Darshan Varsani

Atelier: Advanced Practice
BArch: MSA
Skills: Adobe, Lumion, Sketchup, Rhino and Modelmaking
Interested in: How sustainable design can be integrated into architecture without a hindrance to the experience of space. I am also interested in how communities can be integrated into schemes that have long-lasting positive changes.
Posted 1 Mar 2021 17:54
Skills

Model Making & Sketching

Model making in both physical and digital form and sketching will be a key part of the project to initially understand concepts that really benefit the community.

Research & Srategies

Concepts will be informed from the initial site analysis but also through implementing design strategies that have a positive impact on the environment. There will also be the scope of developing a landscape strategy for the exterior space that connects coherently to the extension.

Presentation

The presentation will be a major factor in communicating the scheme as this is something that will be used to raise funding for the project. The use of diagrams will be a visual communication device used alongside sketches to help the collaborator understand the direction behind the concept.

Software

There will be an opportunity to develop skills within the Adobe Suite package as well as learning visualisation techniques with Lumion. 3D modelling software such as Sketchup will be used as a way of working with rendering software.



Posted 2 Mar 2021 15:09
Team 1

Following on from the morning activities, group members were put into two groups whereby individual ideas were combined. Team 1 focused on the programmes of the gallery extension looking at the relationships between each space. In addition to this, the exploration of form was carried out alongside the idea of incorporating a roof terrace.
Posted 11 May 2021 18:58
Team A

Using the landscape and circulation as a key driver for the concept team A explored this through a series of sketches. The key part of the concept is addressing the threshold between the existing gallery and the proposed gallery extension. The way this has been addressed is through the use of a glass link that acts as a buffer but also the circulation space. All this whilst considering the social value it adds to the community using the user profiles.
Posted 11 May 2021 19:04
Week 1 Summary

Using the user profiles and thinking about how these characters may navigate the extension and the wider city has allowed for exploration of designs that really consider the journey and what they may see. By using this as a technique both groups have produced two proposals that consider the interaction between the existing building and the proposed extension. Using mediums such as sketching and understanding how the concept can be presented is a key learning from this week's work and was successful when presented to the collaborator mid-way through the project.
Posted 16 May 2021 16:29