notesonarchitecture

Bluesfest is a multi-stage 10 day music festival. The location is LeBretton Flats.  Blues is the nominal theme, but essentially this is a festival with a wide range – last night’s main stage theme was Country.  The festival is a well organized, well oiled machine with a big volunteer component.  It is now in its 25th year.

The photos here are all un-cropped, un-adjusted digital files from an older iphone.  While image quality varies, they can be viewed at a larger scale by clicking or double clicking.

 

Five Snapshots – Friday July 5th :

1.  The festival’s main venue is the City Stage, here with Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit performing.
2. A view from the ‘Big Chill’ – a non live-music area which includes casual seating, a DJ, beer sales, massage therapy, kids games, etc.
3. The Bluesville Stage is a tented venue, here featuring The Little Walter Tribute
4. The Bluesville area of the festival site includes some carnival type games and a Ferris Wheel
5. Night sky at Bluesville carnival

*****

 

The arbor presented here is located within a public garden at the Central Experimental Farm.  Information on the designer and date will be added.

This decorative landscape feature offers seating, shade and framed views.   The details are of interest in and of themselves, and together reinforce the overall concept – the parti.  Independent of whether one feels the project is fully resolved, or is to one’s taste, it is apparent that this is the work of a thoughtful and deliberate designer.

The images below are all unmodified raw digital files.  They were taken June 21st and 30th using a two and a half year old iphone.

*****

Progress in the design for the house in La Pêche has been slow.  A site survey is an outstanding next step. As well more detailed studies are needed for elevations, massing and materials.

The images below are shown chronologically. The site photos are from May 19th, last saturday and today.  The two sketches represent a fixed point on the property but not a proposed solution – some kind of stepped pathway will likely be needed but is not designed, and the sculptural object in the sketches simply represents the idea that, this location might be a focus area.  Potentially there could be seating, sculpture or a fire pit here.

For larger scale, click or double click

*****

 

 

May 7

 

May 11

 

May 13th

 

May 14

 

May 16

 

May 19

 

May 21

 

*****

*****

The studies here are recent screen shots from the working SketchUp model.  The model file name is Trinty Ouest 3D.  It is all somewhat loose and fast – and includes multiple small errors.  It is still highly useful to explore the design.  Next studies will focus on the current roof structure, building elevations, and the stairs as a feature element.

The site photos below are from Easter Sunday.

*****

 

Click on images for larger view

*****

April 2019

*****

The sketches above represent the design development in the days directly following the purchase of the property in December.  This is  a continuation of the studies done before purchase.   The diagrams are to a scale of  1:100, and were a means to explore or confirm a number of design elements for the house, and it’s relationship to the site.  They provided a to-scale re-check of the site’s potential.  The plan is oriented with north on top.  To the south, the land slopes up, and vegetation changes from mixed deciduous to tall dense coniferous.

The spatial and functional requirements  for the house are modest.  They include on the ground floor an oversized single garage, a storage room and entrance vestibule.  Stairs to the upper floors are on the north-south axis.  On the second floor is a kitchen, living/dining room, one bedroom and bath.  The living/dining room is double height. The second floor is larger than the first with cantilevered space on two sides.  The top floor includes a space that could be used as – depending on the priorities of those living here at any particular time –  a bedroom, a music room, a studio, or reading room.  A second bathroom is also located on the third level.  The intent is that daylight and views will be key features for the multi-purpose upper room, and in fact, throughout this ‘machine for living’.

The images below are screen captures from a Sketchup model. These represents the current state in the development of the design.  Now, without having made a conscious decision, the plan has been re-oriented with south to the top.  Using Sketchup, one is drawing full scale and accurately.  The software facilitates the study of architectural detail and provides views at a broad perspective.  While for the plan of the third floor, elevations and building massing, there has been some some exploration and working assumptions, these will be the next focus of study.  At some point, a physical model of the site and design will be built.

