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POLITICS OF WATER | Upper Pool Design Studio 2004 Sem 1

Upper Pool Design Studio | Studio Coordinators:

The project will run in three phases. Phase 1: Spatialising water (weeks 1-4)

No site is static and unaffected by change, whether change is environmental, climatic, diurnal patterns of light and sound, the flux of human occupation, or simply natural attrition. Very often we document these changes through maps, spreadsheets, and scenarios. Traditionally built materiality has been mapped and recorded in a number of ways and is often argued as the result of these processes but is (as Jos Boys has argued) translated via the specificities of design conceptions. Changes can be represented as time-based linearities (such as temporal chronologies) or as connected points in a network (spatialised maps). Our traditional understanding of boundaries and enclosure as something contained and fixed just might be challenged by addressing spaces of flows. The first part of this assignment is an important initial phase to be developed in the latter stages of the project.

Working individually, students will:

(a) Position their thinking relative to water sourcing treatment and supply by

• Providing a short statement evidenced by researched material. (800-1200 words) This part invites students to think about the politics of water not only as an environmental issue but as a social, cultural and artistic concern. The topic is wide and you are not expected to become an expert in the field but to think about such things as water sourcing and collection, disposal and recycling, irrigation and garden sprays, waste run off and water borne pollutants, salination and drainage. Questions over the impact forced environmental change have on our suburban, urban and rural habitations – particularly as we enter an era when a view over water is seen to be desirable. It has been argued that the nineteenth century was the era of industrial urban development; the twentieth century has seen the expansion of suburban living, and for the twenty-first century ‘coastal’ seems to be the emerging and desirable model.

(b) represent quality of water by

• Providing a digital and/or physical model representing an aspect of water Focus on an aspect of water, preferably a physical property, or state and find ways of mapping, documenting and representing it as a digital and/or physical model. You may address water in a number of ways such as its gaseous, liquid or solid state; high speed imaging; magnification; surface properties; subsurface currents, splash patterns etc.

Phase 2: (Architecture Students) Waterside architecture (weeks 5-8)

Working individually, students will: develop a design project broadly scoped as follows:

• Demonstrate relationships to urban / maritime / otherwise aquatic setting (1:500) • Provide general arrangement information (1:200) • Document elevation treatment (1:100) • Provide a 3D visual representation

Students will devise the project brief as part of the assignment. The project must be a building that is multi-cellular, multi-storey, situated next to water (reservoir, sea, river, lake etc.), and used by the public. Examples of appropriate projects include a research centre dealing with issues of source, supply and purity; a water treatment plant; a pavilion that serves to educate the public; or an aquatic centre for water sports and/or other recreational or healing activity based on water. There is no prescription regarding representation: students may work in any medium, virtual or physical and in any combination. The scales above are to indicate appropriate levels of detail. The visual representation must capture a critical aspect of the project and be used to demonstrate the desired intention.

Phase 2: (Industrial Design Students) Fluid Objects (weeks 5-8)

Students will devise the project brief as part of the assignment. The project must engage with either or perhaps both of the following notions.

  1. An object which can - like water - exist in several states, perhaps simultaneously, such as an object which has a virtual and real component, or alternatively an object which can change its state or form.
  2. An object which is central to our use and engagement with water, it may hold water, purify or change water or use water as part of its function.

Students are required to use their research and discoveries from Phase 1 to inform this project. Students are required to deliver the following

• A scenario describing the user relationship / engagement / interfacing with the object as well as: - if topic 1 is chosen – how the object exists in several states or changes its state - if topic 2 is chosen – the relationship between water and the object • A series of scaled detail drawings. • A 3D visual representation of the proposed design.

There is no prescription regarding representation: students may work in any medium, virtual or physical and in any combination. The scales above are to indicate appropriate levels of detail. The visual representation must capture a critical aspect of the project and be used to demonstrate the desired intention.

Phase 3: Synthesis (weeks 9-13)

Working in groups (architecture and industrial design students RMIT and QUT) students will: develop a selected design project broadly scoped as follows:

• Surface qualities – trapping movement and intangible qualities of water / ice / steam / vapour (no scale) • Formation of a tectonic argument and assembly (1:20 and 1:5) • Choice of materials appropriate finishes (1:1) • Granularity (10:1 +++)

Each group will work on a project selected from the individual phase: the project originator will not be part of the design development team. Together the team will develop the design to a fine-grained level of detail. There is no prescription regarding representation: individual group members may work in any medium, virtual or physical in any combination. The scales above are to indicate appropriate levels of detail. Each group is encouraged to work collectively using both virtual and physical media making use of 3D scanning and rapid prototyping equipment, where appropriate.