THE ARCHIVE

The final saga in the five-year architecture program at Cornell is an independent design thesis. For the majority of our undergraduate lives, this looms far in the future and is conceived vaguely as a ritual act performed by the most mature members of the architecture cult. Then, the moment arrives when you too must prepare for this rite of passage and become one of the deranged and sleep-deprived creatures known collectively by the younger generation in Rand as “those thesis students.”

In the spirit of Cornell, we tend to place a lot of pressure on ourselves when considering the thesis – hoping that it will be a shinning culmination of our extended tenure in Ithaca, but worrying that it might fall short. At his birthday party a few weeks ago, I told Richard Meier that we’ve been staying up at night with thesis nightmares and he responded humorously “who doesn’t have those?” Apparently, he continues to suffer from the same anxiety fifty years after his own undergraduate thesis at Cornell.

Today, we put aside anxiety and took our first official step in the thesis process by submitting posters for public display in Sibley Hall. Using a combination of text and visual material, these announce our intentions to professors in Ithaca and help us solicit advisors for the upcoming spring semester. The deadline caused a fury of activity throughout the week and a number of late nights, but forced us to solidify our ideas into a single, compelling proposal.

I have chosen to pursue an interest in destruction and intend to claim this process within the realm of design. Although slightly morose, I think the theme raises a number of interesting questions regarding the life-cycle of buildings that production-driven architects tend to neglect.

My site is on the southeast periphery of Rome along the New Appian Way and I am proposing to redesign an auto-demolition facility that caught on fire there last summer. If you’re curious, here is the first paragraph of my thesis statement:

In the summer heat of 2009, hundreds of discarded cars along the new Appian Way caught on fire, sending plumes of smoke into the skies above Rome. The pyre of automotive waste frightened residents throughout the capital city and called attention to a striking discontinuity in the historic and increasingly populated landscape of Rome’s periphery. The flames marked the site of an existing auto-demolition facility, where the traces of consumer culture have been awkwardly lodged between the expansive park of the ancient Appian Way and a developing residential district. Within this context of permanence and growth, how can architecture accommodate volatility and destruction? How might the internal metabolism of waste positively contribute to the life and economy of the Eternal City? READ MORE >>

With poster and proposal complete, the real work is about to begin. Before next semester, I hope to assemble a thesis committee that draws expertise from a variety of different disciplines. So far, I have enlisted a Roman architectural historian who has provided me with some fascinating information about the funerary monuments that once lined the ancient Appian Way. Now I am looking for people with expertise in material properties,  the (de) manufacturing process, and the automobile. Let me know if you have any ideas!

The Cornell architecture students in New York recently discovered the Myers-Briggs personality test and have been consuming the descriptions of “personality type” like scientific fortune cookies. The classification system assesses an individual on the basis of four categories that, when combined, describe 16 unique personalities. We each took a brief online questionnaire and found how our cognitive functions align with the following dichotomies:

• Extraversion vs. Introversion
• Sensing vs. iNtuition
• Thinking vs. Feeling
• Judging vs. Perceiving

Myers-Briggs defines each of these terms in a particular way that might differ slightly from their normal connotation. According to the theory, each person has a preference for one quality over the other similar to right or left handedness. Preferences are innate or developed and can be slightly expressed, or dramatically so. In sum, they gauge how individuals perceive their environment, interact with others, and make decisions.

My friends have a variety of personality types, but I noticed a strong preference for intuition over sensing (described by the letter “N”). This category differentiates between people who draw information from their five senses (focusing on the present) and those who see patterns and possibilities in the information they receive (focusing on the future). Architects benefit from both qualities, but it appears that we at Cornell are disproportionately inclined toward the later.

My personality type is ENTP with strongly expressed “iNtuition” and “Thinking” and weakly expressed “Extraversion” and “Perceiving”. Apparently I share this personality with Walt Disney, Julia Child, Steven Spielberg, and Julius Caesar. Try to make sense of that! It sounds like I’m destined to lead an autocratic cooking show.

