Between Silence and Light::A Falling Water Experience

Craft is an essential element in design. Although it is easy to make something look nice, craftsmanship takes practice to perfect. Frank Lloyd Wright is an excellent craftsman. His world famous architectural structure Falling Water is a great example of his level of craft. Touring the home, one would think that for the most part it is a very modern style of design, when in actuality it was constructed in the 1930s and that to me shows how talented and advanced his mind is. The techniques that he used to build the home were innovative and he took a risk. "The guide format becomes a behavioral design logic." (Heimsath)
"Designers have to be able to inform, persuade, motivate and direct their audiences..." (Landa, 169) Language in design should communicate with the viewer/client in a personal way. The language communicated to today's design through falling water is a very modern and advanced language. In other words, it in my opinion was not the same language of that time period(1930s). From the style of the design to the cost(considering that it was built during the Great Depression), the language communicated was definetly more advanced and 21 centuried design. Although Wright specifically created the residential space for a shorter family, i do not think that a language of comfort for someone 6ft or taller was communicated. I almost want to ask myself: Though this was intentional, would the home be more welcoming for more people if the ceiling height was higher, or would it take away from the intimacy of the space? Would the language be foreign in that case? "The environment can create positive support for goal seeking or it can work negatively against the individual goals." (Heimsath) The public and private spaces in Falling Water are very well defined and easy to read. One thing that was successful in the design was the narrowness of the halls where the spaces were meant to be more private(bedrooms/baths), and more openess where the space was meant to be public. Intimacy was a connection that I felt with the whole space, and that is to me a well designed space. The actual placement of the structure within the woods over a waterfall also created a sense of intimatcy and so overall, I felt like the whole space was private in relation to the world around it. Design is a system that orders and translates reality and ideas into meaningful units which are intelligible and communicative (Landa, 169) Physically, I was present at Falling Water, but it in a sense was still a virtual experience to me. Virtual reality may be the correct term to describe what I felt while I was there. The combination of the actual beauty of the design intertwined with the intimacy that I felt and the sound of the flowing water put me in a state that was unreal.

Heimsath, Clovis. Behavioral Architecture. 1977. McGraw-Hill Inc.
Landa, Robin. An Introduction to Design. 1983. Prentice-Hall Inc. Englewood Cliffs, NJ.

[Re] Actions

Movement
Movement is a very important aspect in design and more importantly in interior design. When designing a space, the designer must know the function intended of the space as well as possible functions. Designing an interior space for Suzanne's class forced me to think about the amount of space I had to work with, as well as what I had to incorporate within it. The movement around the space was also essential to consider and because I chose to do a split level design, I had to be sure that spacing around the staircase and entrance was accurate and reality. Doing my perspective in plan also helped with the organization of the space. In my sudio project, I chose to emmulate light through movement and reflection.

Portfolio 2nd semester pt.1

Pat's Chair Plan

Audience, Character, Transition

"Designers should be fair and candid with their clients and serve them to the best of their abilities..." (Deitch, 22) We as designers are characters and our clients, employers, teachers are our audience. As designers or characters our job is to intrigue our audience with something expressive, innovative and inspiring. We can get inspiration from things that interest us or things that may relate closely to the concept of the project. As inspiration for my pattern layout for studio, I focused on the contours of berries and how they interact with one another. In the Baroque period, artist and designers were innovative and fresh with new ideas, but they also took inspiration from previous periods. Just as a writer writes a play and is in control of what happens, we as designers have that same opportunity when it comes to our work. Although our audience may have ideas and suggestions about our design, it is our slate or canvas to create. "The artist has a responsibility to the blank page..." (Robin, 80) With in our designs there are many characteristics that help our work stand out. We have to figure out what characteristics are needed to make our work "pop." In studio, my curves and strong contrast of positive and negative space are the characteristics that added a element of interest and uniqueness. Transition in design is very common as designers move from one idea to another. It can also be evident in our work as one concept can transition into the next. In the Baroque period, emotion was evoked and change was identified. The transition from the Renaissance to the Baroque period forced designers to be more creative and innovative targeting a new audience, but also taking from the past. "There is one profession and only one, namely architecture...in which the reference is always to yesterday." (Le Corbuisier, 109)

[Re] vision:

"Without vision there is no art..." (Collier, 235) Revisioning or revising my work as a designer a key is a step in every design process that I am faced with. Through experimentation with different shapes and lineweights, I found patterns that did and didnt work. With the patterns that did work, I revised them to make them better and came to my final pattern. The Baroque period can be looked at as a revision of the Renaissnce. By taking what did work from that period, the designers then made improvements to further advance design in the world. In drafting, we always practice revision because we are required to produce atleast 2 copies of each assignment. That is succesful in that when drafting the final product, we are able to use what works and fix what doesnt.

