Day 51 (5/11/11)

Another beautiful studio day here in Rome!! After a little bit of last-second work we met with our teachers and talked about the issues we have been having with our form. It went extremely well and we feel that we have a pretty solid direction for now! We discussed creating a system or catalogue of a few specific typologies, which we in turn distribute across our site. These types would not only vary in scale and shape based on the programmatic requirements they fulfill, but also in the skin and general articulation of these forms. We have also been working on the density aspect of the canopies, and a direct relationship between the amount of them and the amount of transparency they must have is a clear issue to work on. After we finished working we talked for a little bit before doing our own thing until our lecture. I am starting to compile everything for the Travel Log, so I am going back through all of my pictures to find the important ones. Sadly, this website does not have a tool to create books from these blogs, so I am going to have to create my own layout and submit it to a bookmaking site. The good news is, if everyone wants a couple-hundred pages of me, I will let you guys know how much it costs (or it can be a present, since you can never have too much Zach in your lives).
After a good bit of work on that I took a break and watched NCIS with lunch before we reconvened. We discussed a group member’s epiphany (all of our good ideas have come in an instant thus far) for a while regarding a system of articulation that involves a series of slabs that could be stacked depending on the amount of space needed. These slabs could also vary 9, creating interesting relationships and different light conditions than just a series of floating boxes. We spit up here for a bit to do some research on modern architectural practices in Italy as well as different materials that we could use to create a transparency through the forms.
After a while we met back up for our double lecture. The first was done by a representative of a newish Roman firm called Insula. He talked a lot about the process of design in Italy and the gist of it was how difficult it is to work around and with the history of the city. The lack of cooperation from various governmental bodies also provides a constant issue, so I am thankful to return home to design! We took a break and ate some pretty great snacks from the bakery in the Piazza in front of the school. We had various baked things filled with hot dog (like pigs in a blanket), spinach and cheese, and ham. For dessert we had an amazing cherry pie-like pastry that is a Roman specialty. The second lecture was by another young firm called Scape, and two of the founding members came to give it! Their work was pretty fantastic, their renderings were beautiful, and their design methods were intriguing: they approach all projects in terms of landscape (hence the name Scape), regardless of the medium that they work in. This is interesting because there really are no landscape architecture firms in Rome, and because understanding a variety of forms and types as different landscapes is a novel approach in my mind.
Once the lectures were over we all came home to chill for a little bit before heading to a concert. Our Italian professor plays us music every day to help us get better at understanding words and recognizing sentence structures outside of the typical slow-teaching style. The song she played yesterday was by one of her close friends (he is on iTunes: Fabio Cinti, the song is called Se Fanno Pop), and he is performing at The Place tonight! So we are all going to go and say hi to her and hope he plays that song early since it doesn’t start till ten and we are all pretty pooped.
After some dinner we set off for The Place, which is just beyond the Castel Sant’Angelo and semi near the Vatican. We took the Metro out across the river before walking along the riverfront for a while. We finally made it to the bridge to cross over to the area near the Vatican, and after some brief misdirection and silliness, we found The Place! Francesca (our teacher) was so excited to see us, and we talked with her (90% English) for a while. Sadly, the concert was twelve euro to get in, which was a little steep for a concert that we only came to for one song. So we said goodbye and walked all the way back home and made dinner! Tonight we made hash browns and scrambled eggs, both of which were great! After dinner I went directly to bed instead of being studious. Oh well, when in Rome right?