Amna Ansari

FINALIST: XI’AN RIVER STUDY FINALIST - OFFICE OF MAYOR OF XI’AN

While employed at Dblant Design Group

A proposal presented to the city of Xi’an looking for ideas to revitalize the section of two major river crossings. Xi’an is organized by a structured macro grid system, clearly defined along the infrastructure of highways. This investigation attempts to reinterpret an organized yet unfixed grid by finding irregular structures of varying uses and density.

The Chan and Ba River define the east border of Xi’an without interrupting inner city development. While holding a one week workshop in Xi’an and collecting local data, we noticed that the rivers were left untreated with trash ridden edges that define industrial zones. We also noted that the natural topography of the rivers change drastically during rainy and dry winter seasons, hiding and exposing the river embankments respectively.

Given the strong natural features of the rivers, the proposal considers its changing appearances in regards to future development and its inhabitants. In contrast to the traditional understanding of the Chinese city as geometric built surface with infills of organic spaces, this design proposes the reverse: a natural landscape with implants of highly cultivated spots in hopes of densifying the rivers with visitors and inhabitants.

Houston's Warehouse District dynamics are evolving as large infrastructure planned projects are projected to start within a span of 5-30 years. This creates an urgency for examining planning scenarios that secure a thriving district and support Houston Downtown’s future success.

The project will conduct a series of planning studies associated with the assessment and upgrade of urban design, transportation, and infrastructural systems within the Warehouse District.

Amna Ansari - is leading the Warehouse District Vision study under SWA Group for Houston Downtown Management District

More about the study can be found on Houston Downtown Management District’s website:

Houston Downtown District Planning and Capital Projects

Proposal for Health Service Clinic Park in Sunnyside Houston.

While employed at SWA Group

VIDEO: AERIAL FUTURES: THE NEXT FRONTIER

The Next Frontier Think Tank- Houston Spaceport

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

‘Aerial Futures’ is a non-profit exploring innovation in the architecture of flight, technology and the broader urban mobility ecosystem’ - aerialfutures.org

‘The Next Frontier’ was a two part event. The first evening a panel examining ‘cosmic connectivity’ with guests from NASA, FAA, and the Houston Airport System. UltraBarrio’s Co-Founder Marcus Martinez, was moderating as the Chair of the Houston AIA Urban Design Committee.

The second day - The Think Tank event expanded with a select number of leaders in the fields of robotics, astronomy, physics, and prototyping. Together we examined the many aspects of Houston’s future Spaceport. Both UB co-founders Amna Ansari and Marcus Martinez co-led one of the three panels called ‘Space for Culture’.

The full day investigation was focused around the emergence of commercial human space flight and the potential opportunities that spaceports may provide in the context of Houston. While Houston has had a long standing reputation as Space City, could the spaceport become both disruptive and unifying?

AWARD: ASLA HONOR AWARD 2017

While employed at SWA Group

The Bend of the River Botanic Garden Master Plan envisions a spectacular community gathering place set amidst a regionally significant botanic garden. The design for the 88-acre site synthesizes site contamination cleanup issues with the design and construction of the gardens. The Master Plan enhances the historic communal uses of the former ranch site while expanding the programming opportunities and creating a strong vision for integrating botanic programming with restoration of the native ecosystem and amplifying the cultural milieu of central Texas and the City of Temple.

LOCATION

Temple is midway between San Antonio and Dallas, and the Bend of the River site is located at the southeast quadrant of the intersection of interstate I35 and the Leon River. The site is composed of two parcels separately donated to the City of Temple and consolidated into a single property. The site exists within the Blackland Prairie ecosystem of central Texas, and community members expressed a strong desire for the use of native plants on the site to restore the ecology from its current conditions of mowed turf and agricultural uses. Native prairie and forest systems will structure the overall site to create habitat, provide legibility for the major circulation systems, and ensure low maintenance, while the actual garden collections will feature more colorful and exotic collections typical of a botanic garden that will draw the public. Culturally, Temple was established as a railroad town and has become a major stakeholder in the healthcare and bioscience industries, and to this end the plan provides many opportunities to promote healthy lifestyles, learning, research, cultural enrichment, and leisure activities.

