CHRONOS
STRANGE CREATURE: TROPICAL ANIMATED FORM
DESIGN IV | DESIGN BY MAKING | 2020 - 2021
Surviving in an environment is about adaptation. “Strange Creatures” are enveloping forms, each accommodating one person. Each has a persona. To thrive they need to reconcile the bipolar contradictions of the tropical climate. They exploit an aspect of the climate or environment to benefit and express their existence. They are territorial, highly mobile within the confine of their chosen habitat. Their skin, bones, muscles, and organs are transformed from salvaged materials and as-found objects.
Alfred Russel Wallace
A Narrative of Travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro, 1853
“In all works on Natural History, we constantly find details of the marvelous
adaptation of animals to their food, their habits, and the localities in which they
are found. But naturalists are now beginning to look beyond this and to see
that there must be some other principle regulating the infinitely varied forms
of animal life.”
Environment, Climate & Envelope is a lesson about design by making, informed by empirical and evidence-based means for developing form & space responsive to the hot, humid, and wet climate.
Daniel A Barber
Modern Architecture & Climate, 2020
“Architecture is the interface of a material and a symbolic substrate for a range
of new ideas about social engagement with climatic patterns……….The planetary
interior becomes the space for cultivating a planetary imaginary, where the
role of climate in design is not an obstacle but an opportunity.”
RAIN
WIND
COMMON MATERIAL: COTTON BUD
SUN
The design begins with the selection of a common everyday material. Out of the numerous
materials available, the team chose cotton bud. The reason are as such:
I. Due to its size and scale, the potential of a single unit to create variations is vast.
II. When aggregated, the cotton buds are able to interlock, displaying various
tectonic properties.
III. The presence of cotton at the tips grants its ability to soak and retain liquid,
potentially informing the form, passive climatic strategies and scents.
Additionally, the thickness of the cotton ends allows us to connect
them in more ways than a stick with a uniform profile.
SKELETAL FRAME
We first explored the potential of cotton buds as a skin by placing
individual sticks together through various connection methods.
The resulting piece was all soft which hints at the possibility
of folding and twisting.
The next attempt was to create a variation of the 'Wind Fabric' that
would better show the movement of the wind, we created a surface
using modules that could twist, allowing it to twist in response
to the predominant wind direction.
EXPANDABLE PANEL
Focusing on the concept of "dynamism", the team tried to
create a frame that can be manipulated. After subsequent
attempt, we discovered that interlocking the pair modules
in a certain way allows it to slide, and we made use of that
property to create this 'Expandable Panel'.
The first breakthrough was the discovery of the 'pair module'
where the team connect the cotton buds in pairs, interlocking
one another. This allowed the resulting models to all be
dynamic, allowing them to collapse,
expand, and also twist.
COLLAPSIBLE FABRIC
Based on the discovered modules, the team investigated their
potential to form architectural surfaces. The first surface is termed
the 'wind fabric', as it acts like an ephemeral skin that responded
to the wind and seemingly mimicked the leaves' pattern.
While responding to the wind, it is also collapsible in both
directions to become denser/porous, while also being
able to be folded and curved in multiple directions.
COLLAPSIBILITY
BOUYANCY
ALTERATION
TECTONICS TRANSLATION
Buoyancy - Sense of Lightness
Collapsibility - Dynamism in Space
Alteration - Adjustability / Adaptability of Form
TECTONICS DIAGRAM
With the continuous movement of time, the cotton bud
responds to the structural behavior of light and shadow.
Iterative Process Video
The video reflects the interrogation of Cotton Buds during the 13 weeks
from January 11 to April 13, 2021.
GARDENER | WRITER
CONCEPTUAL DIAGRAM OF DUALITY
Conceptual diagram showcasing the preferences of the gardener and the writer in relation to the tectonics
of cotton buds and their individual methods of tracking time, as well as their own time-tracking mechanism.
Temporal Perception serves as an interesting layer for the architecture, and timekeeping
is retained as the identity of the personas. The way they perceive time is different and as
such requires the envelope to be in a different state to accommodate.
The gardener will retract it to create a darker and isolated interior whilst
the gardener will expand it to create a brighter and engaging interior.
Varying the numbers of cotton buds within each module
and the way of layering will affect the intensity
of filtered light and shadows.
Increasing the number of cotton buds and having fewer layers will
allow more light to enter for the gardener whereas decrease the
number of cotton buds and having more layers will
reduce the amount of filtered light.
MAKING - WEEK 04 | 01 FEBRUARY 2021
Thomas Carlyle
Scottish philosopher & historian, 1795-1881
"Silence is deep as Eternity;
speech is shallow as Time."
AGING PROCESS - WEEK 28 | 06 AUGUST 2021
Thomas Stearns Eliot
Four Quartets, 1941
"To be conscious is not to be in time
But only in time can the moment in the rose-garden,
The moment in the arbour where the rain beat,
Be remembered; involved with past and future.
Only through time time is conquered."
PERSONA TRANSLATION
LEAVES RUSTLE
SHADOW PATTENS
GARDENER'S TIME
GARDENER'S ENVELOPE
TRANSLATION
The Gardener perceives time through motion and growth; The gardener seeks physical evidences of the passage of time in the external environment around him. He embraces nature directly and actively tries to be part of it, to witness and experience the changes firsthand.
The gardener reaches out for maximum exposure to the outside and wishes for a direct engagement . He enjoys looking out at the rain and feeling the droplets against his skin; observing shadows change as clouds cover the sun; watching
the wind animate objects; feeling the
warmth of the sun.
FOCAL LIGHT
DIFFUSE LIGHT
WRITER'S TIME
WRITER'S ENVELOPE
TRANSLATION
The Writer grasps time through writing and self-reflecting. He desires solace to write, reflect, and reflect. He enjoys the protection provided
by the envelope against environmental
conditions that allows him immersion
into his own world.
The writer retreats inwards and seeks protection. He seeks a private space to write. He enjoys diffused light within the envelope while having focused
light for him to write; The stillness of the
enclosed space, and the privacy it
provides, gives him peace of
mind to think and write.
EXPANDED
CONTRACTED
WINDOW - OPEN
WINDOW - CLOSE
CURTAIN - DOWN
CURTAIN - UP
ACCUMULATION | SUBTRACTION
The use of wooden modules on the envelope as a
method of timekeeping for the gardener and the writer.
GARDENER | WRITER
SECTION
GARDENER | WRITER
PLAN
STRANGE CREATURE: CHRONOS
GARDENER | DUAL PERSONA | WRITER
The video demonstrates the dual character between the writer and gardener
who use the envelope to suit his character.
SCALABILITY
SITE
JURONG LAKE | LAKE GARDEN
LAKE GARDEN
SCALABILITY | DEPLOYABLIITY
KAIROS
QUALITATIVE MOMENTS OF INDETERMINATE LENGTH
Upon visiting the site, there seemed to be a lot of couples taking wedding photos. Witnessing this, we realized that
this is an opportunity to tie the poetics of cotton buds to the events occurring at the site. The cotton buds
offer the potential to be integrated into the site as a series of "moments" catered to the
couples whilst exploring an alternative perception of time - Kairos.
EXHIBITION
PROCESS JOURNAL