*****

The photos below represent preliminary design sketches, mostly plans, for a small house project in La Pêche.  This output was done for a particular site, and was done prior to having ownership of the property in place.  As quick studies, done somewhat randomly between summer and December 2018 – they helped assess the developable potential for the site, for a house.  There are a number of distinct ideas explored.  Designs evolve as more information is available and conceptual approaches mature.  The earliest sketches are not to scale.  New information that impacted the process here included, topographic info, scale and orientation to north confirmed, requirements and options for site services.  The layouts are orthogonal with one or two exceptions – and for the project, that seemed correct.  As exploratory sketches, the plans may represent more than one storey at a time, and while three dimensional options have not generally been drawn, there were always assumptions for conceptual massing.

Recently the sketches were pulled out and loosely organized – both chronologically and thematically.  From this sorting, the sheets were pinned up, arranged top left to bottom right.  This selection shows a phase in the development of the project, but at this time, does not reflect the most current thinking for the design.

The photo of the site that is included here, was taken last Friday.

 

Photos above were taken Monday and Wednesday this week.  The main change from the previous post related to this project (October 30th, 2018) is that this designed pile-up tower of shipping containers has been painted a persistent blue.  The painting of what had been a subtle, but likely un-designed, colour and graphic composition, took place in early November.  While other activities within this large urban development site are ongoing, no other work has been observed on the tower.

*****

Yesterday, the colonnade at the National Gallery, 11am.  Much of the scaffolding and all of the canvas that had been installed here last year has been removed.  A finely detailed plywood hoarding remains on the north wall.

The visit yesterday was  a brief survey of temporary shows. The photos here are shown in the order taken, and can be viewed at a larger scale by clicking or double-clicking on them.

 

As part of an exhibition for the 2018 Sobey Art Award short list, the contemporary galleries present works by Indigenous artists including Joi T Arcand, Janeen Frei Njootli and Jordan Bennett.  The image above shows a work by Arcand on the end wall.  An ice fishing shack that is part of the installation by Jordan Bennett is on the right.

The contemporary galleries also feature a group show titled ‘Anthropocene’.  This exhibit highlights environmental issues. The artists here are Edward Burtynsky, Jennifer Baichwal and Nicolas De Pencier.  The three images below are from this show.

Anthropocene has several hi-tech interpretive components which are referred to in promotional literature as ‘augmented reality (AR) installations’.  For a number of these, visitors  borrow ipads that are enabled so that a a simple physical ‘stand-in’ representative element in the gallery appears as something else on the ipad.  In one case, a medium sized box in the middle of a room has muted photographs of a pile of elephant tusks printed on it – on the ipad, what is viewed live, is a large pile of tusks in high definition and full colour.  Basically on the ipad, you view and walk around something in real time that is not there.

A detail from a photo by Edward Burtynsky that is part of the Anthropocene Exhibit.

 

The three images above, and the series below are part of the Sobey Art Award exhibit.  For Jeneen Frei Njootli, above, the gallery interpretive material notes that the artist’s ‘practice engages her cultural  foundations as a member of the self-governing Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation, along with Western art history and contemporary production.’  Apparently, the double leaning steel plates  ‘Wind sucked in through bared teeth highlights a dialogue between Indigenous and Western artistic methodologies.’

 

As per the gallery notes above – the entrance to the installation by Jordan Bennett is through an ice fishing shack.  The main room for the piece is dimly lit, with some accent lighting on key elements, and a large corner projection of sky and clouds.  The young boy, who is on the right in the last photo of the installation space above, asked aloud – Is this real?!  For some, or many, this would be a relaxed, smile-worthy space.

 

The images here are from a small exhibit of sketches by Moshe Safdie that date from the time when the National Gallery’s design development was underway.  The exhibit also includes some explanatory text about the project and design.

 

The current feature exhibition at the National Gallery is a Paul Klee retrospective.  The exhibit includes seventy-five drawings, watercolours and oils by the Swiss artist.  This is the Berggruen Collection from the Metropolitan Museum in New York.  The three images above, are details from the work.

 

Yesterday, the colonnade at the National Gallery, 1pm

*****