SITE CONTAMINATION

The west (30-acre) parcel, a ranch donated by the Talasek family, has topsoil contaminated with arsenic and antimony that were aerially deposited over a number of years from the Rockwool Industries site southeast across the river. This parcel, adjacent to the freeway, has been frequently used for community events over the years, and is the obvious location for large events for the public in the botanic garden plan because of its accessibility to the freeway and its flat topography. The Master Plan provides two options for dealing with the contaminated soils: full removal or cap-and-cover, depending upon funding. Phytoremediation is not an option given this type of contamination, especially paired with the clients' desires to quickly clean up the site. The Master Plan considers the worst-case scenario of keeping the contaminated soil on-site in a cap-and-cover mound, finding creative methods by transforming the mound to facilitate experiences.

FRAMEWORK DIALOGUE

The Master Plan creates a design language transforming challenges of contaminated soils into a method of spatially structuring the site. It was paramount to resolve the contaminated zone and furthermore, exercise the creative capacity of the remediation strategy toward the programming language of the greater site. The plan finds opportunities within the remediation strategy of the cap-and-cover mound. The mound is positioned and composed to maximize both internal and external relationships to the Botanic Garden. The mound, parallel to the freeway edge, creates a sound barrier to the interior of the site while also creating a striking and artful land form that emphasizes garden entry at a vehicular visual scale. The citywide bike path can be integrated to the north edge of the site, further offering cyclists an elevated perspective into the gardens as they bike along the top of the mound in this vast flat landscape.

The natural topographical character, existing forest and lake were each a key subject of preservation and ecological restoration – and valuable as authentic zones that pair with a Native Nature Walk zone, that anchors the framework for the Master Plan. These paths array along the native contours of the site that leverage the natural exhibition of local biodiversity, and provide complementary programs, such as Bird Blinds, an Elevated Canopy Walk, and a Native Nature Walk that celebrates native species. The Garden Collections are organized within this Native framework, allowing the gardens to punctuate, lead, and define a unique pace to the experience of the site. This framework serves as a scenic backdrop for the gardens, with rotating collections that offer continual visual interest throughout the year, while providing opportunities for visitors to socialize, exercise, relax and learn in a beautiful setting.

PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT

The Master Planning process involved educating the public about the contaminated soils on-site and options for cleanup, potentials for programming and garden collections, and coordinating the cleanup of the contaminated soils with the phasing of the construction of the botanic garden plan. The public engagement process reinforced the expressed desires of retaining the community gathering functions of its previous use while simultaneously expanding its potential as a regional draw for events, weddings, passive recreation, and the performing arts. A series of four public meetings encouraged the public to dream about the possibilities of their future garden site while communicating the opportunities and constraints of the site design, and gather feedback on the draft plan for refinement for the public presentation of the final Master Plan.

IMPLEMENTATION

A path to full build-out of the plan was created that aligns the required site disturbance for the contamination cleanup to coincide with the first phase of construction. This first phase will simultaneously continue the use of the site for community gathering by providing an event lawn for concerts and performances, plaza space and multi-use building and also look to the future by introducing the first gardens and associated maintenance and trial grow areas. The second phase can develop over time as funding allows the implementation of individual gardens. The third phase involves enhancing the large wooded area on the eastern portion of the site with a canopy walk and more trails and gardens. The final phase includes an arboretum and the possibility of relocating the maintenance and trial grow areas to the east of the site if there is demand for additional parking in those locations from the first phase.

The LANDSCAPE ECOLOGY approach emphasizes the interrelationship between urban landscape patterns and ecological and socioeconomic processes on different scales. Achieving these objectives will require a balance between consideration of the broader patterns of ecology that provide context for the greenways, and the small scale opportunities to create or enhance habitat and cultural value. The greatest chance for success rests in the ability to find “win-win” scenarios in which both people and biodiversity benefit.

While employed at SWA Group

AWARD: AIA HOUSTON DESIGN AWARD 2011

While employed at Powers Brown Architecture

With efforts to revitalize Bryan’s historic downtown, city just north of Houston, Texas, development is underway with future planned offices, retail, and housing. The Bryan Intermodal Transit Facility located near downtown’s Main Street, includes a 900 car garage, new offices, retail, and a small bus terminal.

