Group Work

FIRST MEETINGGroup Notes

Problems identified by the group regarding the site:

• how to educate people - how are they going to learn? will the task satisfy intuition?
• access to site
• how are we going to make users stop and engage?
• the structures ability to draw in users
• geography - floods?
• visibility of the structure - where is it to be viewed from? all points? one particular point?
• how do you generate or provoke emotion through the structure
• use and how this changes through the time of day and seasons
• who will use it
• what are we trying to teach? direction? history? location?
• who are we teaching? young, old, pedestrians, cyclists, families, couples, singles

There were two main questions identified:

• who are we teaching?
• what are we teaching?

Tutor spoke to us about not getting caught up with "teaching".  Don't focus on the learning outcome, learning can be done on many levels, for example the interaction with the space.  Think about how you are going to draw the user in and what qualities the structure will have - how this will generate an experience and interaction with the space.  How will this generate a user response?
Refer back to the cliff face and how this could be abstracted into a form: This idea of mimicry.
Refer back to the notion of push and pull. This idea was then explored through an interactive structure where elements of the structure could physically be pushed and pulled.

Materials discussed were that the elements that move be different to the foundation structure - timber was one suggestion, a reference to the history of the wharves and the site.  How this could be interactive, if you needed to push or pull or remove elements to enter the space? If the elements moved in place or if they could be removed and taken elsewhere within the site.

Tutor spoke to us about idea development - showed us the twisty green arch rule and made shapes, suggesting we approach the brief from a non conventional learning perspective.


Tutor spoke to us about the siteless project  - the book with many shapes - taking a form and abstracting it.  this prompted the discussion of voids and solids and how this related to the cliff face, how this could be translated into our form such as mirrored surfaces, openings, elements that could be removed and placed back.  Suggested we look at the South Korean pavilion from the last world expo in shanghai?

Ttutor spoke to us again about learning, how is it defined? wiki it and see what that says, draw from this.  Visit the site again and take into consideration weather, access, views.

We left totally confused and with the key words; push/ pull and a form that was interactive in terms of elements that can be moved within the form.

Some of the sketches discussed about the form and movement through it are below.

Above: The notion of pulling and pushing objects and materials allows interaction.

Above: The framing of views and where ever you are in the space you get a different perspective of the surrounding areas. A metaphoric symbolism towards learning and the different approaches we all take are different.

Action Items:

• research learning further
• revisit the site
• Meet Monday 12th after city until about 1:30pm to discuss research and ideas generated over the weekend.