belize are chosen based on the hues of yellow and blue. Despite of the psychological meanings, they are used in the display walls in order to provide light backgrounds to art works. Georgian Bay is also chosen based on the blue hue and it is used in the special display room to specially emphasizing the work of art. The bright white is chosen for the ceiling to add more lightness. It also carries a sense of eternity which related back to the concept. The Study brown is used on the wall that divides the special display room to make contrast to those light colors and also to make the space more realistic. It helps to reduce the lightness and also to increase the warmth. All the colors are chosen to help creating a comfortable circumstance for people to move around. Moreover, in order to incorporate the concept into the space furtherer, there are cloud lights on the ceiling, water flows under the floor and transparent glass wall in flow shape in space. Those represent the cycle of water---gas, liquid and solid. Because water keeps changing among these three states but the change exists forever, the concept—“transient eternity” is shown.

The process of creating renderings for STIR was really helpful and I feel I got some improvements on both perspective skills and rendering skills. After all, the experience was really valuable.

                                                                  Poster for STIR

Art Museum Experience

   I visited the Getty Center in Los Angeloes. There are a lot of collections such like painting and drawings from the Middle Ages to the Impressionist period, 19th American and European photographs, contemporary and modern outdoor sculptures and more. The exhibition I focused on was the sculptures from Europe. The approximate square footage of the space is about 4800 square foot and it is divided into three smaller spaces. Pedestals are used to display those sculptures.There are different materials of pedestals such like marble, wood and bronze and the heights of the pedestals are also varied depends on the heights of the sculptures.There are louvers on the ceiling, which help to bring in natural lights and LEDs are surrounded by the louvers to support the display of artwork. The observers are directed to walk around through the big openings, material changes of floor (marble-wood). In additional,I found that the walls that backed up with the artworks were interesting. It looks like polished gray concrete, but it is not totally gray. There some dark grays blended together to create kind of blurry feelings and I think that works very well by helping to emphasize the beauty of artworks.Moreover, there are rounded sofas in the center of spaces for people to rest without blocking the views to the artwork.

 

(Louvers, LED around and blurry walls)

(Wood Pedestals)

(Rounded sofa in the center of the space)

(Beautiful view in the Getty Center)

Vision disability ability workshop

     The vision disability workshop I did was really interesting and helps me to understand people with low visions better. The first activity I did was looking through the two layers of plastic which represents 20/60 vision. When I looked the newspaper through the two layers of plastic, though I can’t read the words very clearly, I could still tell some overall shapes and colors. However, when I used the four layers of plastic, it was just all white with very obscure and blurry colors. 
     When I experienced with the simulator tool, my observations are except the totally blind one, I could still read some words from the other three kinds of vision loss, even though not very smoothly. 

(Totally Blind)

     Then I wear a sunglasses with a lot of glue on its glass and I began to walk around. I tried to walk up the library stairs and though I could feel the steps by foot but when I took a look at the stairs, it was just a whole white stripe without any gradient. When I experienced with the elevator, it was hard for me to push the floor button and I ended up push all buttons and the elevator stopped every floor. The stairs in CUB was easier to use compared to the stair in library since there are color contrasts to inform me where steps start and end. Then I went to the Bank of America ATM machine, the location for the card swipe and the key-pad were found easily since there are red lights near the card swipe and I could touch and feel where the key-pad located. Mostly, because I used this machine a lot, so the familiarity helped. There is one more thing I want to mention is natural light was always very noticeable, it appears light blue and I could easily tell it. Generally speaking, everything seems blended together when I wear that glass and I begin to have a general sense of how people with low vision live, work and behavior. I will incorporate those observations in my future design to help people with low visions live better and more comfortable.

