Daniel DillowB.A.S.

Graduation Portfolio

02101822

Madison Central Library

Merit, Tx Residence

Taliesin: Interpreting the Experiment

Desert Shelter

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Daniel DillowB.A.S. Graduation Portfolio

To the reader:

Thank you for taking the time to read this portfolio. I hope you enjoy what you see as much as I’ve enjoyed bringing it to you.

This year, the school began a secondary evaluation process that is less formal than traditional presentations. I find those moments to be considerably more informational.

Thank you,

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Madison Central Library

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Daniel Dillow

6 mo. value$120.00

This summer, the city of Madison, Wi. released a RFP for their new central library.

The city intends that the library operate in symbiosis with commercial use, benefitting financially and culturally while supporting local economy. The RFP calls for any amount of light commercial space attached to a phased 100,000 square foot “library condominium”

This excitement that drives the concept comes from questioning why traditional libraries are losing their patrons. The city of madison has requested that the parcel be re-planned as a mixed-use facility. The commercial/residential aspect would not only avoid the vacancy that Jane Jacobs discusses in the pivotal book, The Life and Death of Great American Cities, but it would also generate revenue to offset the cost of construction in this struggling economy. What if this mixed use is more than just an equation that generates a site plan? What we rethink the library paradigm? My friend, Todd, doesn’t go to the library to read free periodicals anymore, because the library has stagnated in an awkward model of silence and discomfort. Instead, Todd goes to Starbucks with a buddy. They bring their favorite periodicals on display in the connected Barnes&Noble, and they sit down next to a college study group or a couple of business partners, people who you used to see at the library. The soft music in the background provides the acoustical privacy necessary. Few tenants actually buy the $30.00/quarter magazines that they come to read, but most people come on a weekly basis and buy $10.00 worth of coffee. By re-thinking the library model in a less formal, if not perhaps more capitalistic way, more people can enjoy civic offerings.

site planninggraphics

nature of materialsstructures

cultural contextpsychology

building codes

6 mo. value$30.00

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Madison Library

Population223,389

Geography68.7 square mi of land16.0 square mi of water

Culture‘96 Money calls Madison the best place to live in the U.S.

Thriving local economy supports small business and limits unemployment

Strong civic support for community divertissement

State Capitolmajor downtown arterycrecendos with “capitol square”

Universitycreative student minds connectwith higher culture on State St.

Madison Demographic

downtown madison

madison

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Daniel Dillow

Lake Monona

Lake Mendota

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State Street

Capitol Square

Mifflin Street

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central library

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Madison Library

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Daniel Dillow

State Street is the cultural HUB of Madison, and its material language is elongated roman brick. This project should extend that tradition into the Library’s neighborhood, but today, brick is a veneer, stuck to the side of structural material.

It is often argued that architects who use veneer forfeit honesty and landfill space in favor of economy, versatility, and simplicity. Surely this is a tough decision. In brief, masons are cheaper when they have to lift a tenth of the weight, but what does veneer really cost? When that veneer reaches the end of its useful life, it is stripped, and sent to a landfill. why add unnecessary weight too a system just to make it look like something that it is not?

The Library is a A-1 assembly space, though, and requires heavy structure anyway. so by replacing CMU with structural clay masonry units, which come in a 8x4x16 module, I can retain the look and function of brick while saving landfill space.

clay veneer adds weight to the system

clay masonry gives more structure for the same appearance

removal of tile finish

Nature of Material

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Madison Library

OPEN TO BELOW

OPEN TO BELOW

entry level

second level

reading level

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Daniel Dillow

68’-0”

54’-0”

40’-0”

14’-0”

0’-0”

DANIEL DILLOW3 R D Y E A R B . A . S .Taliesin School of Architecture

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Madison Library

Merit, Tx ResidenceDe Stijl Tectonic AnalysisDe Stijl Tecto

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Daniel Dillow

This project is a case study that explores the De Stijl through a residential study in Merit, Tx.

