Architecture for the Birds

The festive season is upon us and we are looking forward to the annual TruexCullins holiday party.   Mark your calendar for Wednesday December 5th for a friendly celebration with food, drink ... and birdhouses.  (VIEW THE BIRD HOUSE EXHIBIT)

This year we will be showcasing a collection of unique birdhouses designed and built by TruexCullins staff and friends.  The creative works of avian architecture will be up for silent auction during the reception, with all proceeds going to benefit the King Street Center.  Guests may also vote for their favorite birdhouse as part of the People’s Choice competition.

The TruexCullins holiday party is open to all clients and friends of the firm (and readers of the blog).  We hope to see you on Battery Street next Wednesday.  And if you would like to build a birdhouse for the auction, there’s still time.  Submissions may be dropped off at our office for Carmen George by Monday December 1st.

Digital Crayon: Article 7 - Technology in Schools

posted by David Epstein, AIA, LEED AP

In our last conversation, we looked at the Learning Commons (aka Library) and started discussing technology. This is a subject worth spending a little more time on. While schools we work with are all increasingly integrating technology into the learning experience, they are all at different parts of the journey. Some have one-to-one laptop programs, some have laptop carts, others a few hardwired computers in each classroom. Some have all of the above!

A decent percentage of the schools have a technology plan. Like a strategic plan, this plan lays out the school’s goals and approach over a fixed period of time. However, the technology is changing so fast that these plans often become obsolete quickly

Let’s first talk about laptops. The first issue affecting facilities was the need for charging stations. Some schools have carts, others  have put outlets in lockers. Recently, we have heard of some schools who put the responsibility on the students to do this at home. This depends of course on battery life. We suspect with the advent of solid state hard drives and longer battery life, this issue will go away.
Laptops generally run on a wireless network. Concern has been raised by some schools about the health effects of wireless technology. As far as we have read, the evidence is not conclusive. However, the concerns are real. Wireless technology can be less reliable than wired networks and can’t support large file transfers as readily.

Laptop carts have become quite popular. This is a mobile cart holding 20-25 laptops that several classes can share. As a result, we have been converting some computer labs back into classroom space. The two areas where this is not possible is with young students (Pre-K, K, 1) and High School video editing labs. The younger kids can’t carry the laptops around easily. Video editing requires fairy robust desktop computers to process the large files.
This brings us to tablets. To date, we have not seen wide spread adoption of a one-to-one program with a tablet but we are sure it's coming. With their relatively low cost, low weight and long battery life, they seem a natural for the school environment.

Many students, especially in high school, own their own device(s) and prefer using them to school issued equipment. As a result, some schools have a BYOD (bring your own device) approach to technology, investing their resources in an infrastructure that allows many types of devices to access the network, digital curriculum and printing options.

In this rapidly evolving environment, the key to a successful approach is flexibility. Focusing on providing the infrastructure to support multiple platforms will help keep the school ready for the next new device. Easy access to power and data outlets, wireless, network resources, internet, printers and most importantly the school’s educational and communication tools are always good investments amidst the changing digital landscape.

Next Article - Article 8 - Sustainability - Coming in two weeks!

Last Article - Article 6 - The Learning Commons

  

Digital Crayon: Article 6 - The Learning Commons

posted by David Epstein, AIA, LEED AP

Last article we discussed 21st century learning concepts and their impact on school design. Nowhere is this more relevant these days than in libraries. It seems as though every one of our schools is grappling with how to transform their libraries into a “Learning Commons”. 

In our work and research, we have come to understand the learning commons as a place where students can learn in a variety of settings. Those settings can range from an active social space with food and comfy furniture to quiet spaces for individuals and groups. Technology is widely available to support their learning, including printing, copying and tech support. Learning Support services may also be located in the Learning Commons. This concept, while in flux, is in contrast with the notion of the Library as a repository of knowledge (i.e. books).

There is no recipe for the Learning Commons and each school approaches it different ways. It may be possible to co-locate a school wide feature such as a café near the library to create a social space. Think of retail bookstore design a la Barnes & Nobles. This is a case where successful commercial ventures are leading the direction of library design. Other schools are looking for an outdoor component for their Learning Commons experience.

One area where there is widespread head scratching is the role of technology in the new library. How many books should there be? What is the role of e-books, tablets and computers? Our experience is there are fairly divergent ideas about where we are heading. More on that in the next installment.

Next Post - Article 7 - Technology in Schools 

Last Post - Article 5 - 21st Century Learning

TruexCullins Welcomes Marjorie Dickstein

TruexCullins Architecture and Interior Design welcomes seasoned architect Marjorie K. Dickstein, AIA, LEED® AP as Project Manager. She is a resident of Starkboro, and the daughter of Sue and Richard Dickstein of Williston, Vermont.

Dickstein graduated from Yale University with a Master of Architecture. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Environmental Design from Parsons School of Design. She also has a Bachelor of Arts from Eugene Lang College of the New School for Social Research, with a concentration in Urban Studies. Dickstein was an adjunct faculty in the Department of Furniture Design at Rhode Island School of Design.

She is a licensed architect in Vermont and Connecticut, and a registered interior designer in Connecticut. She has served on the Development Review Board in Starksboro, Vermont since 2010. 

