Grand Designs

I have decided to blog about the channel 4 programme Grand Designs. This is because each week of the series every house they showcase is unique in its own different way and none of the design seems similar and they all stand out in their own ways. Some of them work on a much grander scale and are design really modern buildings design on the vast depths of a budget worthy of the house, where as other design are designed on a much more tighter budget, whether being design from environmentally friendly materials or being built within what appears to be small location, all of the designs somehow manage to find a way round on obstacles thrown in their way.

From watching this programme it gives me inspiration into any designs I do in the future, as there will be bits that I remember from different designs I have seen on Grand Designs that have caught my eye for many different reasons and that I will do my best to incorporate them into my designs.  

Not only do I watch the UK Grand Designs, I have recently started to watch the Australian version of it. By watching this programme also, it allows me to look at similarities and differences between the two architectural environments, especially because they’re on different sides of the world to each other. Another reason I have started to watch the Australian version is because it is a country where I would really love to go to and possibly live there for some time, so this gives me some information on the types of property they design.

Another good thing about watching Grand Designs is it gives me information on the construction of the building, so I see it going right through from the design stage, to the construction and to the rendering and furbishing. Also I find it useful to see the different problems they get faced with during their projects and how they overcome them. Overall I find watching these programmes very useful because not only does it give me inspiration for the future it also gives me lots of information which I try and remember for future use.

I find that watching programmes like Grand Designs will broaden your knowledge really easy and it is enjoyable way of learning because watching the television is something you will do every day, so by watching television programmes it is not the normal way of teaching and learning things so you will be more focused on learning this way.

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/grand-designs/pictures

@FineComposition

This is a group from Hawaii, which i have recently started following on twitter and they blog about other interior designers and furniture trends. On their twitter page, they post links up from their blog showing these different designs. Some of the designs they have posted are really modern and are the type of the designs that I am interested in.

When i have some time on my hands, this has often been something which I have looked at. This is because the designs that they show you are really unique and are all very different. Also I feel like this is a very good way to keep up to date with current trends in the design world which is something i see as essential for a student architect/interior designer.

By following this group on twitter, it allows me to "re-tweet" any ideas which I really like, this then sharing them with the rest of my followers on twitter and by "re-tweeting" their tweets it will inform other people that follow Fine Composition that I'm "re-tweeting" which pushes me into the design world as other designers may start to follow me by seeing what i follow. Also because I have started to follow a lot of Architecture or Interior Design related groups this allows me to broaden my knowledge by doing something I am currently doing in my day to day life, it will allow me to keep up to date with all the different trends currently being used and any tips that could possibly be used in my designs. Not only does it help be expand on my knowledge, I know that I could contact the groups I follow if I need any advice on a project, or if I just want another professional opinion on my work.

Although I will be using Twitter to give myself a greater knowledge and help me generate more innovative ideas, and communicate easier between other designers, it is harder to blog on Twitter due to word limits being set on your tweets, which is why this blog will be my main source for blog entries and I will frequently post my blog address onto my Twitter account so people that follow me or even vue my page just the once will be able to take a look at my blog when they want to.

http://www.finecomposition.com/

https://twitter.com/#!/FineComposition

The Shard

Once finished, The Shard will be the largest tower in Western Europe. Standing at just over 300m it dominates the London skyline. It takes its place in modern architecture of today among many over towers and designs. To build this design, it has used techniques that have never been used in the UK before.

The design of The Shard, was a dream of Irvine Sellars in 2000 but this idea was quickly quashed, that was until he met Renzo Piano, an Italian Architect who'd previously designed the New York Times Building. You could see his flare from his design of the Shard. When he heard about its surrondings, of the River Thames and the railway he said the design was similar to that of a sail coming out of the sea and quickly sketched his ideas onto the back of the menu where the two were eating.

The design is split up into sections containing offices, restaurants, a hotel chain and then luxury apartments which will offer views of London that will not be rivaled. Much like the London Olympic Stadium, one of the things that held The Shard back was the financial crisis however a consortium from Quatar invested in The Shard meaning the project could go ahead.

