How can reusing materials make people consider their impact on the environment?
Process Piece
Bricks made from concrete and fabric
These bricks are a way to remove fabric waste from the waste stream and incorporate it into building materials. By re-presenting fabric waste as a durable good, the goal is to make people reconsider their place in the cycle of material culture.
The bricks are made by cutting donated clothes into scraps and mixing them with concrete. The result is a brick face that has a sinuous quality uncommon in building materials.
The brick experiments aim to find ways of making bricks that are structurally sound and experientially impactful. The bricks will be tested in the Department of Civil Engineering to find a mix that performs as well as standard bricks. The aesthetic experiments will combine fabric to create textures that evoke the sinuous qualities of textiles, embedding a new material experience into the build environment.
Philosophy
Mission
I want to use architecture to make people aware of the forces at work around them.
In my designs, I try to make spaces that expose the built environment as a product of material culture—the expression of our values, society, economics, politics, and ecology. Positioned in these spaces, people find themselves in relationship to these forces, and contemplate their role in those systems. Hopefully, they leave more aware of how their behavior will impact the future.
Thesis
Problem Statement
People don't realize the ways that the built environment expresses and reinforces social systems.
People don't realize the impact of their consumer behavior on the environment.
Research Question
How can reusing consumer goods in building materials raise people's awareness of their impact on the environment—built, cultural, and natural?
Thesis Statement
Architecture can raise people’s critical consciousness of their role in systems that construct reality by incorporating reused materials—both architectural elements and consumer goods—
to induce disorienting dilemmas that lead to a change in behavior.
Architecture can raise people's critical consciousness.
Research
These material experiments are attempts to make building elements into tools for Liberation Theory.
Liberation Theory outlines a process for making people conscious actors in constructing reality. The final stage of this process is critical consciousness, when people are aware of issues in the world and take action to affect change. This process is built on the historical theory of dialectical materialism, which explains how our mental worlds and physical worlds are co-constructed.
Development
Precedents
re-presentation through re-assembly
Ningbo History Museum
Wang Shu
re-presenting history by re-assembling demolition waste
China Academy of Arts
Kengo Kuma
re-presenting reality by re-assembling roof tiles in new way
Site Analysis
materials and history
rough brick with faded paint
existing windows and egress
tiles remaining from former store
Context
materials and approach
Design approach
re-presentation through reassembly
Design translation
re-using fabric and cotton waste to produce building elements
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bricks made of fabric
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display furniture made from cotton waste and resin
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floors and light fixtures made from tiles present on site
Design
current iteration of project from pre-thesis development.
Client
A fashion brand that makes clothes from recycled clothing.
Building type
retail store and light manufacturing
Program
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retail space
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design studio
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donation center
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storage
Plan
production during thesis year
Design
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Develop retail interior concept
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merchandising scheme
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design scheme
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Develop studio layout
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Develop brick facade
Materials
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Develop bricks made of fabric
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experiment with composition and texture
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test for strength, durability, and moisture permeability
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make durable enough for exterior veneer application
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Develop interior fabric tiles for wall
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Experiment with mixing cotton waste and resin
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try different stages of waste: dust, yarn, scraps
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develop joinery for furniture application
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Objects
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furniture made of resin and cotton waste
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Furniture using whole cotton bales
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light fixture made of on-site tiles
Presentation
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documentation - video and photos of brick making process
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diagrams - metamorphic
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renderings - interior
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rendering - exterior elevation