Architectural Design IV

Project 1: Disability Experience Pavilion

In a group of three students, our assignment was to create a recreational use pavilion for a disabled group of our choice (Sensory, Mental, Physical). Our assignment proceeded first with research into the user needs and space requirements of disabled user groups, then we iterated on our ideas via precedent studies and explorative physical models, finally culminating in an A1 poster showcasing our research, collages and final model diagrams and orthographics.

Project 2A: Site Analysis

The first part of our final semester project took us to the Kepong Botanical Gardens by the neighbourhood of Taman Ehsan, on the outskirts of Kuala Lumpur. As a tutorial group our job was to divide the large task of analysing the Gardens and its surrounding areas as a macro site, and then present our information and themed interpretation of the place's character in a set of four A1 presentation boards. We would determine the theme amongst ourselves and tie all the information together using it, and it would also be a launching pad for each of our own individual interpretations of the project's program and concept.

Our choice of theme was Stillness in the human self, and how such a state of mind could be harnessed to improve the health and well-being of a person, specifically within our chosen user demographics amongst the Taman Ehsan population (children, adults and the elderly). The presentation goes on to illustrate how the sense of stillness can be achieved through natural surroundings found in the atmosphere of the Gardens, and the various potential programs that can arise from this concept - fitness, meditation, health centres and so on.

Project 2B: Still As Water

After the site analysis, we each branched off into our individual interpretations of what sort of building we would create for the community of Taman Ehsan. Our proposal was to incorporate a narrative that responded to the site's surrounding environment and community, incorporating poetics into our building typology to overall create a place that bore a sense of community.

My own concept and proposal was to recall the large lake of the Kepong Botanical Gardens by creating a water meditation centre. The centre utilises a cluster typology to not only provide open entry to all parts of the site and take advantage of prevailing winds, but also create a freeing and open feeling which relaxes the user's experience and instills a sense of calm within them. The building also takes advantage of its natural surroundings by blending in with the existing softscape, using neighbouring tree canopies as shade and as buffer zones to enhance the natural feeling.