One issue they faced was the location they was building. As they were building in the middle of London it meant it was a relativley small plot located between Guys Hospital, one of Londons busiest hospitals and London Bridge Station, Londons 4th busiest train station. To build the tower they first needed to knock down the building already standing there, however they had to be careful as the lower they made this tower the more it disturbed the current surface and could potentially pose a risk to nearby buildings and make their foundations move so they installed movement detection equipment into all of the buildings within 80m of where The Shard would be. In order for them to start construction of the foundations, they need to get rid of the current ones which are made from reinforced steel, at the only way to do this is by using explosives to blast them apart.

They needed to build a much stronger foundation that the current ones as the building was going to be much larger than before. However becaause of its close proximity to the River Thames, they needed to build a dam to stop any water coming into the excavation site. The base of the foundations will be made from 120 concrete steel piles. When constructing it, they used a top down method of construction, meaning as they dig the foundations they start building upwards so they are doing two jobs simulationusly saving time and money. When building a tower some of the issues they will face are the height in building as they will face issues if there is any wind as this will blow the cranes around when they're lifting the materials and also getting lifts high enough to some of the floors, one way which they got around the crane issue, was by installing a crane at the top of the lift shaft which enabled them to construct the floors below. When they get to the 50th floor building work stops with 45 floors left because they reach winds with speed in excess of 40mph and these winds get colder the higher they get colder. One way they neglected the wind that high up was by putting screens which would slid up when they went up to the next floor, which allowed them to continue building.

At the top of the luxury appartments, they needed to make sure there was no sway so to do this that placed a device which would absorb the movement, much like when you're earthquake proofing a building to share the movement around resulting in less movement this will mean the top of the building will sway less than previously. They got this idea from a skier and their poles and if they were put off balance then they would adjust their poles to balance themselves out again.

After 36 months of construction, In May 2012 the last part was put in place, bringing an end to one of the best skyscrapers in the world and something that is pathing the way for Architecture in London, bringing London's Architecture into the 21st Century and hopefully we will be seeing buildings like this dominating Londons skyline for many years to come.

London Olympic Stadium

During this week i watched a documentry about the London Olympic Stadium. When watching this programme it showed me that when designing something of that scale you will come up against natural, physical and financial problems.

One of the reasons why London won their Olympic bid was because they said that the stadium would become a legacy and would remain in the city for many years. So this meant that the Architects, Populous, had to design a stadium which could be used for anything after the Olympics. However they came up with a clever solution to this, incase that they couldn't find a purpose for the stadium after the Olympics, they designed it so that the stadium could easily be taken apart and the parts recycled, meaning that they have a plot of land of which to rebuild on.

Natural problems the team faced was a south-westernly wind that blew towards the stadiums and they needed to make sure that this wind didnt produce a tailwind within the stadium as this could give some athletes an advanatge during the race and potentially make their times void depending on how high the wind speed is, just like Wilma Rudolph whos world record was not counted due to a high tailwind. To make sure this wind didnt funnel its way into the stadium, it meant that the stadium needed to have a roof on it so Populous deisgned a PVC fabric roof to be stretched over the stop of the stadium which meant the wind would travel over the top of the stadium and not funnel its way back into the stadium.

They had to design the stadium in the height of a recession in London and this meant a smaller budget than previous designs like the Birds Nest in Beijing. Initially for the exterior of the stadium they had intended on making it a big screen where images would run round the sides of the stadium however this would have been to pricey so rather than just having the skeleton for the stadium they had decided to have something like ribbons coming down the exterior with different images on. However this plan was stopped when the Olympic budget was cut by the government and the £7m that was slashed from this meant that this plan could no longer take place. This could have meant that the look of the stadium was not finished and potentially leading it to be an Olympic Stadium that didn't live up to it's billing. However a solution was reached when a private investor donated the money in order for the project to continue.

Those two problems show you that when you are designing something such as a stadium you are going to come up against physical issues made by other humans and more often than not many issues created will be due to nature and this is something you will just have to adapt to or find a solution to get around.



Construction of the Olympic Stadium

Time Lapse of the Olympic Stadium

Over the up and coming weeks on my blog I’m going to be looking into various designers, whether this is artists, illustrators, photographers or architects. When I’m looking at these designers I will focus into what stands out about their work and why I like them, things they do which intrigues me or things they do which are new and need to be researched further and most important my opinion on their work and how I could possibly use it to enhance my own work.