Deets

Forgive my long absence from the blogosphere, stuff has been crazy. I do this much too often.

Anyway, here is a ridiculous picture I found today in my building systems book. It's unintelligible, so i am appreciating it purely for its aesthetic value.

Diplodocus the Dinosaur

People at shows in St. Louis need to dance.
Get ready get ready get ready

Black White Barbie

I met someone at a bus stop today, and he (she?) was very good at talking. Sometimes people get good at speaking because you need to, and sometimes people get good at speaking because you NEED to. I think this case was the latter, in conjunction with the right amount of sass in the personality department.
The feeling that I got was that of general amazement, love, fear, joy, sadness, among other things. It was really complicated and confusing. But great speakers can just jolt you into some land and shake you up.
I really would love to become one, but I think my voice is too squeaky.
hug life,
Hitomi

Required Rants

Yo.
Does this blog partake in hibernation??

What do you guys/gals think about requirements? Do you think it destroys the souls of most involved, or does it seem like a good idea to you?
In general terms, I think it's pretty vague and iffy, but what about required classes? I only thought about it seriously when I (overreacted and) felt as if my educational plans were in shambles. Having to teach a required course must suck, especially since many required courses are general overviews of topics whereas electives are more specialized and both the teachers and the students care about that specific topic. Isn't there a better way to teach general knowledge? What happened to good elementary school teachers?

Love,
Hitomi

Blogmania from Rural Studio

I am just now realizing (in a flurry of excitement and a tinge of jeals mad jeals!) that each of the newer Rural Studio projects have blogs!! Some of them document the process really well, from the site to the design process to the construction. It's really really cool. The Lions Park Concession Stand one has fun fun sketches and photos.
Maybe we should do that more often?
Hugs Mcgee

Chouteau Ruins

A few weeks ago, DJ and I were biking home from an Architecture for Humanity event and we stumbled across this set of ruins. Its about a block south of Chouteau near Lafayette Square. Its surrounded by some small houses on two sides, an alley on the other, and an abandoned, also overgrown lot. We were left awe-struck. Obviously, this building is really old. But why is it still standing? Or maybe, more importantly, HOW is it still standing? It's such a beautiful, old creature. Was it once a home? A shop? Or something more sinister? Who knows?
Now, it's returning to the earth from whence it came. We're going to do some investigation and attempt to discover its provenance. We'll keep you posted.

Hugs,

Antonio Pacheco

So Groc

We've mentioned in prior posts that we're working on designing a co op grocery store/kitchen incubator/artist's studio in Old North St. Louis. Our project is moving along slowly, with many fits and stops. But ultimately, it is moving forward. We're taking this existing building on 13th st and St. Louis ave. It sits on a large lot and has a small community garden funded by a grant from Missouri Foundation for Health. Our main goals with this project are to 1) provide a venue for healthy, good food in the Old North area, 2) create habitable, pleasant space, 3) reuse this old building in an interesting way.
Here are some images from the work we've completed so far.
That's an elevation DJ drew of the north side of the building. The grey part is the artist's studio. The boxes on the roof are greenhouses and the red part is the actual grocery store. The original building was built in the early 1900s. There was an addition made (the artist studio) in the 70s. At this point, much of the building was clad in ugly brick. Since the artists studios are distinctly different from the original building (where the grocery and incubator will be housed), we didn't feel right keeping the ugly brick veneer. Instead, we're proposing taking the brick off and exposing the concrete masonry unit construction.
This is a drawing Hitomi made of the same elevation that takes DJ's ideas further. Here, the blank, windowless walls are cut into to 1) allow light into the space, 2) help with ventilation, and 3) break up the facade, giving it a more human, less monolithic scale. Hitomi proposed the idea of cutting these notches into the wall (the lower half of the drawing) to do just that. We're thinking of covering the walls between these notches with advertisements for the grocery or simply, pictures of veggies and maybe installing benches along these spaces, as well.
This is a drawing I made that we all helped photoshop. It's of the loading dock/east/west facades. Here, we're exploring rooftop access and how that could work. We're proposing having a staircase that leads to the roof but begins inside the building. We're proposing this for safety reasons (Roofs are dangerous, you cant just have random people climbing up there willy nilly) and because it's kinda cool.

We made a rough Sketch Up model. It has helped us quite a bit with figuring out some of the spaces, but we're still far from done. The following screenshot looks down into the building. Please not the elevated deck/covered eating area on the right (south) side of the image. This deck will help to soften the transition from the inside of the building to the garden on the opposite side of the lot, as well as help enclose and define a playground we're proposing for this part of the site.


Here's a plan. Again, it's rough. The bottom rectangle house the grocery (far left), incubator (square-ish thing near the center), bathrooms and an office/storage space (far right). The rectangle above all that stuff is where the artist studios will be (note hitomi's notches along the uppermost/northern wall). The deck is the angled form at the very bottom.

I know these were all pretty superficial analyses of the building; we're still trying to work out all the kinks. So, please, forgive the roughness. But we'd love some feedback!

Hug Life,

Antonio Pacheco