The descriptions of each personality can only go so far but these tend to be more accurate than the placemats at Chinese restaurants. You might be surprised how much you can learn about yourself by taking one of these tests. The theory and terms presented by Myers-Briggs also provide a good point of reference when considering group dynamics and decision-making. Thus, it’s an invaluable resource for architects who spend the majority of their careers working with teams.

I scoured the internet to see what various researchers could tell me about my personality and found some amusing relationship advice. My natural partner is an INFJ or INTJ. So, if you’re a twenty-something girl reading this and want to talk about the future… I might be your type.

Saturday morning, those of us studying history with Mary Woods wrestled ourselves out of bed and headed downtown to the Staten Island Ferry. On the other side — after a free ride past Governors Island and the Statue of Liberty — we climbed aboard a Park Service bus and headed toward Freshkills Park.

The weekend excursion followed in the footsteps of Gordon Matta-Clark, who gained fame in the 1970’s for artistic mischief in the outer boroughs. Like all of us, Matta-Clark studied architecture at Cornell, but he rejected the discipline and launched himself into the New York art scene with works that he dubbed “anarchitecture”. These exposed the volatility of the city (and its structures) through building cuts, social and culinary experiments, and other acts of creative recklessness.

With irony and respect, our history of architecture class now honors Gordon Matta-Clark with the unofficial course title, “What Would Gordon Do?” Besides obviously referencing Jesus Christ, this title captures the essence of our course. Throughout the semester, we look at a series of neighborhoods in New York through the historical and theoretical lens of Matta-Clark. His life and work pervade the city and provide a launching point for discussion and debate. What would Gordon do if he were presented with the largely gentrified city that exists today? Do the changes over the past thirty years represent progress? Where do opportunities for intervention still exist?

The weekend field trip to Staten Island provoked all of these questions.  The bus took us to Fresh Kills landfill to explore a site that gained fame as the world’s largest trash heap. In 1972, Gordon Matta-Clark visited this same site under much different circumstances and produced a video documenting the mountains of residential waste, the machinery that moved them, and the seagulls that feasted on the decay. (click the image to play film)

In 2001 the landfill officially closed and became New York City’s second largest park – three times the size of Central Park. The landscape firm Field Operations developed a site strategy and the land will be incrementally re-purposed over the next 30-years. Although the park remains closed to the public, there are many opportunities to visit with members of the park service, who lead weekly informational and bird-watching tours. More information is available on the park service’s website.

The site today is strikingly clean with four man-made hills covered in long grass.  One might not think twice about the rolling landscape if it weren’t for the occasional metal well-heads that vent gas from the decomposing rubble underneath. These, however, cause little disruption to the sprawling views and reflect the cool austerity of much larger infrastructural fragments below. Gordon Matta-Clark may not have envisioned a park here, but the idea now seems well within reach.

Images of a landfill: past, present, future.

Rarely do I rub elbows with world-famous architects, but this Friday night I found myself chatting alongside Richard Meier at Cornell’s studio in Chelsea. As strange as it may seem, the encounter didn’t involve a lecture or design review. It involved cake.

The evening festivities were organized to celebrate Richard Meier’s 75^th birthday. Dean Kleinman hatched the idea a few weeks ago as a friendly gesture to Meier (who serves on the Dean’s council) and as a fun occasion for students in the NYC program to meet one of Cornell’s more prolific architecture alums. In preparation, students designed an interactive birthday card (above) in Meier’s own style and decorated (ahem, cleaned) the studio space to avoid offending the well-known king of clean.

After a brutal week of mid-term reviews and presentations, we welcomed the opportunity to unwind with a bit of free food and drink. And although none of us had much experience throwing birthday parties for celebrities, everything went quite smoothly. Feelings of trepidation were overcome and Richard (with whom I now consider to be on a first name basis) proved to be friendly, gracious, and surprisingly easy-going.

