Detail
Students’ ideas about materials had begun to form early on through model making, drawing and from looking at built precedents. 146 И 47
Holly Newnham on the use of a storyboard to connect the ideas behind the project:
I had lost sight of the way that all my preliminary pieces of work together formed my concept. This allowed the visiting critics and fellow students to understand the proposal, as well as the reasoning behind it, and to give feedback. Combining the section and plan allowed me to arrange my seating and provided inspiration for the shape of the theatre. Design was interrogated at small scale (‘where should the entrance to the building be located?’) and large scale (‘what route will the audience take to arrive at the theatre?’). Each designer was encouraged to develop certain areas in more detail, focusing on those that were best understood and most closely related to the concept (for example, ‘in a project about light, how should the windows be designed?’). Through creating a storyboard of my process so far, I was able to link all my previous work together to home — in on the things that are important to my design and fill in the gaps where the communication of my process was unclear. There is no need to capture them, for the process and method leading to their conception can be observed in reverse. Design choices leave a trail of logic. lt was also important to learn that technology, which can be viewed as a constraint, also has the potential to generate architectural concepts. William Fisher on the use of orthographic drawings to study and resolve a detailed portion of the theatre:
The design project
Used the seat and stage models to produce a plan, by taking into account the depth of the stages, the angles they are placed at and how this affects the viewable area in which the audience can sit. Ideas are hard to capture in their fleeting moment. Ralph Saull on the difference between making early conceptual leaps and later considered design choices:
Pigeon steps and somersaults: design ideas feel to me like somersaults, a thrilling jump from A to B. At the interim review each student presented their process work (early sketch ideas and analysis) and orthographic drawings of their proposal to scale and in context. Students were encouraged to increase the complexity of their initial proposal. Making design choices can feel like taking tiny pigeon steps in comparison to having an idea, but in their combined outcome the thrill is found. Working in section, I then discover the angles required to view over the top of the seats in front.
