John K. Sasse

“Architecture is involved with the world, but at the same time it has a certain au-tonomy. Th is autonomy cannot be ex-plained in terms of traditional logic because the most interesting parts of the work are non-verbal. Th ey operate within the terms of the work, like any art.”

-Th om Mayne

“I am not only a thing, but also a way of be-ing-one of many ways- and knowing the paths I have followed and the ones left to take will help me understand what I am becoming.”

- Daniel Keyes

614 Georgia AveSignal Mtn, TN 37377

sasse.john@gmail.com | 423.580.4916

Architecture Portfolio

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Solar Decathalon - Washington DC

Vol Terrace - Knoxville, TN

Mixed Use Building - Nashville, TN

VW Pedestrian Bridge - Chattanooga, TN

Prefabricated Housing Units - Knoxvile, TN

Traveling | Work Crews

01Spring 2009 - Forth YearProfessor Rose

Solar Decathalonin partner with Jacob Boner, Liz Bronson, Ashley Reddington and Heather Houser-

Washington DC

Th e Solar Decathalon project was research to help the University of Tennessee learn about the competition. Th is was more information for the library of knowledge for design. Th is helped in the process of entering the Solar Decathlon. Th is project was an inter-school studio with forth year interior design students.

Th e project revolves around designing a eight hundred square foot home that re-lys on solar energy powering the whole house. Th e Department of Energy is on the of the main sponsers of the competition.

Th e semester was broken into two halves. Th e fi rst half was done individually and six partis were chosen to go foward in a team situation. My design was chosen to move forward. I had a focus in creating a mass produced product. Th ere would be a kit of parts catalog that could put a home together. I was designing for a house that does not function as the So-lar Decathlon house by itself. Th e whole hosue could be shipped on semi-tractor trailer truck.

Th e project was small enough to be able to focus on everything from the large scale to the small details. Th e millwork and interi-ors were developed to refl ect the fi ne wood box contrasting the harsh metal cladding.

Th ere was a central hallway spine that the liv-ingable, service, and decks could attach too. I took a diff erent approach to the solar panel; I decided to show them off as a design tool rather than hid them on the roof. Th e solar panels have diff erent opacities to discouarge blocknig out views. I designd a clear service vs living spaces that are seprarted by the hallway spine.

Kalwall filled with Nanogel 3” Kawneer Horizontal Glazing

Suntech PV Glass 10% Transparency

Sun Power 225 PV Panel

Kawneer Outswing AA900 Computer Controlled

Double Seal - Rubber Gasket

Single Bulb LED Strip Lighting

EPDM Roofing Membrane

Hook and Metal Cord Connection of Wood Panels

3 x 3 x 1/4 HSS Door Header

Exterior Door for Storage Room

Down Lighting under Cabinets:Light Bright Units

Stainless Steel Tile - 2” x 8” x 1/16”

Double Seal - Rubber Gasket

Magnetic Catch Cabinet Hardware: Sugatsune

14” x 7” Metal Ducts

3 x 6 x 1/4 HSS Structural Beam

Adjustable Piermyd

Metal Sill Plate

Sheet Metal

3/4 x 2 C - Channel

Wood Sill

02 Fall 2009- Fifth YearProfessor Davis

Volunteer Terrace

Knoxville, TN

Th e vision of any campus today is to have a united, fully interacting campus. Today there is a disconnect that happens between commuter students and on-campus students. Parking Lot 9 on the University of Tennesse Campus is the current site that is in despite need to be designed. Vol Park Center becomes that solu-tion, which can be used as a unifying piece to bring together this campus . Th e opportunity here is one of both built structure and built landscape. Th e students and faculty both need a place of identity that they can call their own.

A great opportunity arises here at the site be-cause of the foot traffi c that happens here as well as the bus system connection here. Th e campus has a disconnect feel as you move from living vs academia. So, with that be-ing the case UTK needs a building that the students, faculty, and perspective students can be proud to see everyday. Th e Uni-versity needs a building that starts bringstudents back to the middle of campus.

Th e site combines multiple diff erent program elements and users in one spot. Th ere needs to be a system of juxtaposing programmatic elements. Th is site proposing a new kind of university campus that does not shy away from combining multiple elements into one build-ing. A new look of academia brings a com-munity of peers onto the site. Students, visi-tors, and faculty, individually focused uniting on the campus of the University of Tennessee.

Culinary Arts School:

Th e Culinary Arts School needs to be upgraded into a visible and viable major at this school.

Th e Campus Experimental Eating Node (CEEN):

Th is will be the major node for eating on the academic side of campus. Th e CEEN’s schedule will promote a late night eating centre along with the typical times.

Volunteer Intelligence Area:

Th e VIA will be a centrally located leadership centre serving the campus and visitors. A signifi cant part of this element will be the apartments to live in on this centrally located site.

Volunteer Park:

A space outside is vital to a success-ful campus. Th e park will encourage people to be a part of the site and use the space like it should be used. Volunteer Park will take advantage of the typical outside spaces as well as the spaces created throughout the program elements.

03Fall 2007 - Th ird YearProfessor Overton

Mixed Use Building

Nashville, TN

Th e project for this semester focused on ur-ban design. Th is is the fi rst project in my ar-chitecture schooling that dealt with the urban setting. Each student was given a diff erent site in downtown Nashville. Th e sites were picked in order to help densify the downtown.

My site was located at the foot of the Ten-nessee Tower. I had the unique opportunity in building a project that had a skyscrapper backdrop to the project. Th e problem was the Tennessee Tower was pulled way off the street and left no defi nite edge. Th ere was a great apportunity to design a project that took advantage of the views from the site.

