DFO at Southern Cross

These aren't the best construction detail pictures of the DFO at Southern Cross Station, but here they are anyway. The detail shows a fairly complicated joint of column to rafters. I noticed the services were all quite exposed in the ceiling area, and the structure was fairly visible, although i think this may have been more for cost efficiency than any kind of Miesian philosophy. I remember reading an article last year in the age where a bunch of prominent architects publicly criticised this building, which is usually against the architect's code of practice. They were objecting to this kind of cheap, industrial and ugly building being so prominent in the city centre, and i would have to agree that it is out of place.

Residential Site

This is a small residential site I walked past in Clifton Hill. It's not long span, but it is a lovely image of a slab on ground with plumbing sticking out.

Brambuk continued

Here are some images of the Brambuk Cultural Centre being constructed from this website: http://oak.arch.utas.edu.au/projects/aus/163/cbram.html. They show the organic forms that can be created with a bit of ingenuity in the timber framing. The website also has technical information about the project outling the process and the materials utilised. Here is an extract:

"Local sandstone was used for the base of the walls and lower floors of the central area. The display area floor and the walls of the main gathering space are of consolidated earth.

Twenty four 200 mm diameter Grey Box poles, many with bark intact, encircle the hearth and carry parts of the roof structure as well as the spiralling ramp which winds its way up through the building. The principle roof structure is supported on the massive undulating segmented ridge beam which, like a back-bone, runs between two large timber posts at the extreme ends of the building, where the major space of the theatre and display room are located. The segmented ridge beam is constructed from short lengths of straight material (LVL) lapped and nailed to form the complex curve of the roof profile. Nail gusset technology, derived from industrial building practice, thus provides a role in the organic expression of the building.

The ridge beam supports one end of the series of inclined 360mm x 63mm LVL rafters, that form the roof profile. Segmented timber stud walls support the other. Pre-fabricated in 1200mm wide panels, the walls were designed as a tilt-up system that deploy Radiata Pine framing, and a plywood skin that also functions as the interior wall lining. The external cladding is Cypress Pine boards, steamed to fit the curve and fixed horizontally in a lower band and vertically above. All of the curved timber elements, including the Victorian Ash handrails of the spiralling ramp, were steam bent on site.

The rafters carry a timber board ceiling, insulation and the sheet metal roof".

So there you go. They said it all. Cool building.

Brambuk Living Cultural Centre

Here are some images of the Brambuk Living Cultural Centre in Halls Gap from when I visited a few weeks ago. It was designed by Gregory Burgess and engineered by Peter Yttrip and associates, as mentioned by Jeremy in the timber lecture a few weeks back. I wasn't allowed to take photos of the inside, but check the next blog for some further research.

More Mies

The New National Gallery in Berlin, The Illinois Institute of Technology Library, Crown Hall frame and a model of the Mannheim Theatre project.

Tutorial exercises and my schematic design

This is a gutter detail with a precast concrete wall panel.
Here is a gutter detail between two portal frames.

And this is a section through a portal framed warehouse and an attached office.

Here are some images of my initial design for the major project. The warehouse is in the style of the Crown Hall and the Mannheim Theatre project, featuring a steel frame with attached I beams on the outside of the facade and the roof suspended from external trusses. The sides of the facade incorporate masonry in the first two metres of their elevation, as Mies used in the Illinois Institute of Technology Library. The attached office space will be modelled on the New National Gallery in Berlin. The overall plan is reminiscent of the classic Mies layout of staggered rectangles, as seen in the Farnsworth House. I was also thinking of placing both on small podiums, as Mies would have wanted.

Major project research

I have decided to design the warehouse for the major project in the style of Mies van der Rohe. Here are some pictures I've found of buildings he designed. He believed that the structure of buildings should be clearly expressed, as shown in these pictures of Crown Hall and the Farnsworth house, which feature the steel structural framing on the outside of their facades.