Manifestos and Models

Our homework from Tuesday's studio session was to make a manifesto of our design. This would be a tool that we would use throughout the project to keep us on track and remind what we wanted to achieve on site when we have lost our minds at 3am and the design just isn't coming. 
I set about doing this on Wednesday:


The idea behind my concept is to create a public space designed around the contours of the site. Instead of having a single staircase within a building, I want to create a building or series of buildings within a stepped landscape. Each building/part of the building will have outdoor access, allowing different areas to be open at different times without having to open the whole building. By making the stairs the main focus of the site, I can then create different levels and different types of spaces within the site. Different heights can provide observation points for watching the kayaking or places to view the iron bridge and over the river, for example. The exterior stairs also allow spaces for various functions, seating, event areas etc. Missing steps in places will help to create these different levels and the buildings buried within the landscape will also create these multifunctional spaces and viewing places. I am going to take into careful consideration the requirements of each rooms/space of the areas to help me place them most effectively on site. For example, the kayak/canoe storage and service area will be best suited at the water’s edge while the race office would have the best views of the landscape from the top of the site. As a precedent, I am going to look at the Minack Theatre in Cornwall which makes the most of the natural form of a steep cliff top landscape to create and open air space, providing views of the stage further down the hill. I am also going to look at some precedents of visitor centres to see how they utilise the space, where they place the utility and service rooms relative to their public spaces. 

Rather than having it printed out and stuck on my wall, it's now my desktop background which means it is a constant reminder not only of my design but that I should be doing some sort of work instead of browsing Facebook et al.

We were also set with the task to create sketch models to explore our concept and develop our ideas.
My first was just to get my into the right frame of mind but it turned into a model of the site to help me become spatially aware of the landscape. I added some card stairs to it to try and get an idea of how they would sit in relation to the landscape. 

I felt that my second had more of a purpose to it as I was looking at how my buildings would site on/in the site. As the site is narrow, I realise that I would have to excavate into the bank and some of my building would be underground while some of it would be extruding from the landscape. I will have to think about the layout carefully, making sure that all the public spaces are easily accessible from the outside as that is my main public space.

My third and final model (for the time being at least) looked at how I would create large flat spaces in the landscape. There are two ways that I can achieve this: creating spaces concave to the landscape and spaces convex to the landscape. I will probably use a mixture of these two in my final design.