Th e building was a mixed used project that had public commercial space, meeting spac-es, and art galleries juxtaposed with housing on the upper fl oors. My design attempted to create a connection with the courtyard square axis. Th e one concept I took advan-tage of was the diff erent zones and views I created by controlling views and circulation. Th e regualting lines taken from the site and neighboring building were used to set up diff erent programatic elements and spaces.

Th e building was fronted with a metal luver-oued system that controlled the light because of the building being wrapped in glass. Th e end cap of glass served as public offi ce meeting spac-es where the meetings could never be hidden from the public. Much how the whole build-ing is a permiable building, highlightening the diff ernt uses of public and private spaces.

Th ere was a union of the public and private realm in the hope of responding to and en-hancing the quarlity of public life. Th e city has through the years lost its civic identity and the erosion of the public realm was an issue. Th e project aims at supporting, clari-fi ng and articulation the structure of the city.

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PLINTH / GROUND FLOOR PLANSCALE : 1/16 = 1’

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A B

C C

04Fall 2009 - Fifth YearProfessor Davis

VW Pedestrian Bridge in partner with Lauren Rogers

Chattanooga, TN

Th e opportunity arrose for me to enter this compeition for Volkswagen of America. Th e company is opening up a new plant in Chat-tanooga, TN. Laruen Rogers and I took the challenge that Volkswagen put out for stu-dents to design a pedestrian bridge. Both of us are from Chattanooga and added to the interest for both of us. Th is was a project we took on as an electrve for the semester.

Automobile production is defi ned by the abil-ity to mass produce certain pieces that can be assembled in an effi cient manner. Every car made by Volkswagen uses the same key com-ponents. Th ey have motors, doors, grills, yet they each have their own innovative designthat sets them apart from the others. Our in-spiration for the pedestrian bridge came from this idea of prefabrication and interchangeable parts. A material palette of 4 by 8 steel, per-forated steel, glass, and LED panels as well as steel beams were used to create a repetitive and interchangeable system. Th e panels are substi-tuted to provide diff erent levels of enclosure and visibility. Th ey also allow for easy modifi -cation as the plant grows in the years to come. Th e bridge dissipates as you walk its length providing full views of the test track at its cent-er before reassembling as you enter the plant.

05Fall 2008 - Forth Year Professor Rose

Prefabricated Housing

Knoxvile, TN

Th e focuse for the semester was integrat-ing a project from all the information gathered from previous semesters. Th e site was downtown Knoxville, TN. We were challenged with designing a commercial spaces on the street level and adding diff er-ent sized apartments above. Th e focus was then on creating a prefabricated building.

When fi lling in the site i had to keep in mind that there was a back door entrance to the church behind. I kept a pedestrian only walkway through the whole site. Th e created a permiable site that related to other permiable walkways throughout the downtown area. Th ere was a visible and apparent walkway and entrance.

Th e basic idea to my project is the idea of carving out diff erent spaces from a large rec-tangular object. I was creating diff erent solid and void areas through the design. Th e build-ing starts the dissolve from fl oor to fl oor. Th is refl ects the prefabricated nature of the project.

Th e structure is designed around this concpet of shipping containers. All the columns line up and pass the weight of each unit to the ground. Th e units are fasined together side by side as well.

Th e project incorperated all design, structures, environmental and diff erent systems classes into on project. Th is project developed to a detail that had not been achieved until this semester.

06 Work CrewsCurrent Work

Over the past four summers I have volunteered for a missions organization, Son Servants. I did full staff two summers and an assortment of trips over the other two summers. Th is is something I grew up going to in high school and took the challenge in college to be a leader.

Th is has been a great experiene for me be-cause it has taken me all around the world. Th is job has opened my eyes to the strug-gles our world encounters today. Th e great-est lesson I have learened is the fact that we should not forget that there isses in our own backyard that is ofter forgotten.

On these trips I was in charge of a worksite full of high school or middle school kids. It has been a great opportunity to interact and have an impact with some many diff erernt kids. I have learned many diff erent skills and oppor-tunities that have help my architectural career.

Th e international trips focus on building con-crete homes. I have been involved with and taught every fasit to building a concrete house. Th e in country trips focus more on home re-pair and roofi ng. However, in New Orleans the focus was on construction related to Katrina. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Currently I am working on a design build project in studio. Th is has been a great opportunity to learn a diff rent side of architecture that we are not usual taught. I have alawys enjoyed the constrcution side of architecture. Th e studio is run like a fi rm which has been great experience.

Th e project is a house being built in Norris, TN. Th e house is being designed to meet the platnium LEED rating. Th e project is a col-laboration project with engineering, land-scape, and architecture. Th ere is a construc-tion class that is helping build diff erent aspects of the design. Th e main construction of the house is being taken care of Clayton Homes.

Welch, West Virginia

Cranks Creek, Kentucky

Chattanooga, Tennessee

Jacksonville, Florida

New Orleans, Louisana

Reynosa, Mexico

Mandeville, Jamaica

Yucatan, Mexico

TOTALSLEED for Homes Rating SystemNew Norris House

Earned Pts.Credit Category

Currently Anticipated Points 94

1. Innovation & Design (ID)

2. Location & Linkages (LL)

3. Sustainable Sites (SS)

2

Max. Points: 10

Max. Points: 22

Certified 35- 49

15

17

14

7

4. Water Efficiency (WE)Max. Points: 15

5. Energy & Atmosphere (EA)Max. Points: 38

7. Indoor Enivronmental Quality (EQ)Max. Points: 21

8. Awareness & Education (AE)Max. Points: 3

6. Materials & Resources (MR)Max. Points: 16

17

2

Silver 50- 64

Gold 65- 79

Platinum 80- 136

Credit Thresholds (reflect deduction due to square footage of house)

20

Platinum

(Projected)

(Projected - based on early estimation of HERS rating)

(Projected - largely depends on available materials)