Upon his arrival, he congratulated us on attending the #1 architecture school in the world and suggested with a smile that we might even be the best architecture students. We laughed – awkwardly — to avoid any misplaced vanity that his comment might have provoked. After the ice-breaker and a few words from the organizers, the evening proceeded informally with ample quantities of food, song, and conversation.

After conducting a proper survey of the buffet table, I landed myself in front of Richard Meier and tossed him my first piece of conversational bait. He eagerly spoke about the Ara Pacis museum in Rome and the adjacent (and neglected) Mausoleum of Augustus. This led to a conversation about Cornell’s Rome program and the comparative merits of that versus “AAP in NYC”.

Along with newly appointed chair of architecture Dagmar Richter, we engaged in an interesting discussion about the future of architecture courses and coops in New York City. Meier offered plenty of advice and we brainstormed various ways that the program might be improved or expanded in the coming years.

As the evening wore on, Richard Meier and the other mature folk parted ways, leaving us with left-overs to eat, a sound system to pump, and projectors on which to play an assortment of youtube videos. It goes without saying that an impromptu dance party commenced. My only regret? That Richard Meier never showed us his moves.

The two-year Solar Decathlon saga came to an end this weekend with Cornell’s Silo House in 7^th place overall. Team Germany won the competition again with a power-churning photovoltaic box and Illinois claimed second with their well-insulated “vernacular” mobile home.

It would be a lie to say that these results were well received by Cornell or the architectural community. The Solar Decathlon competition – which has always been extremely restrictive – seemed to be rewarding the wrong things. Brawny photovoltaic systems collected a windfall of points whereas creative architectural solutions were all but overlooked.

Cornell team members returned to Ithaca this week proud of their accomplishments but frustrated with the competition. In an attempt to shed light on the situation, the Cornell Daily Sun asked me to write an article exploring some key issues. My feeble attempt at doing so appeared in today’s paper and is linked below:

SOLAR DECATHLON IN THE DARK

Oct. 21, 2009

Shock and disbelief were the only two feelings stronger than nausea when judges announced the results for architecture at the recent Solar Decathlon competition in Washington, D.C. After a two-year, Herculean effort, Cornell’s Solar Decathlon team (CUSD) had produced an innovative house of remarkable craftsmanship. Its peculiar form and materiality exerted an uncanny architectural magnetism, attracting the press and public and eliciting praise and pride from everyone involved.

So it came as a surprise last week when this dynamic work of architecture earned 16th place in a pool of 20 solar-powered homes >> go to full article

Homecoming events never seemed very cool when I was studying in Ithaca as an undergrad. But since I am now studying in New York City (still an undergrad but no need to dwell on that), I felt a strange urge to go back and reconnect with my alma mater. Friends from the Class of 2009 were back in full force, eager to escape their professional lives for a long-anticipated weekend of college fun.

I traveled up to Ithaca on Friday and many of the fields along the highway were covered in snow. This seemed unusual for mid-October but I’ve learned never to underestimate upstate New York.

Upon arrival I scoured the campus for some time and discovered that little had changed except for a bit of long grass on Libe Slope, a glass monstrosity lodged between Baker and Rockefeller, and a vast pit of mud in the parking lots behind Sibley Hall. The later (pictured above) marks the arrival of Milstein Hall and, in the distance, the new wing of the Johnson Art Museum. Both projects appear in a nascent state at this point, but are expected to begin taking shape by this spring.

I met up with several friends and we quickly realized that we no longer had a “home base.” The old-geezer alumni consider the Marriot Hotel their home base, but we had neither the resources nor the nerve to do such a mature thing. Instead, like so many young-alumni (and fifth-year-architecture-students-studying-in-new-york), we decided to crash with friends.

Many of my younger friends at Cornell are “brothers” in the Delta Chi fraternity. They were kind enough to host several kids from my class and feed us continuously throughout the weekend. On Saturday, the homecoming tailgate and events were markedly Greek. Students donned hoodies with their fraternity and sorority letters prominently displayed alongside the Cornell football logo – pretending for one day that we are a Pac 10 school.

