UN-MONUMENTAL PERMANENCE - THE NEW TORONTO WALDORF SCHOOL

Toronto Waldorf Center for Learning

UN-MONUMENTAL PERMANENCE [a second look]

To pick up where I left off:

Through the development of the first project "Un-Monumental Permanence" typology became a driving definition as a method for separating the undesired program constraints to a more refined and appropriate response to site in the context of the proposed ideas.

"One of the frequent arguments against typology views it as a "frozen mechanism" that denies change and emphasizes an almost automatic repetition. However, the very concept of type, as it has been proposed here, implies the idea of change, or of transformation"

- Rafael Moneo in Oppositions

Moneo's proposal is of a series of elements to work with opposed to the conventional view of typology. The context in which I am proposing architectural solutions builds off of this with a series of elements that are not only used to achieve a typology for the proposed project but in fact redefine the actual typology of the building. 

This has led me to a new statement of intent for the project as it appears below:

Architecture has been thought of and designed in theory as permanent objects in space; however in practice we see an expected lifespan of our buildings lasting less than one generation. Due to its ephemerality, architecture has developed to represent specific moments in time, ultimately disregarding the nature of time as a continuous network of progressing and changing systems. 

This raises the question, how can we design our buildings so that they can function through the progression of time by taking focus off of transient aspects of our buildings and solidify elements that redefine typologies and the appropriate proportions relating to specific typology i.e. appropriate scale? This would allow the form and continuously shifting programmatic elements to keep up with the changing aesthetics and technologies of architecture through the ability to design the cycles of the buildings birth, regeneration, and death.

Strategy 1:

Design buildings true to their typology, removing focus on the transience of program and placing focus on the buildings response to site and context. 

Strategy 2:

Establish elements that are central to the function of the typology, and redefine the typology to be these elements solidified in time and space.

Strategy 3:

Conceive a cycle with the form as one moment in the cycle that allows change in the program, materials, and mass throughout its birth, life, and death. 

These strategies maintain the original intent of the tri-connection between Sterlings sustainability through permanence, the counter proposal to Brands senario-buffering, and the Mau's concept of cycle design. However, the combination of this tri-connection points towards an approach to typology by its redefinition as elements.

Project 2

The following sketch are of an elementary school proposal based on the principles of the Waldorf education system.

Without getting into the details of the Waldorf philosophy (which I am still undecided on) the philosophy is based on a strong connection between Architecture and Pedagogy. The founder Rudolf Steiner defined a whole philosophical movement about the ways in which children should be taught and a schooling system that he believed reflected this through his architecture (I believe he was an architect). 

Working off of the principles of the Waldorf education model I have developed the following VERY QUICK sketches to start a discussion about the appropriateness of typology in the framework that I have established with my theoretical position. More information regarding the spatial organization of this schooling system will appear in subsequent posts and obviously the final presentation. 

The site is located at the current Swansea Jr. and Sr. Public school ground in Toronto ON. This project is proposing what "should" be there as an alternative to its existing condition. 

The main building would locate science rooms overlooking the forest park with connecting paths into the forest and ultimately connecting to High Park to the East. 

What is not shown explicitly in these sketches are the "elements of permanence" manifesting as 8 rooms for thinking located around the building perimeter. An element of material differentiation would be evident in the resolved solution. 

Please post your thoughts, comments, insights and plot holes for the narrative as it exists currently. 

As always, thanks for reading!

Density and Voids

Just adding to the resources here. For those of you dealing with Density and Voids within an urban context the A+T book "Why Density" may be a good resource. I haven't had a chance to look through it but if you come across a copy somewhere A+T usually publishes useful references. 

UN-MONUMENTAL PERMANENCE

Building with Permanence: Sketches 1

Long over due: 
Here are the first sketches relating to the concepts expressed in my last post. 

The core or "soul" of a house. A hearth, and its structure.

Set in a house formed by the application of standardized panels (interlocking SIP)

When overlaid the potential for an evolution or destruction of the form can occur without the removal of the core or "soul" of the home. 

Building with Permanence

"When we build let us think that we build forever.
Let it not be for present delight or present use alone, but let it be such work our
descendants will thank us for."

- John Ruskin in the Lamp of Memory

Architecture has been thought of and designed in theory as permanent objects in space however; in practice we see an expected lifespan of less than a generation.

Due to its ephemerality, architecture has developed to represent specific moments in time ultimately disregarding the nature of time as a continuous network of progressing and changing systems.

“Sustainable practices navigate successfully through time and space, while others crack up and vanish. So basically, the sustainable is about time – time and space.”

- Bruce Sterling in The Last Viridian Note.