An Athenaeum in Washington Heights

An Athenaeum (here, a private institution combining housing, a theater, and a library) was situated across a difficult site in the heart of Washington Heights. The site was difficultly graded (more than 45 degrees over the entire length of the site), and positioned in the middle of a poverty gradient (from a 4% poverty rate on the west to a 60% poverty rate on the east). The Athenaeum was an attempt to promote communal equality through architectural devices, such as selective transparency and elimination of visual hierarchies.

A Library in Chinatown

Situated on a government-owned thru-block site, the Chinatown Library is a project completed during the Fall 2007 semester. It is a representation of the psychogeographical map of the Chinatown natives, and presents a narrative, bringing the building's user from infancy to maturity through the careful location of programmatic elements. Modeled with Sketchup, rendered with Maxwell Render.

A Pool on Rutgers Newark's Campus

A parcel of land was given to us to design an outdoor pool, with only one requirement: the pool doesn't matter. Quickly noticing a plethora of golden ratios and perfect geometry, I dedicated the site to an exploration of platonic forms. From that developed an allegorical representation of Plato's Cave. Splitting the site's users into two groups, Swimmers and Walkers, the Swimmers are privileged, and understand the whole of the site, whereas the Walkers live happily in their realm, oblivious to the qualities of the pool.

A School in Newark

The Newark public schools system presented a problem to the students: create a school on one of four urban sites to replace the decommissioned Central High School. Capitalizing on Newark's trend to vocationalize and specialize (I.E. Arts High, Science Park), Fermata is a music-focused K-through-12 school. Engaging the community in a simultaneously authoritative and embracing gesture, Fermata creates spaces that allow the flow of music from practice rooms to learning spaces to foster the educational process.

A Housing Mid-rise in Brooklyn

This studio project was an exercise in constraints. The site was assigned, and restrictions on height, massing, open-space ratios, floor-area ratios, and even material requirements were given. Confined by real-life constraints, this project embraced the massing and open-space requirements to create a community gallery and courtyard, with a strong visual connection, creating a sense of community ownership. The site is finished with an integrated commercial/communal programmatic component.