With the major façade of the entire building being the garage’s south face, the task was to design a skin that could articulate the character of Bryan and fit within its existing fabric. An unusual yet intriguing aspect of Bryan, especially for buildings on downtown’s Main Street, is the application of fire escape stairs in major view.

This idea is hyper exaggerated on the garage’s south facade with multiple fire escape stairs that provide access to all five levels at various points, continuing the city’s urban fabric. The stairs exist in a transient space occurring between edge of the garage and the outer screens constructed of perforated metal. Stairs cut in and out of the metal screens and through the structure with purpose to preserve the city’s historical character and provide a method to decipher the building’s disposition.

Circulation, both horizontal and vertical, is also an important architectural consideration for this project in fulfilling the urban demands due to its governance of people; the single most critical component of urbanity and their movement through spaces.

AWARD: AIA DC UNBUILT HONOR AWARD 2010

While employed at Powers Brown Architecture

The competition invites ideas for a single family house prototype that could be built within 99K construction budget employing local sustainable and replication strategies. Ultimately the winning house will be built in Houston’s Fifth Ward district with potential for repeated prototypes. The Fifth Ward has seen recent decay and foreclosures in the housing market, the aim is to revitalize the area by bringing families back to the neighborhood.

Strong consideration is given to creating a house that considered not only the demographics of the area with extended families living under the same roof but also utilizing a structural system that could act both as roof and wall.

Given budget constraints, a prefab industrial Quonset construction system, abundantly available on the outskirts of Houston, was selected because it can minimize erection time, cause efficiencies in the ability to act as both roof and wall and accommodate a wide range of labor capabilities. It utilizes crimped steel ribs to create self structuring spans of varying lengths that have the benefit of being energy efficient through the recycled nature of the steel and its high reflectivity.

The plan is flexible, it attempts to accommodate the idiosyncrasies of its users and not predict how they must live. This strategy provides a sense of customization on a budget.

with Powers Brown Architecture

AWARD: ASLA HONOR AWARD 2016

While employed at SWA Group

Riverfront Fort Wayne Conceptual Master Plan utilizes Fort Wayne’s rivers as catalyst for creating new types of public spaces, improving river ecology, and fostering economic growth. Further, the plan seeks to strengthen the identity of Fort Wayne as a destination that displays an active and healthy lifestyle, provides access to nature in the city, and captures historic assets, transforming them into distinct experiences.

The Riverfront Study was set forth as a result of a Legacy Fort Wayne community initiative, created by Mayor Tom Henry in 2011. Legacy Fort Wayne Task Force identified Fort Wayne’s riverfront as the key opportunity area for investment and recommended to make the Riverfront Fort Wayne Conceptual Master Plan a priority. Revitalization along the riverfront would re-connect with the landscape heritage of Fort Wayne and be a vital step towards achieving a vision of a vibrant, regionally important destination just north of the City’s downtown. A plan that dates back to the early 1900’s also recognized the need to protect the riverfront from over-development. This plan preserved a series of green corridors and patches as an amenity for the city.

However, industry and the introduction of the automobile fragmented this early notion of protecting the riverfront's green corridors. The riverfront project area is also within the 500 year floodplain and nearly half of the area is within the 100 year floodplain. A 1982 flood forced an evacuation of 9,000 residents and damaged many buildings. Water quality is also poor given the large number of CSOs (Combined Sewer Overflows) and agricultural runoff within the larger watersheds. As a result of those factors and effects of the dam-controlled artificial pooling of the water, the three rivers within the project area have poor aquatic habitat. Riparian and shoreline conditions have extreme range from expansive natural areas such as floodplain forests, to highly engineered rip-rap banks and flood walls. These conditions often sever views and access to the rivers, which have great potential as assets for the city.

Primary strategies lodged within the master plan will create a series of catalytic projects that build on one another while taking advantage of a growing river culture and appreciation of Fort Wayne’s rivers. The plan proposes significant improvements in the riparian habitat of the river system and constructs new types of habitat ecological systems in key locations that put nature in the heart of Downtown Fort Wayne. The plan is intended to be a long range vision for Fort Wayne’s riverfront and looks at a 50 year horizon.

