ENCAPSULATION
In times of a mandated social distancing, individualization and privatization of space becomes highly valued. A certain kind of capsule, sanitized, hygienic, and hermetic space is desired to protect oneself from not only the outside world, but also from those within our space. The entasis, or optical correction in architecture, that occurs from prescription optical lenses is used as a metaphor and translated here to an architecture that orients the body in certain ways (depending on whether the form is convex or concave) and compartmentalizes space.
The high level of individualization and repetition that comes from these capsules results in a reading of the overall form as either long vertical bands, or as long horizontal bands, if seen through windows. The end result is a meeting house and a set of social, communal spaces that are still highly individualized in nature, emphasizing the private bubble of the individual.
Started off with original bedroom window: tall and vertical, 8’ tall. As a kid, I would inhabit this window but of course am too big to inhabit it now.
What stood out to me about this window was the misalignment between the window and the garage / driveway it outlooks, exactly 1’ apart.
But when you stand in the window, it does not seem that you are misaligned. Only from the outside can you perceive that.
I then was interested in the optical correction or entasis that occurs. As a metaphor, I looked at diagrams of myopic and hyperopic persons, who use convergent or divergent lens on their glasses to correctly refocus the convergence point of incoming light rays to the retina. The rays either focus inward to one point, or scatter outward in convergent and divergent lenses respectively. Using that metaphor, I wanted to look at the curved glass architecturally, and not literally for its refractive properties.
Here a convex window emphasizes individuality and makes space for one person to occupy. A privileged perspective is implied. On the other hand, the concave window is used to displace oneself to the outside context. Multiple points of view can be inhabited.
The result of translating this kind of window into a room is reciprocity. The convex window of the inside becomes concave for someone walking around the perimeter on the outside. On the left, we see a conversation room with conversation chairs from the Victorian era that face each other with a barrier in the middle. Each chair is calibrated so that the seats are 6’ apart. The windows are such that inside the building, within the concave window: person B is talking to person C. But what was convex on the inside becomes concave on the outside, therefore creating a space for a bench for person A on the outside. In this moment, A and B can see each other through the glass, but cannot converse or hear each other. Furthermore, person A cannot see who person C is. because of this wall
The furniture also is calibrated so that any two persons are exactly 6’ apart.
On the right, we see a reading room with a large convex window. This creates unique bottle neck moments for the larger tables on the ends. Furthermore, the convex window on the inside activates moments on the outside of the building. This is shown as pathways outside the building that start to interact with the facade and accentuate its undulating properties
The window is then used to create a variety of rooms, as shown here. The furniture is calibrated such that tables, for instance, are 6’ long between where any 2 people can sit. The geometry is then controlled by aligning the furniture with the focal point of each window.
Size of the window depends on the program — for the small private dining room, each dining table seat is encapsulated by a window. Likewise for the conversation room, and also for the outward facing reading room tables. Larger windows are used for limited congregation between people in program like the meeting room. But are also used in the guest room, where someone would stay with their family or by themselves, so a small capsule window is not necessary. Rather, the whole room becomes a capsule as it would be read from the outside.
The undulating facade then creates a ribbon, by stacking similar window sizes with each other. The overall facade can then be read as vertical, because of the capsule like geometries that run throughout, or can be read as horizontal if you group the windows as bands that run across.
This undulating facade mirrors that of the CONANT HALL, the neighboring building.
Here you can start to see the reading of the building as vertical bands and the variety of spaces that result from the outside space activated from the windows.
The building is sited on SITE 1 such that it mirrors the existing campus building to the left of it in both dimension and its undulating facade as we began to see in the worm’s eye view.
There are certain moments of alignment that position the building within its site: This large window aligns with the side street in front. This back window aligns with the corner of the behind building. The two corner bubbles here align with its sister building. In ways, the new meeting house is a contemporary version of the undulating facade of the sister building next to it.
In the worms eye, we start to see the kinds of alignment that occur, and relationships between the corner of the contextual building around it.
In the ground floor plan, we begin to see the kinds of spaces that emerge from these kinds of windows. These unique moments are embraced as opportunity for landscaping: planting trees, and having the pavement extended into these bubbles, inviting occupation. Once again, the furniture is aligned to be 6’ apart so that space is highly individualized, and calibrated such that distancing is possible in pandemic-like times.
The verticality of the building facade arises from the silos in the section. Here, we see that there are vertical bands of similar programs. Verticality is emphasized as you see the repetition of the human figure throughout the building in the vertical direction.
In this nighttime render, this vertical reading is emphasized. Each window reads as a capsule, as we only see one individual figure inside them.
The high level of individualization and repetition that comes from this capsules results in reading of the overall building as a series of vertical bands, coming back to the long, vertical window I started with that can be inhabited.
The end result is a meeting house and a series of encapsulated social communal spaces that are still highly individualized in nature, emphasizing one’s private bubble One can imagine walking along Oxford street and just seeing individual bodies in capsules- in what is supposed to be a meeting house and community house.
The interior render from inside the conversation room is a testament to how the window functions as a mechanism for the individualization of space. A certain kind of capsule, sanitized, hygienic, and hermetic space is implied and desired throughout the building to protect oneself from not only the outside world, but also from those within our space inside a bundling.
Here, we see the conversation chair calibrated so that each person is 6’ apart. The concave and convex windows creates a reciprocal relationship both within the building and outside the building.