Examples of colors and shapes blended together:

 

Concept Development

 Overall, the process of the concept development was really educational, inspirational, and interesting. The concept development was made for the project which is re-purpose the old depot to a new building which will has three parts of space---residence, studio and the gallery. First of all, I went to the depot to take the inspiration picture and I ended up using the picture I took (show below image 1) from the layer of the train because there are icicles going down the train, creating lots of different layer and angles. Then I started exploring different patterns from the inspiration. I mainly focused on the color contrast that icicles created for the colors of the train. As showed in the image 2, I ended up using the patterns that I taken from the portion of the person’s hat. It is not only because there are color contrasts, but also the curved lines. I felt there are kind of movements going on and at this stage, I suddenly catch another phrase---transient eternity. I got this phrase because icicles are stable while trains are supposed to be moving. That forms a contrast in another way.  After that I incorporated different color scheme into my parti, I finally decided to use the blue and yellow because psychologically, yellow is a color that is most fatiguing to the eye and it gives a feeling of frustration and anger, so it could represent the “transient” part. Blue is used to represent the “eternity” part, because it conveys a feeling of calmness, serenity and tranquil. After I decided the color, I enlarged, resized, rotated the parti to create the movement for the textile (image 4). Those movements also help to create a sense of eternity like it goes forever. At the final stage, I made the model (image 5). I randomly tore some yellow pieces and also tore their first layers to make them look rough. I glued them together non-directionally to create different angels and versions. Those yellow pieces are representing the transient part. The long and smooth blue pieces are glued around those yellow pieces to ease the stress of yellow. Those blue pieces are slightly curved. The blue is functioned to give a sense of wave and eternity. The the plastic stripe us add through to bring the idea of transparency of icicles and it also kind of functions as cohesion to make the model looks like a whole.

Generally speaking, the concept development was really helpful for me and I felt I’ve grown from last semester. I could picture patterns more abstractly and I could also transform the abstraction back tangibility. I felt I gain a lot through this development both academically and psychologically.

Image 1 (Inspiration Picture)

Image 2 (Inspiration Object Analysis Sheet)

Image 3 (Final Parti)

Image 4 (Textile)

Image 5(Final Model)

Contextual Investigation

     My case study topic was the history of railroad in the west, and depot design in the US. Firstly, I got together with another team who were doing the same topic as me and we each decided a different depot for latter research. I was doing the Union Depot in Lewiston, Idaho. Then, I did some research about this depot including its material, its overall design, its adaptive re-use and I also investigated the railroad that depot used to serve. After that, I put all of the information together and came up with the poster. During the process, I felt that my skills of gathering information had improved. There were not a lot information about the depot online and I had to check every link in order to get those small details. I don’ think my strength had shown in the project, instead, my weaknesses has shown. I think my skills of creating a poster still have room to improve. My poster layout looks plain and not very strong. I should practice more and look for more examples.

     Generally speaking, I think I did well in this project. I could handle problems by myself even though my teammate was absent and I am glad that I went through the processes successfully.

Habitat for Humanity Project

     The project was designed a house for Habitat for Humanity. It was a two stories building with very limited room. So, it was kind of hard and my teammates and I did a lot of modifications to make the space properly and comfortable. Overall speaking, the final result of the project came out pleasing. My teammates and I tried our best and the final poster looked nice. That is the successful part of the project. However, there are still some parts that still need to improve. For example, the team needs more communications on the division of tasks. Every teammate should do the equal works.

     We did a lot of processes works for developing this project. We did the client interview and asked a lot questions about how to planning the space to make it suitable for the family to live. The general principle for designing a Habitat for Humanity’s house is “durable, affordable and sustainable”, so our questions were basically around there three words. Then we did the site visit to make the sure the house is fit to the neighborhood and we then began our drafting works. We did the floor plan, front elevation and perspective drawings and then inked and rendered them and finally the poster came out.

     During the project, I felt my rendering skills had improved and I think my strengths were drafting the perspective drawings and making the poster. My weaknesses were space planning, I was poor at planning the space with that limited room. My goal for my future project is to practice more space planning works and I really should get familiar with the measurements.  For example, like what’s the minimum size for a bedroom or a bathroom. I should memorize all those dimensions.

     Generally speaking, I really put my efforts into this project and I think I did pretty well. In the future, I will try something I am not good at instead of always doing the things I am familiar with. I should push myself and make some challenges. I hope I could become a professional and comprehensive designer when I grow older.

     

First Floor

 Second Floor