A Machine for Driving

I’m going to let you in on a little secret about the dreams and desires of architects: the building types that we find the most pleasure in designing are not the ones you would suspect.  Of course, we all have our own individual passions and talents, but for many of us, I can think of one building type that gives us particular satisfaction: the automobile showroom.

So much of our work is (rightly) focused on the comfort and cultivation of people, that perhaps the chance to design a structure solely dedicated to the celebration of machines is a welcome change.

A good example of this is a building that TruexCullins just completed and is now open in South Burlington: the Audi Showroom at 1325 Shelburne Road.  You may have seen this ad recently in the Sunday Burlington Free Press:
 

German cars are known for their superior engineering, but the Audi brand today is just as much about beautiful design as anything else.  And the architecture of the automobile showroom is there to serve one function: to showcase these beautifully designed machines.

The Audi showroom in South Burlington is a pure glass box, with sharp lines and crisp edges that contrast fittingly against the sinuous curves of the automobile. Smooth, rectilinear metal panels wrap a pure geometric form. Large expanses of glass extend all the way to the ground, with no horizontal mullions to obstruct the view into the showroom.  In fact, the mullions are placed on the inside face of the glass to minimize any break in the transparent cube.

The roof passes overhead as a clear horizontal form, floating effortlessly over the glassy showroom, with no need for heavy columns.  This is repeated at the roof of the service bay, where customers take the experience one step further: by driving into the building, their own car becomes the one on display.


Architects’ fascination with cars is nothing new.  The man who started the love affair and introduced architecture to automobiles was the early modernist master Le Corbusier.
 
Corbu claimed that the house was a “machine for living”, and he liked to photograph his buildings with a modern automobile parked in the foreground, such as this famous shot of the 1927 Casa Weissen:

Today, automobile manufacturers themselves are pushing this marriage between architecture and cars, evident by a slew of ads that combine the two.  A good collection of these can be found on a blog by Donnie Silberman, such as this ad for Buick with the car parked in front of David Chipperfield’s World Cup Building in Valencia, Spain:

Or this one with a Nissan Altima at the Diamond Ranch High School by Morphosis:

 

In these ads, the architecture is always modern and linear, portraying a rigid sense of strength.  The buildings set up a sharp contrast with the fluid form of the cars, emphasizing motion and speed.  The architecture here is used to sell cars in print, just as the Audi showroom in South Burlington achieves the same goals in glass and steel.

Congratulations Diantha Korzun

TruexCullins Architecture and Interior Design has promoted Diantha S. Korzun of Cambridge to Associate. She is the daughter of Grace and Leonard Korzun of Shrewsbury, Vermont. 

Diantha Korzun, AIA, LEED, AP

Korzun is the President of The American Institute of Architecture of Vermont and the newly elected Secretary/Treasurer for the American Institute of Architects of New England, She successfully orchestrated a three-day AIANE conference in Burlington, Vermont. 

She received a Master in Architecture from the University of Washington and a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts from Carnegie Mellon University, with a minor in European Studies. Korzun is a registered licensed architect in the State of Vermont, the State of Wyoming and the State of Washington. She is a LEED accredited professional and she holds her NCARB Certificate.

For the past five years, Korzun has been the Project Architect and Manager in TruexCullins’ Education and Workplace Studio. As Project Architect she was responsible for overseeing the design of the recently completed King Arthur Flour Headquarters expansion project and  Anglo American School of Sofia Project in Bulgaria, anticipated to receive LEED Gold.  She was the LEED Team Administrator of the Heritage Flight building, which was awarded LEED Gold Certification and won the Efficiency Vermont Award and Governor’s Efficiently Award. She was also the LEED Team Administrator for the Currier Project in Hanover, NH.

King Arthur Flour's Headquarters in Norwich, Vermont

Current projects she is managing include the St. John International School in Belgium and the American International School in Bucharest. She is part of the team that is participating in the American School of Paris Competition.

A Sneak Preview of the Juniper Lounge

Anticipation is mounting on the west end of Cherry Street.  You may have seen the 200 foot crane towering over the downtown block as the city’s newest hotel takes shape.  Hotel Vermont is set to open in Spring 2013, and we are looking forward to a very grand opening.

This photo, taken earlier this month, shows the progress being made on the exterior envelope.  The hotel, designed by Smith Buckley Architects, occupies a formerly underutilized parcel on Cherry Street, between Macy’s and the Courtyard Marriott.  The hotel will be in an ideal downtown location, halfway between the waterfront and the Church Street marketplace.

Meanwhile, our work on the interior is continuing, with the design of natural materials, custom furnishings and dramatic lighting.

On the main floor, the heart of the hotel will be the Juniper Lounge.

With juices and pastries in the morning, and creative cocktails in the evening, this is a fluid and flexible space that will change accordingly throughout the day.  We recently produced these photorealistic renderings of the bar area, with actual materials and colors.  The bar features a local wood floor and wall finishes of white oak and black slate.  The space looks out to an outdoor terrace with a fire pit and lake views. (Click to enlarge.)

You can see these and more images on the Hotel Vermont Pinterest site.