A node in a larger system and local landscape.
Hannah Pavlovich & Kevin Chen / Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI - Arc)
Our project for a small airport in Ibaraki, Japan is a warped node in a larger infrastructural system. The building and surrounding landscape are created from an expansive field of structural pins. The landscape is filled in with artificial soil, which covers and works with the pins. The pin field is then warped to move up and around the building, connecting landscape and building into a single surface. To form the building, the pins are held together with a diagrid, structurally strengthening the building.
Under the local landscape, volumes are gently carved from the pin field to allow for car and airplane traffic and garages. Above, the building comprises of multiple layers, diminishing the idea of the building as a unique form, and celebrating it as a conglomeration of parts. The layers weave together, making each component important in composing the whole, while they maintain their integrity to the continuous vector field, obliterating a unique definition in them.
Through our excess layers and use of fields, we have created a building that cannot be read as an autonomous unit, but as a node in a larger airport system and local landscape.
Under the local landscape, volumes are gently carved from the pin field to allow for car and airplane traffic and garages. Above, the building comprises of multiple layers, diminishing the idea of the building as a unique form, and celebrating it as a conglomeration of parts. The layers weave together, making each component important in composing the whole, while they maintain their integrity to the continuous vector field, obliterating a unique definition in them.
Through our excess layers and use of fields, we have created a building that cannot be read as an autonomous unit, but as a node in a larger airport system and local landscape.
Hannah Pavlovich
Hannah Pavlovich is a designer based in New York City. She received her Masters of Architecture from the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) in 2014 and a B.S.E. in Civil Engineering with an Architectural Focus from Princeton University. At SCI-Arc, she was awarded the Gehry Prize for outstanding work on her thesis project, Puzzling, which synthesized the esoteric form-finding strategy with the programmatic and typological challenges of designing a courthouse. She is currently working with Studio Joseph and maintaining her commitment to creativity while implementing design solutions. She recently completed Jacob Riis: Revealing New York’s Other Half at the Museum of the City of New York, for which she was the lead designer and project manager.
Kevin Yen-Po Chen
Growing up in Taiwan and Canada, Kevin Yen-Po Chen has always been passionate about architecture, he has a background in both civil engineering and architecture. Throughout his studies and career he has always been intrigued by architects such as Buckminster Fuller, Frei Otto, and Peter Cook. His passion in digital fabrication, engineering, and machines has led him to scripting in python and grasshopper, building his own 3D printer, and conducting research projects with space-industry materials. During his studies at SCI-Arc he has been mentored by Wes Jones, Wolf Prix, Nanako Umemoto, Herwig Baumgartner, Peter Zellner, Margaret Griffin, and Eric Carcamo. His experience include working at design firms in Los Angeles, Taiwan, and Vancouver. He is currently working with a developer firm, incorporating not only design, but all facets of architectural projects such as cost and proforma by building innovative scripts in grasshopper.