Datum

"The distinction of a fine face lies in the quality of the feature and in a quite special and personal value of the relationship b/t them." (Le Corbuisier, 203) Through datum we understand order, compostion and overall organization in design. In finding/creating a pattern for our studio project, datum is an important factor in the final design. Though datum has a greater reference to straight lines, it can also be about how to organize positive/negative space. With that being said, my design/pattern is inspired from berries found in nature so its datum will be more organized around the contrast of positive/negative space more so than lines. Since datum relates also to organization, today's sub-divisions are composed around a datum on both a community scale and an individual scale. Just as Patrick suggested, the way the homes began to be organized in the 17 century around and enflade is the same way homes are organized today.

Works Cited:

Collier, Graham. Form, Space, and Vision. 1972. Prentice Hall Inc. Englewood Cliffs,

NJ.

Corbuisier, Le. Towards a New Architecture. 1986. Dover Publications Inc. New York,

NY.

Deitch, Ronald M. Professional Practice. 1931. Peguis Publishers Limited.Winnipeg,

MB.

Landa, Robin. An Introduction to Design. 1983. Prentice Hall Inc. Englewood Cliffs,

NJ.

We as designers are characters

Pee Week

Professional:Portfolio:Process:

"Interior designers are educated to become creative professionals who analyze problems from many different perspectives" (Veitch, 7) Taking from Ronald Veitch, designers are not only limited to designing a space well, but in addition, we must be able to explain our designs to others whether they are in our field of professionalism or not. The presentation board that we are putting together in Suzanne's class is a good example of this, as well as a good way of making a formal presentation very professional. Whether it is a digital or physical presentation, certain "rules" remain in effect such as datum, grid, order, and craft to make it look professional. In the professional world, a very common and successful way of representing yourself through your work is by putting together a portfolio. "The audience may be a client, a committee, or merely someone browsing for an idea. Whether produced to assist the client's imagination or to obtain a commission, either privately or through a competition...it should communicate as clearly and accurately as possible..." (Ching, 322) A portfolio is a representation of an artist or a designers best work, and it shows how he/she has progressed and how their work has became stronger. Both my digital and physical portfolio's include my best work, but they also include my process work. That to me is very important when presenting work to clients or employers b/c process is what shows them where you started and where you ended up. It also shows them that you are both experienced and willing to do the project right by taking time to carefully plan out every step. "Writing the design program is clarifying, to the satisfaction of both the client and the designer, exactly what is needed and wanted in the space under construction...it is a lengthy investigative process, sometimes taking up to one-third of the project's total time." (Veitch, 92) Stoel instructed us to include both a bond and vellum copy of all of our work in our portfolio's. "rough draft," or bond copy is the beginning phase. In this copy, the assignment is started and it serves as a reference for the final copy, but it doesn't include the aspects that make it final. The "final draft" or vellum copy is the completed copy with all details such as the borders, name of assignment, north arrows, scale, etc.

Periphery:Perspective:
The job of a designer is to take a project/problem and complete it or solve it. With this, I feel that designers should be limited to nothing. The periphery or boundaries are in a sense not present. Of course somethings are not going to work in every design, but the idea is to think outside of the box. Our minds should be more complexed and detailed than our clients. Whether we are given a lead as to what they want or whether we have to start from scratch, the end result should be extreme but functional, and aesthetically pleasing. If our clients have and idea, we should make it a reality. "If nothing is so powerful as an idea whose time has come, nothing is so enevervating as an idea that's been sitting around for years like money not earning any interest. That is precisely the concept of moving from the design of things to the design of the circumstances in which things are used." (Caplan, 152) Also as a designer, our skills should be advanced and practiced enough to where we are not just single-minded about designs. We should obtain different perspectives of design. "The challange in mastering perspective is resolving the conflict between our knowledge of the thing itself...how we perceive its optical reality - as seen through a single eye of the spectator. (Ching, 201) With that being said, we should view the world of design through atleast 2 perspectives: our as the designers, and others as our clients, employers, co-workers, or people in general.

Tying it together:

As designers, we must be professionals in which we always have our work ready to be viewed by generating a portfolio, know and understand the process of design and be able to carry it out, be open to try new things and see design from not just our perspective, but others, and lastly be able to think outside of the periphery of normality.

Caplan, Ralph. By Design. 1982. St. Martin's Press.
Singapore.
Ching, Francis D.K. Design Drawing. 1998. John Wiley and Sons.
New York, NY.
Veitch, Ronald M. Professional Practice. 1931. Peguis Publishers Limited.
Winnipeg, MB.

Function Plan of MHRA