Implementation of Riverfront Fort Wayne Conceptual Master Plan is focused on improving publicly held lands, and acquiring certain privately held parcels. The Riverfront Study Area is divided into six precincts. Beginning on the eastern edge of the Study Area the precincts are: Bloomingdale & Guildin Nature and Ecology Park, Riverfront Promenade and Development Parcels, Superior Street, Lawton Discovery Park, The Old Fort, and Sphere of Confluence environmental art place.

The identified Phase 1 promenade plan envisions two distinct waterfronts unified by the river. The north side of the river offers a soft native landscape with trails complimented by rest areas under shade structures. The open space is anchored by a large stepped and floating deck designed to be a great civic space along the river. Headwaters Junction envisions plaza spaces that transform the historic rail experience, into a public event. The south side is comprised of lounge decks and plazas with a variety of places for shopping, dining and entertainment. The waterfronts are connected by two pedestrian bridges: one existing, Old Wells St. Bridge, and one proposed, anchored at Headwaters Park. Interconnected pedestrian circulation loops make waterfront exploration convenient and encourage visitors to linger. The process for Phase 1, riverfront promenade development, is underway. The city has a $12 million budget for the riverfront’s Phase 1, paid for through a combination of Legacy Fund money and contributions from the Community Foundation of Greater Fort Wayne and the Allen County-Fort Wayne Capital Improvement Board.

Public meetings were held at each stage of the design process to maximize community input and involvement. At the initial public meeting, ideas were introduced about how inherent qualities of riverfront adjacencies should inform planning decisions. The underlying structure of sub-districts, community and programmatic networks begin to identify big idea strategies. During the next series of meetings, programmatic percentages were presented in order to develop the right mix of elements on the site. Feedback from the residents helped determine their correct balance.

The overall goal of Riverfront Fort Wayne Conceptual Master Plan is to establish a framework for action, to maximize the use and value of Fort Wayne’s rivers through increased recreational use, ecological restoration, enhancement and development. The master plan also realizes the value of reconnecting back to the city’s rivers and riverfront areas as an economic and place making asset to the downtown, the community, and the region.

While employed at SWA Group

Located within a master planned community in New Cairo, the central greenspace of Hyde Park uses planting, landforms and programming to create a neighborhood oasis - a communal greenspace for its residence to explore, engage, and connect. Hills create a dynamic experience both visually and experientially by embedding program within. The landforms are also utilized to frame views and provide a layering effect to the landscape. An interconnected open space network connects a variety of experiences from hike and bike trails, fitness plazas, and botanical gardens. Community clubhouses, retail and restaurants serve nearby residents and community visitors.

Programmed hills within four distinct zones create a dynamic experience along an interconnected open space network, providing unique amenities to a wide variety of age groups. The ecological or botanical zone is comprised of an interactive nature learning experience, demonstration gardens, a koi pond for quiet reflection and sanctuary garden for an end of the day decompression. The prominence of the three sculpted hills within the cultural zone serve as focal points from the surrounding villas as well as seating for audiences and classes.  The cultural zone offers many opportunities for group gatherings with an event lawn, the clubhouse plaza, and an area to host an outdoor art market. The active or dynamic zone closest to the main food and beverage component provides several opportunities for both passive and active exercise. Amenities include a sprint track, CrossFit area, bouldering wall, and yoga lawn. The entertainment zone creates moments for visitors and residents to enjoy the lake as a beautiful backdrop with opportunities for outdoor dining and hosting private events on the lake’s lawn, all serviced by the Food and Beverage establishment.  This building also serves as an iconic entrance into the park while framing views to the park.

Connection to the private sections of the park are accessed directly from the resident’s property. These connections lead homeowners to the main arteries and promenades of the inner park space. The trails are designed to accommodate groups of walkers, bikers and golf carts. These trails also serve to connect homeowners to the more remote ‘parklets’ which consist of playgrounds, barbeque lawns, splash pads and shade structures.

