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A Character Building Experience

Part 2 Project 2003
Peter Ryan
Emma Macann
 Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology | Australia
This project re-evaluates the school type as a place of connections, no longer just between students and knowledge, but also between students, their peers and the wider community. The efficient housing of students is no longer the primary motivating factor of the proposal. In its new expression, the school type is viewed as a social space, where relationships emerge and develop according to individual characteristics and community interaction. The manifestation of this realignment is a three-dimensional mapping of the school, where the interrelation between programmatic components and their occupants can be understood in terms of the formal and organisational compositions they create.


In this highly original project Peter Ryan re-examined the program for an Australian suburban school from the point of view of the character and behaviours of its inhabitants. The first move used dynamic systems to map the site as a series of attractors. The behaviour of particular actors (technically, agents) were then characterised by attractions and repulsion to other actors and programmatic elements. Interacting together on the site (controlled by software written for the project), each actor has a propensity to enact particular constructive operations related to its character. Though displaying a certain wry humour, the serious intent of this project shows the rich architectural possibilities of digital systems truly interacting with the intent of the architect.
Tutor(s)
2003
1312 _01.jpg, Overview In its new expression, the school type is viewed as a social space, where relationships emerge and develop according to individual characteristics and community interaction.
1312_02.jpg, Public Facilities Entrance The school is designed with a public and a private entrance to facilitate community involvement without compromising security.
1312_03.jpg, Playing Field The effect of these social interactions even extends to school playing fields where surfaces are transformed producing a new characterised functionality.
1312_04.jpg, Building Threshold The building envelopes are connected by a covered walkway that serves as a mediating threshold between building and landscape
1312_05.jpg, Landscape Threshold The myriad of pathways can be adapted as required to form stairs, seating or other landscaping devices.
1312_06.jpg, Planning Process The planning is organised using a system of weighted connections that distribute program according to desired proximities rather than rigid classifications of type.
1312_07.jpg, Connections The resultant programmatic arrangement is then combined with a cast of characters whose relationships are defined by a generic schoolyard narrative.
1312_08.jpg, Zoning Process Programmatic elements are converted into a field (using their area as their intensity) to form an interactive environment for character interaction.
1312_09.jpg, Character Profiles 01 The traits of the characters form the main design component of the project, with each agent possessing parameters that affect its ‘personality’.
1312 _10.jpg, Character Profiles 02 The characters are distinguished from one another by their speed, turning ability, programmatic desires, affiliation with other characters (see connections) and materiality.
1312_11.jpg, Trajectory Process Although every character is in some way attracted to the programmatic field, outcomes can be influenced through interaction with other participants in the system.
1312_12.jpg, Characterised Masterplan The manifestation of the combination of characterised agents and the programmatic field is a masterplan that incorporates both narrative and planning considerations.
1312_13.jpg, Formal Rationalisation With the addition of a profile for each character type, the edited trajectories of the masterplan are developed to form the shape and disposition of the buildings.
1312_14.jpg, Interaction Catalogue Although the large number of parameters in the system provides a great deal of formal variation, characters always manifest themselves in recognizable configurations.
1312_15.jpg, Landscape Plan The landscaping is derived from the hierarchical arrangement of character trajectories and forms a physical manifestation of the pecking order of the schoolyard.
1312_16.jpg, Detail Plan Internally the buildings are kept relatively restrained, with room divisions generated from the field intensities created during the zoning phase of the process.
1312_17.jpg, Detail Section The predominantly single story section reflects the suburban nature of this school and generates an appropriately ‘human’ scale building.
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