As a child of the industrial revolution, the De Stijl is typically defined by its orthoganal angles, simple materials, and primary color pallet. But flat paint, and 90-degree angles aren’t all that make the De Stijl. The De Stijl is about sensitivity to planes in space. By increased sensitivity to tectonics, the way planes intersect, a designer can beautify connections through simplicity. Gerrit Rietveld achieves tectonic simplicity by arranging planes such that every connection is clearly a butt-joint connection. this ensures that every connection can be identical, and there are no fussy miters which require skilled craftsmen.

philosophyinterior design

landscapingstainability

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Merit, Tx Residence

Top: entry gardenBottom: entry

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Daniel Dillow

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1 garden2 entry3 bedroom4 kitchen

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second floor

ground floor

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Merit, Tx Residence

Top: view to great room from entryBottom: great room

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Daniel Dillow

water collection

daylightingghtingggggg

Bamboo grows fast and strong, some species grow up to 48 inches in 24 hours! And with OSU professor Kaichang Li’s formaldehyde-free adhesive, inspired by coastal mussels, this family can enjoy great wood finishes while maintaining superior indoor air quality.

Rammed earth provides protection from the western sun, and with a rubble trench foundation system, one can use less concrete.

section through bedroom

section through great room

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Merit, Tx Residence

Shroder House - Gerrit Rietveld

Rietveld Pavillion - Gerrit Rietveld

Harris Residence - Rudolf Schindler

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Daniel Dillow

1 artemisia2 red oleandar3 palms4 buckeye tree5 white oak

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Merit, Tx Residence

There are many ways that Taliesin can contribute to the academic community. One of those ways is through interpretation. Not just interpreting its founder, Frank Lloyd Wright, but interpreting contemporary themes in architecture through the lens of an institution that understands the relationship of Frank Lloyd Wright’s legacy to the greater architectural community. Of specific interest is the relationship between Frank Lloyd Wright and Le Corbusier and how that might inform the relationship between Taliesin and the contemporary trend of blob architecture. Le Corbusier built Villa Savoye in 1929, formally exploring the piloti, but choosing to ignore material. Six years later, Wright contributed to the international style with Fallingwater, which interprets the form of Villa Savoye, but clarifies the material consequence of that form. Today architects still explore form above and beyond material. One example is a trend that is becoming known as “blobitecture.” The term Blobitecture refers to buildings with smooth, often undulating envelopes that are designed using computer algorithms and modeling software. By critically assessing the material nature of blobs, Taliesin can make the same contribution to Blobitecture that Frank Lloyd Wright made to the International style.

In 1923, Charles Edouard Jenneret (Le Corbusier), published his famous manifesto, Towards a new Architecture. Consistent with the International style, this book calls for architects to reduce their work to mass, surface, and plan and to employ the piloti (small column), which raises the main hull of a building off of the ground to provide pedestrian use and garden space below. (Le Corbusier, Towards a New Architecture, 1929) These concepts are strong and have made critical advances in the way we practice architecture today. Some areas in Europe even require use of the piloti, but in order to better explore space, Le Corbusier chose to ignore material.

In 1929, Le Corbusier built Villa Savoye, one of his better known buildings, which successfully employs all the elements of his manifesto. (Daniel Borden et al, Architecture: A World History) Clearly the form of the building was important to him. In fact, the form was more important than the material. Villa Savoye is a

TaliesinInterpreting the Experiment

Villa Savoye - Le Corbusier

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Daniel Dillow

philosophyphilosophy of FLWnature of materials

writing

brick building, but Le Corbusier chose to cover the brick with white plaster, subordinating the material in order to promote an aesthetic. Le Corbusier’s subordination of material highlights a critical assumption that drives the form. The assumption made is that an element lifted off of the ground must be supported by columns. This is true, given that the parapets of Villa Savoye are clay brick, but six years later, Frank Lloyd Wright interpreted Le Corbusier’s aesthetic with structural material.

