On Monday we had our preliminary review. I just barely had everything ready. I didn't even do everything that was required, but no one else did either. I'm not sure if he'll really curve the completeness of an assignment, but you never know.
I generally dislike reviews because it seems like I always end up hating whatever it is that I come up with. It's very hard to sell an idea you hate. With only two weeks to do all this stuff, I felt like I just had to spit something out onto paper and then draw it up. That's not the only reason my work wasn't satisfactory, but it was definitely a factor.
This is the site plan with my unit layout. I wanted every unit to have southern exposure for solar access. This made it difficult for me to come up with a layout pattern that would fit with all 36 units. As you can see, all the units are boxes. I really don't like that, and that is the first thing that I've changed.
These are the drawings for the one bedroom unit.
Pictures of the one bedroom unit model
The two bedroom unit. It took me so long to figure out how to set up the perspectives in Revit. I swear, that program has such a steep learning curve.
Pictures of the two bedroom unit model.
The three bedroom unit. I didn't have time to do a model of this one unfortunately.
These are the drawings for the community center. The site is actually one of four parcels on one chunk of property. The project is phase two of the Templeton Place development. Phase one is a senior housing development located directly to the south. Our site would share their driveway and both developments would have access to both community centers. We were actually supposed to be designing senior housing as well, but the funding didn't come through. Now it's broadened to multi-family low income housing.
As far as the review, a fare number of people came. I spent most of the time talking to my fellow classmates and waiting. I finally had one professor talk to me. She gave me some good advice. Some things I hadn't thought of, some things I already had. One thing that I found interesting was what she said about the communal area at the entrance to each set of four units. She said that because there are very few windows from each unit to that area that it's anti-social. And she was right. I was thinking that it would be a place where people would see each other coming and going, and unless they were out in the shared garden or yard space at the same time, they wouldn't see each other much. I was thinking that if families are living so close together, they probably don't want to be connected to their neighbors ALL the time. They'd want a defined private space. It's interesting because I didn't realize that my anti-social tendencies were coming through so strongly in my work.
Some other things she mentioned were little details on my presentation that were confusing. She said that I had a lot of potential and that I just needed to put more time into and fix the little details to be great. That was nice to hear. I've been wondering if I just don't have the knack for this. It seems like someone thinks I can make it. I hope she's right.
Today I spent class reworking my floor plans. I think I may be onto something much more interesting. I have to have an updated print on Friday so I'll let you know how that goes. Also, for anyone out there who may reading this: constructive criticism is very much welcomed!