While employed at Powers Brown Architecture

The project is located in the middle of Houston’s Ship Channel occupied by heavy amounts of factories; it is one of United States’ busiest sea ports with constant traffic from Gulf of Mexico. The Ship Channel itself is close to the inner city, located along the east side of the inner loop.

An international client in Houston offering custom solutions and shipments for heavy lift and project cargo requested for a building with conference rooms and small offices at the Ship Channel overlooking their operations, in order to showcase their daily activities to the clients.

The challenge was to create a building that could withstand the Channel’s harsh environment as seen from surrounding metal buildings with deep corrosion caused by air ridden chemicals and sea water.

The building is elevated from the ground level, away from any unforeseen heavy traffic to allow visitors a better view to the company’s real time operations. Reception, offices and a small gallery are on the second floor, and break room and conference rooms with balcony access are on the top third floor. All major rooms and spaces are filtered with natural light. The massing and window openings reference a ship’s command, making the building fit along its moving context. The main exterior material is glazed brick of three different colors used to ‘color code’ program.

PUBLISHED: FAST COMPANY MAGAZINE’S ‘CO.EXIST FUTURIST FORUM’ JULY 2013

TALK: 5X5X5 SMART CITIES PANEL, ARCHITECTURE BOSTON EXPO 2013 HOSTED BY BOSTON SOCIETY OF ARCHITECTS

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

Currently, a number of American cities continue to regard parking, vehicle access, and speed as facilitative agents for growth and revenue. Is there a new model for American cities, in which mobility can reverse the effect of city centers consumed by the private motor car and its needs? How could the city operate if we made the same demands on mobility as we do for personal technology and software?

When it comes to personal technology we are critical of resilience, compatibility, energy consumption, and adaptability. In similar manner, can we consider mobility as a productive interface?

Shuffle City identifies opportunities outside of the ownership model to liberate an otherwise suppressed urban landscape, by programming a dynamic system of flow that is made more immediately possible through a public autonomous (driverless) vehicle fleet. City form and mobility act as a mechanism, or logistical body, that readily adapt to change, than the current fixed transit model.

Proposal for Houston Downtown Master Plan

While employed at SWA Group

Proposal for Vertical Take Off and Landing Impacts

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

Midtown DistrictPlanning

While employed at SWA Group

AWARD: AIA HOUSTON UNBUILT HONOR AWARD 2008

While employed at Powers Brown Architecture

Klein ISD was looking to expand into a larger high school, and as land is becoming scarce to find in large contiguous tracts, their current site had to be condemned and purchased by the school district. It is the last over 50 acre contiguous tract in the 88 square miles of this suburb.

Understanding that land is a valuable resource to the community, a proposition was made to minimize the building’s footprint, therefore allowing land to be available for future development that involves not only the school but also the city. This vertical building ‘learning machine’ proposes an integrated way of configuring the classrooms and its 545,000 SF program. Congested and impacted with spatial configurations make it stimulating to learn in. SLC’s (small learning communities) that focus on various subjects are arranged to promote dialogue and interdisciplinary collaborations. Outdoor garden areas are carefully carved out at various locations to provide spaces for students to practice dancing, singing, sculpting, or taking a lunch break.

The experience is something like a social mixing lab. The internal environment with its community space and inbound SLC’s will provide a transitional experience that will better prepare them to move on; serving as a cross between a High School and a College.

with Powers Brown Architecture

While employed at Morris Architects

While employed at Powers Brown Architecture

AWARD: HONORABLE MENTION - TOGS INTERNATIONAL 2009

ARTbenh / YOURbench is a responsible assembly that synchronizes art and its community; a module that when extracted from the assembly is used as benches for the community. The idea is driven by a strong consideration of the pavilion’s life cycle after its temporary use, offering a true ‘recycling gesture’. A perfect module for creating a place of art and reflection while servicing the community after its expiration date. In place of paying rent to store a retired pavilion, the bench components that assemble the pavilion can be distributed to museums, schools, playgrounds or any public space.