It is clear that the international movement had an effect on Frank Lloyd Wright. In 1932, he withdrew his portfolio from the International Style exhibition at the New York MoMA as a result of conflict with Philip Johnson. This conflict seems to have had a lasting impact on Frank Lloyd Wright because in 1935 he produced the famous sketch of the Kaufman Residence, which shows impeccable similarity to Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoye, and he clarified his intention to his apprentices by telling them that he intended to “show those internationalists how it’s done.” (Cornelia Brierley, Interview by Dave Frazee) It’s possible that Frank Lloyd Wright saw value in Le Corbusier’s work because not only did Frank Lloyd Wright choose to interpret Le Corbusier above the other internationalists, but Fallingwater started a new trend for Frank Lloyd Wright, which occurres in other buildings like the Gugganheim.

With Fallingwater, Frank Lloyd Wright uses similar spatial logic, geometry, and finishes to Le Corbusier, but he treats material differently. The horizontal parapets that occur in the Villa Savoye as plastered brick occur in Fallingwater as reinforced concrete, and the vertical masonry masses in Villa Savoye occur in Fallingwater as exposed flagstone. The two materials juxtaposed tell a story of how each function; the vertical elements are columns while the horizontal elements act as beams, eliminating the need for the piloti. The international movement attempted to equalize materials, but Fallingwater shows how sensitivity to different material use allows visual interpretation of the structure and liberates the form to function more effectively.

Frank Lloyd Wright - Fallingwater

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Taliesin: interpreting the Experiment

Like Le Corbusier, many proponents of blob architecture are exploring important concepts, giving priority to form over material. Among the designers pursuing such forms is Tom Mayne of Morphosis and Tom Wiscombe of Emergent Architecture. Both designers produce evocative images, but neither has exhibited the material sensitivity characteristic of Frank Lloyd Wright. The result is that, like Le Corbusier, both architects find themselves subject to the nature of the material, adding complication or in some cases, making the project impossible.

Recently, Morphosis won a competition for an office building in Paris, which he calls, “HAWT Tower”. Their design is an exterior frame that undulates relative to site paths and solar orientation. As a blob, the design features prescriptive sleekness, so traditional wide-flange columns are visually unacceptable, but rather than rethinking the column, as Frank Lloyd Wright rethought the parapet, Morphosis chose to clad each column in a steel jacket as Le Corbusier clad masonry in plaster. The decision to use traditional materials in nontraditional ways has resulted design complications, not the least of which is that every connection in the 300 meter tower is unique. To their credit, Morphosis’ staff has been completely open about their reasoning behind the undulating form. “We wanted the building to undulate because everybody’s talking about this stuff, but nobody’s doing it,” said the skin designer during a tour of the office.

Tom Wiscombe of Emergent Architecture explores formal images in an exciting way, but lacks the material pursuit that Morphosis exhibits. Tom Wiscombe looks to nature for his inspiration, and finds some fascinating patterns. Of particular interest is Tom Wiscombe’s turtle shell study, which involves the concept of “smooving,” a digital technique that blurs the distinction between line and plane. The formal result bears an interesting resemblance to the skeleton of

Concept by Tom Wiscombe

HAWT Tower: Paris

Turtle Shell

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Daniel Dillow

a turtle, which is both line and plane. Tom Wiscombe interprets this concept formally, but his beautiful images attach no material to the form he creates.Each of these acclaimed designers struggle with material. Perhaps this struggle is rooted in the idea that undulating planar elements is a new idea. Both designers make images suggestive of space ships, but they are both dealing with geometry that exists in gothic cathedrals. Maybe all that the future of architecture needs is a better understanding of the past. This is where Taliesin can contribute.

Wright used the material of his day to execute progressive work by letting material inform structure. In the same way, students at Taliesin can adopt a love for material and interpret our own contemporaries, the blob architects, allowing material to dictate form without making assumptions.

column at Sw. Krzyza (St. Cross) - www.krakow4u.pl

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Taliesin: interpreting the Experiment

Desert Shelter

This desert shelter is an exploration in material nature. Corrugated steel acts as a light planar element, reenforcing in sheer while autoclaved, aerated concrete bears load. This was my first truly successful project because I started with the material.

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Daniel Dillow

graphicsmodels

nature of material

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Desert Shelter Graphics

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