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Web Hardware - Day 2

Team members: Stephanie Wong, Elizabeth Galan, Rhett Parker, and Jeremy Bunner

Day two.

We started today with a team meeting. We set a game plan for everyone- finish our drawings (plans, elevations, sections), programming, and to get started on precedents.

Our group split and got to work measuring our building. We have 14,400 sf, so there was a lot to do. We also finished up photographing our building.

We moved on to finishing our existing plans and started discussing what we want to do with our building. Our client was aiming for 10 apartments. The average studio apartment is 600sf and at that rate, with tare subtracted, we can fit about 19 studio apartments in the space. We want to incorporate a rooftop terrace with an amazing vista of the town, both toward Main St. the high school. With any luck, we'll be finish that up tomorrow.

Crichton Building Daily Notes 12/14

After surveying the building yesterday, we completed the line drawings that make up the plans and sections of the existing conditions of the building. We had to go back and re survey a few areas and pieces of the building that we forgot and missed in the initial survey. Upon completion of those, we began to add programing to the spaces. These include variations of our client’s idea of dormitory style housing, as well as other ideas for studio/one bedroom apartments. In the variations of the drawings, we use different forms of egress as well as different styles of spaces to compose the units. In the afternoon, we also went to the Minden Museum, which had a lot of information and exhibits for the size of the town were in.

Team Imperial Hotel Day 2

Group Blog
Members: Rob, Jessica, Shawn, and Annette

The Imperial Hotel has proved to be a time consuming building to document. We are finishing our line drawings of the existing structure and site. We have also come to the conclusion that the small building beside the hotel, which we have nicknamed the “Mouse House”, should be relocated for the value of the hotel property. The Mouse House blocks the view on the first and second floors and is an inefficient use of space. Our design solutions are much stronger with the use of that adjacent lot. Rob and Shawn climbed the fire escape to explore design possibilities on the roof! We are excited about our progress, but are not excited to study building and safety codes tonight.

Crichton Building: Existing Condtions

Minden_ExistingPhotos

Team Crichton Building

TEAM CRICHTON

On our first visit to our building, our group was slightly apprehensive about our assignment. We were initially a little overwhelmed with the amount of work that faced us, but after further investigation this fear has subsided. We realize our building, the Crichton building, has enormous potential for its owner and its surrounding community.

In addition to the building’s extraordinary potential is the building’s existing condition. In comparison to the other buildings in our program, our building is in a wonderful condition. Its Interior surfaces such as walls and floors are sound and are beautifully finished and trimmed with wood. These existing conditions will obviously be utilized and enhanced.

Once our team explored our building for the first time, we held our first client meeting. Right off the bat our owner, Carey Easley, had a very strong concept for the program of his space. He believed the building’s original use, a boarding house, was the most profitable solution for his program. After the conclusion of this meeting our team gathered our notes and began to further investigate this proposition. From this point we have also begun collaborating ideas, research, and drawings in efforts to assess the building’s program. Hopefully by Wednesday this collaboration will effectively produce helpful information that will enable us to further assist our client.

Team Imperial Hotel Day 1

Group Blog
Members: Rob, Jessica, Shawn, and Annette

Today, we toured the buildings that each group will be rehabilitating. Our building, the Imperial Hotel, has three stories. The bottom story is currently used for retail. The upper stories have been deserted for many years, but will be returned to a hotel. Our biggest design problem at the moment is the entry to the hotel. We hope that our client will be willing to give up the rented, retail space on the first floor for a lobby and grand staircase. The owner has another building adjacent to the Imperial Hotel. It resides in an alleyway that would be very profitable to the hotel, but we are not sure if our owner would be willing to move the small building away from the site. We will have several different designs to show our client during the meeting on Thursday.

Team Webb Hardware Day 1

Group Blog

Members: Elizabeth, Jeremy, Rhett, Stephanie

Day 1 was fun and we got to see a bit more of Minden. As a studio, we toured all the buildings we will be working on and we got one that spans a whole block. It is divided in 2 parts and is the second floor of a building with retail/commercial areas underneath. One part is owned by the Odoms and serves as their storage area and the other is an old photo studio. These areas are somewhat deserted and filled with various, discarded junk, so getting measurements was a challenge at times. We've seen our share of dead birds so that was frightening/disgusting, but one other group has many dead and live birds in their building so we're counting our blessings.

We also got a really informative and interesting lecture from Lester Martin who is an architect and taught at LA Tech for a number of years. He is a really nice guy and had a lot of wisdom to share with us. He also had a number of awesome, detailed, hand drawings of a restored building he did in downtown Ruston, LA-they are really beautiful. He spoke about restoration and rehabilitation of old buildings and the positive consequences that come from it.

We aren't completely done with taking measurements as well as editing our photographs, but we are working at a steady pace and have started our CAD drawings.