The concept also allows for various pavilion configurations constructed from one module. Artists can customize their exhibition creating anywhere from a fully closed gallery space to staging an open outdoor stage performance with bench seating provided. The design of the module and its assembly considers scale, programmatic freedom, site integration and comfort. The form of the bench is driven by ergonomics and connections necessary for the module to stack, slide, rotate, turn corners, and stay structurally locked in both axis.

A single module when repeated spatially adjusts to the artist’s needs with customization serving as a method for their identity, and when the module is distributed as an array of objects on a larger field it becomes the city’s ‘urban fabric’, serving the needs of the community.

While employed at SWA Group

While employed at SWA Group

While employed at SWA Group

While employed at Powers Brown Architecture

For a senior assisted living facility located in Pearland, Texas, just outside of Houston, Pearland’s local community organizations enforce strict design guidelines, allowing only the use of stucco with specific color choices, three colors of red brick, and choice construction of gables or sloped roofs.

Driven by certain economy and lender issues in regards to state mandated units, after a long process the plan had been arranged, but the exterior remained an opportunity for design. Instead of questioning the board regarding certain application of materials and configurations which would lead to project delays, the idea was to push the limits within the given parameters and follow the verbal requirements.

The exterior articulation of windows and their screens / shutters follow a housing iconography that Pearland reflects. The interior courtyard facades use stucco as required by the board, with small balconies and screen shutters at window openings. The exterior facade is applied with a select brick used as a framework on which the component language of windows, rowlock shutters, and the building’s roof line are articulated. Instead of providing decorated gables, the roof is manipulated in keeping with housing iconography.

In which case the building ‘lifts up’ at the ground floor on two corners to open up for public use. The project limitations lead to design strategies that offer a pleasant living environment.

with Powers Brown Architecture

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

The “Detroit Idea Factory” is a conceptual collection of architectural, urban, and ecological interventions that inscribe into existing megastructures: Hart Plaza, Cobo Center, and the People Mover, as a network that drives innovation, research, and exploration. Together, they serve as a support system for the city’s visionaries. It offers the city’s creative capital, an integrated space to think, write, make and share.

The distribution of programmed structures offer spaces where the citizens of Detroit can forge a new future for their city. Ideals in the directness of connectivity lead program through all design elements.

Interventions such as sport courts, food and community spaces, directly attach to the rail structure and punctuate the air-space of the ‘People Mover’ to reinvigorate the urban floor.

At Hart Plaza, infrastructural and visual connections principally drive the program vertically in contrast to the largely horizontal elements of Cobo Center and GM. The fundamentally public program is a collection of educational, fabrication and other creative silos that connect to Hart Plaza as a canopy over a series of outdoor community rooms including the new amphitheater on the waterfront.

Hart Plaza takes on a greater ecological function as a water treatment zone between the landscaped pathways and park space. This area collects, cleanses, and naturally treats surrounding city runoff. This landscape connects to the proposed residential and hotel development above the existing Cobo Center.

The ‘Detroit Idea Factory’ can be considered as phased interventions that can accommodate a schedule for economic momentum and partnerships. This vision for Detroit engages the creative economy by means of play, entrepreneurship and collaboration to advance the legacy of the Motor City.

with UltraBarrio

HONORABLE MENTION - REGEN: BOSTON SOCIETY OF ARCHITECTS 2013 ‘BEST UNIQUE CITY INFRASTRUCTURE’

BOSTON SOCIETY OF ARCHITECTS GALLERY SPACE DECEMBER 2013 - JANUARY 2014

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

Sargents Wharf is historically a space of exchange and services. This concept transforms this high value site into a prime civic waterfront space that will return the site to a space for exchange, access, and continuity.

FLOAT HOUSE is an urban platform that identifies the perception of affordable housing as a short-term transitional space, as its greatest asset. In this context, ‘short term’ unlocks a field of organizational filters of ‘access and duration’ that seek alternatives to carry a positive message to a variety of audiences through urban form and program.

The reciprocal relationship of site and program suggest that it is essential that affordable housing exist within urban core sites such as Sargents Wharf, which can benefit the city and the citizen in ways a peripheral site could not. This connected context unlocks ‘housing’ as an active, urban platform that is focused on the individual.