I had a blast in Ithaca over the weekend but, aside from good memories, the only thing I brought back with me to New York is a lousy cold. Repeated exposure to grimy subway cars and public buses on two continents in the past year never caused more than a sniffle, but two nights at Cornell have left me wiped out — increasing evidence that the campus has truly become a bastion of contagion.

The long awaited competition has arrived and Cornell looks poised to claim its fair share of attention – and points – on the National Mall in Washington, DC.  For those uninitiated to the idea of “Solar Decathlon,” let me briefly explain: Every two years, the Department of Energy invites twenty college and university teams to design, build, and operate a home completely powered by the sun. In October, these houses are transported and assembled in DC, creating a “solar village” between capital hill and the Washington monument. Teams are then judged throughout a two-week period and assigned points in ten categories ranging from architectural design to engineering and market viability.

The Cornell Solar Decathlon team (CUSD) participated in 2005 and 2007 with varying degrees of success. Combining the experience of returning team members with the talent of new ones, the CUSD 2009 team gathered together two years ago and resolved to push at the limits of the competition — to literally break the mould. Up until that point, the “mould” had been rectangular houses that looked more or less like decorated shoe-boxes on wheels (They had been criticized as such by more than a few architects). Thus, we organized a design studio with veteran professor Jerry Wells who fueled the collective architectural ambition of the team. The top design would be selected by a closed jury and executed by CUSD.

The jury chose a project that secured either the wild success or horrible failure of CUSD.  There would be no middle ground. The 2009 design, now dubbed the “Silo House,” departed dramatically from the typical solar house.  It consisted of three circular living zones clustered around a square courtyard with horizontal photovoltaic panels hovering above.  The novelty of the shapes, compounded with the transportation and assembly requirements of Solar Decathlon, presented a logistical and technological nightmare. Less than a year ago, there were still many doubts that a bunch of students could really pull it off.

Somehow, despite early setbacks and a nagging recession, the CUSD house arrived on the National Mall in spectacular condition earlier this week. Students, faculty, staff, alumni, and local professionals worked collaboratively to turn early sketches and ambition into physical reality.

The resulting house is currently on display to the public throughout the week at the National Mall. I am heading down this weekend to check it out and see what the other 19 teams have been working on over the past two years. This year’s Solar Decathlon should be a good one and anyone in the area ought to check it out.  Information about tours and events can be found online at solardecathlon.org.  Also, you can track the team’s performance on the continually updated scoring page or find out more about the CUSD house on the team website.

Lately my eyes have been peeled for flyers offering free food or drinks to medical students—but rather than discovering another surgical keg party, I came upon an invitation to participate in a medical study conducted by researchers at Cornell University. Instead of free booze, the flyers in our elevator offered volunteers cold, hard cash. If the study caused any emotional or physical harm, I figured I could use the money to buy booze.  Otherwise, I would treat myself to some good food on the town.  It was a win-win situation.

I emailed the coordinator yesterday and answered a few questions over the phone about my relatively uneventful health history.  I qualified for two separate studies and scheduled the appointments for earlier today.  The studies were expected to take about three hours and I would be paid a total of $75.

I have never been paid so well for a small sample of saliva and a cup of urine—in fact I have never been paid at all for those things.  Aside from these samples (for genetic and drug testing), I completed a series of cognitive tests, computer games, and questionnaires. The computer games were the hardest for me, seeing as my gaming skills never developed much beyond Tetris. They required the player to recognize an expression, shape, or color and press the associated key on the keyboard. I would have done alright if not for a strange digital dyslexia that has not affected my hands since piano lessons as a child. Luckily, no one but the researchers will ever see my results.

In a couple weeks, I plan to return for a follow up session with one of the psychiatric researchers.  It involves an MRI test and a curious social experiment to see if I can make friends with other participants by writing “notes” to them. This time, they are offering cash AND a free picture of my brain. I can’t wait.

