Designer: Suheng Li
Reviewer: Becca Newburg
From the very beginning of this project, Li was determined to design her building using circular geometry. Despite warnings of frustration and discouraging advice from reviewers, Li stayed strong with her intent of using circles. For that, I respect her; because she kept with circles, her concept has remained strong throughout the project. Of course, circles are hard but her project is coming together.
For the rest of this peer review I will use the following format:
What Li said about her work/ what was on her board.
The reviewers’ comments and their “order of worth” about what she said and showed.
My two cents and advice.
I decided to use circular geometry because:
- circles contrast with the existing city grid,
- circles create a fun environment for the firefighters which contrasts with the type of work they do, and
- the cylinders are reminiscent of the industrial tower/drums that appear elsewhere on the shoreline.
These are not good enough reasons for using circles. Circles are a difficult problem so you need a very strong reason to use them. This comes from an “inspired” perspective because they attacked her very concept.
I think her reasons are valid but Li needs to beef them up so that her project could not use anything else but circles. For example, a fun environment can be achieved with squares or triangles. Regardless, I think ” fun” is the wrong word in this case. Maybe inviting is better because the curves draw you in and invite you to stay.
Circulation paths might be another strong reason for using circles. How does the circulation of firefighters improve with circles? I could see a cool diagram explaining this because people don’t walk with corners in the middle of their path.
Each cylinder houses a different piece of the program and are connected by a balcony path.
I like this a lot! It allows firefights to get down to the apparatus bay from their bedrooms quickly and is also social connection between the other programs. As much as I enjoy this path, there is an opportunity that Li is missing with the roof of her apparatus bay which is just below her path. I can see the path floating and moving around a wonderful green place where there is stillness and hanging out. It could be a green roof space with shaded areas under the path. I believe that area has the view to Manhattan as well so having a gathering space there would take full advantage of that. This would also make the sections more interesting and make for a great rendering.
Li used circular geometry for almost every wall and element in her building.
There are a few straight lines. If you’re going to do circles, there should not be one straight line in your building!
I totally agree here; It will only strengthen her project. My suggestion, if Li can’t sacrifice the straight geometry of these walls, she should replace the straight lines with a very shallow curve/large radius. That way, it’ll be curved but it’ll take up roughly the same amount of space that a straight wall does. One of her straight lines is a path by the street that “reacts with the street”. I think what she is trying to do is make the spot where her geometry meets the city grid softer and blended. I think that if she used circles to contrast with the grid, that moment should blunt, not blended.
Li didn’t show furniture in her drawings.
How are you going to furnish your buildings? Furniture as it is is not designed for circular walls and if they exist, they are expensive and rare. Also, how are you going resolve the doors and windows? These comments come from an industrial and practical point of view.
This is not the first time furniture has been brought up. I think Li should come up with some quick furniture designs that are easy and cheap to make and exactly fit into the geometry of her project. I could see her coming up with furniture that you CNC and assemble. Cutting flat-packaged furniture allows her to make any kind of shape she wants and can be really cheap. The hardest thing to resolve will be the beds because mattresses are rectangles. Therefore, laying out her rooms and resolving the leftover spaces with furniture she designs will finally shut the critics up about furniture.
The door issue may be resolved by making a small section of flat wall for the door while the facade curves above it. I am not so sure about the windows but curved glass is not unheard of though probably hard to do.
With all three of these issues, Li really needs to do some research and see how her precedent dealt with them. There might be simple solutions out there that she does not know about yet.
As far as landscape, Li has a circular area designated as a lounge space and otherwise kept the site as it is which is covered in wild grasses.
The reviewers did not like this but did not give her many ideas to work off of. They said the site is uninviting and very underdeveloped. They wanted the public to feel like they belonged in her park design which comes from a civic point of view.
I’m really excited about the possibilities of Li’s site design. Keeping with the circular geometry will make for some really cool spaces. I suggest creating circles at different levels to make sunken gathering spaces or built-up, playful hills. Maybe one circle is a reconstructed wetland, or have a circular dock going out to the river, or a reflecting pool. The in between spaces could be circulation or a place for trees. The fact that trees are circular in plan is something Li must exploit. Trees are a great way to make barriers, sheltered spaces, and effects the way people interact with site.
Extra comments/ final thoughts
Li’s model was very well done. She used a piece of plexiglass for the roof of her first floor so that you could see in and I thought that was pretty ingenious. This way of building revealed a structural problem with one of her cylinders though; it is pretty much floating with no cantilever support or columns. Adding columns may cause problems in the floor below so she may have to play with layout or find a more creative way to achieve a column-less space. I think her drawings were well done and her use of textures made them look elegant. I appreciate the fact that there are no hard corners and that each radius exists elsewhere in the drawing.