SELECTED PROJECT: LRTX ARTIST RESIDENCE IDEAS COMPETITION

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

LRTX, La Reunion TX, a Dallas- based artist residency program promoted an international competition seeking ideas for a building to accommodate artist residences, studios, galleries, performance space, installation space and other auxiliary functions.

The narrow site located in La Reunion with preservation desires of a dense forest, drives the program vertically, yielding stacked residences and studios that communicate as an ecological and cultural beacon. Verticality also preserves primary views to a preserved property over the treeline and provides visibility from all approaches.

The walk-able grassed / decked roof at ground level gallery distributes up as a continuous circuit of ‘play space lawns’ organizing circulation, program, event and collaborative efforts.

Careful consideration is given to the artists’ lofts that maximize space and views within the small units, and provide access to stair lawns, which an artist can use as outdoor exhibition space.

The building attempts to integrate program vertically to promote the exchange of ideas and provide new means of personal exhibition space that is legible from all points.

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

AWARD: HONORABLE MENTION - SHIFT BOSTON 2011

EXHIBITION: BOSTON SOUTH STATION JANUARY 2012

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

A bold appreciation for the capacities of existing systems is fundamental to this strategy envisioned for, but not limited to, New Bedford. This is especially emblematic to the revision of a site that extends the rail into the more dense downtown as a ‘superblock’ of mixed public spaces and program. The new site will leverage existing public services and furthermore grow established businesses to foster new ventures.

The train is an active part of program as a device that enables urbanity. The fusion of plaza assemblage directly with the rail form a new perspective on the train cab as a public realm, and the motivating force to the experience of the city. In other words, not simply ‘density’ but activity, and performance. This proposes to transform the definition of infrastructural elements into spatial devices which amplify the public realm. The cabs themselves are a catalyst as an immediate, temporary, and evocative means of a new public forum. This is an opportunity to test the scale at which the public voice can occur; a smaller enclosed cab? at a medium size arena? or in a larger plaza?

Standard rail cab chassis are mechanically modified into a convertible cab that reveals a stadium seating arrangement. From an otherwise barrier, new spatial territories and program are offered by the open position of the body panels, to one side a vertical backdrop for event, to the other a compression of space as a temporary market.

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

AWARD: SECOND PLACE - RFI INTERNATIONAL 2007

While employed at Associates UltraBarrio, LLC

As the Italian Rail Network (RFI) suffers from severe congestion in major traffic zones with delays in travel time, it set forth to strengthen the system and optimize its capacity by making funding available for a high speed network. The international competition, introduced by RFI, seeks for ideas on how to treat regional and metropolitan train stations and stops occurring through out the rail network.

This project proposes a modular system that considers passenger traffic with connection to platforms via tunnels and fly-overs and treatment of components such as waiting areas, kiosks, and benches.

Because there is such a potential for mass distribution of these design scenarios it was important to notice how an element can be successfully repeated and still share in an individual’s identity, and how those implications affect the identity of the town/city in Italy by a railway station.

Design of the elements is simultaneously considered on levels of: economy affecting fabrication, scale distribution, customization, site integration, integrity and comfort. Each Station has the potential to have a specific identity and share a familiarity for the regional and the metropolitan stops.

Customization becomes a method of identity for a lasting assembly that envelopes an innovative sense of arrival and place for the future stops throughout Italy.

FINALIST: HOSPITAL FOR AL JAHRA, KUWAIT

While employed at TRO Jung Brannen

The client, Kuwait City’s Al Diwan Almiri, requested a new high-end hospital planned to phase out the existing adjacent hospital. This hospital is designed for 1,000 inpatient beds, including amenities and additional services such as dental.

For such a large hospital, a few schemes were generated to understand what aligned well with the hospitals needs. This scheme best served the hospital’s demands while keeping service and patient circulation separate.

The different towers allow for concentration of women’s services, ICU, pediatrics, medical/surgery and orthopedics, while allowing quick access to central amenities and services. Through use of interior design for waiting areas, each tower has its own identity for wayfinding of various services.

The central atrium is pivotal in connecting medical offices with amenities while providing quick access to patient bed towers, including providing bridges that keep patient and service circulation separate.

with TRO Jung Brannen