A few weeks ago, I traveled downtown to see and explore the empty site of the World Trade Centers—now commonly referred to as Ground Zero. I heard that they had built a viewing platform near the site but discovered a situation of disorder and ambiguity.  The pit (a description that remains accurate eight years after-the-fact) is entirely wrapped in chain link fence and canvas, blocking all but slivers of activity from sight. Signs led me around the construction to the Battery Park City sky-walk where views were tangential at best.

In the end, the thing that affected me most during my brief visit to Ground Zero was not the site itself.  Rather, I was moved by the actions of a silent Asian woman selling an ensemble of books and brochures with charged images of the twin towers before their collapse.  Bold letters across each cover spelled out a single, marketable word: T R A G E D Y.

After this first scattered and unnerving encounter with ground zero, I jumped at the opportunity to visit the site—and hear about its future—from two Cornell architecture alumni in a more organized format.  A trip was arranged by Stephanie Goto for all interested students at the AAP in NYC program. We gathered at the newly constructed WTC 7 where we met Osamu Sassa, an architect who works with the Japanese firm of Fumihiko Maki.

Mr. Sassa brought us up to the tenth floor of Tower 7 where the World Trade Center design teams have been pooled together. From the higher vantage point, we were able to see and delineate the newly formed footprints of towers, museum, and memorial. In the Image above (click to enlarge), it is possible to see the new “spine” crossing what was once a mega-block.  This is the nascent Greenwich Street which will eventually be flanked on the left by towers and on the right by the park and memorial fountains. The far right of the image shows the initial steel members of the Freedom Tower, which is expected to rise over the next four years to the symbolic height of 1,776 ft.

Turning away from this panorama, we focused in on Maki’s design of Tower 4. Mr. Sassa explained its sculptural qualities, its engagement with the ground plane, and its subtle reflection of the adjacent memorial. The building is undeniably simple—but in the thoughtful and precise manner characteristic of Japanese design.  This simplicity may prove to be Tower 4’s saving grace as construction begins under financial pressure; the more complex buildings of Richard Rogers and Norman Foster appear to be on hold.

Many of the architects, engineers, and consultants who had been working collaboratively on the tenth floor of Tower 7 have retreated back to their own turf to weather the economic storm. While construction teams work furiously to build massive foundations, no one is completely sure what will appear above.  If lending remains tight, towers face a literal (and figurative) chopping block.

More information regarding the World Trade Center site can be found online at wtc.com

Living here at Cornell’s medical campus offers an interesting perspective into the lives of med students. Our kitchen functions as the main social hub in the dorm and bears witness to a host of communal and culinary activities. Study sessions one night are followed by celebrations the next — the intensity of both activities being directly proportional to the difficulty of the intervening exam.

I glanced at notes on the table and remembered how much I dislike molecular science. Chemical structures never seemed quite as interesting to me as inhabitable ones. Studying architecture, however, doesn’t prevent me from flirting with the idea of becoming a doctor.  I live in a med-school dormitory and have a bona fide identification card — I just need to start attending classes and I will be on the fast track to success.

With this in mind, I have been keeping my eye out for information regarding my future, hypothetical career.  Medical flyers litter the bulletin boards on each floor. One poster encouraged students to attend a lecture concerning H1N1, another invited us to a special conference about healthcare. But one flyer, in particular, caught my attention:

“Interested in surgery? Love beer? You just hit the jackpot!” At the bottom of the page, after some further details, they offer a convincing — if not simplistic – reason to attend the event:  “Surgery is awesome (and there will be a keg. Seriously.)”

I’ve always been intrigued by surgery and I do like beer.  Joining the the Stimson Surgical Society suddenly seemed like a good idea.  Then I remembered my best friend talking about anatomy class and the gruesome dissection videos that he sent me. Cutting up bodies for a living is a gory business. Maybe that’s where the beer comes into play — it calms the nerves.

But consider the implications of this poster.  Do all beer-lovers become surgeons?  If so, it’s likely that other medical specialties have their own drink-of-choice.  Wine for cardiologists, jungle juice for pediatricians, gin and tonic for dermatologists, daiquiris for family practitioners — the list could go on and on.  An entire healthcare system consuming and consumed by alcohol.