This project deals with the conflicts and associations between the historical and cultural context and contemporary urban development. I was inspired by my analysis of the city context and the neighborhood‘s urban fabric. The city of Dessau is full of enclosed housing blocks with inner courtyards. On the other hand, the modern architecture buildings, including the old Bauhaus campus, use innovative crossing bar forms. In this project, I want to combine the two forms and make them work together to redefine urbanity.
TRADITION: NEIGHBORHOOD & COMMUNITY
The residential buildings in the surrounding blocks occupy the edge of the blocks, which shapes an enclosed environment for the community. A community in this shape provides a shared public space in the center for the residences. With different ways of opening the enclosure structure, the communities provide different experiences. With little change in the enclosure structure, we can have a dynamic community with a lot of varieties and interactions.
INNOVATION: GROPIUS BAUHAUS BUILDING
The Gropius Bauhaus building has a radiating form, which provides an interior shared space at the center of the structure. A building in this shape provides privacy and individuality for each program. With different rotation angles, this structure can shape a dynamic web while providing a lot of shared spaces inside and outside the building. It also provides more variable circulation inside the building.
COMBINATION:
By combining both design approaches, we can create a more dynamic environment in terms of inside/outside circulation and shared spaces.
EXHIBITION
The exhibition area along the west side is embraced by the landscape. The transparency between the interior and exterior environment enables the exhibition area to become more dynamic and communicative. The landscaped environment helps create an immersive exhibition experience for viewers, and it also creates a comfortable place for leisure and entertainment for students and instructors.
COURTYARD 1
The massing creates two adjacent courtyards. The South courtyard near the lecture and exhibition space is more public to tourism, while the North courtyard, surrounded by the dorms is a private living space for students. This rendering shows the South courtyard, where people can enjoy the sunshine and have some social activities.
ISOMETRIC PROGRAM ANALYSIS
The overall building has two floors linked together around the courtyards by a continuous circulation. The exhibition and lecture area on the left side create a more public touring space, while the classroom, workshop, and dorm area on the right create a living campus area. The dining area located at the center of the whole building serves as a communication and entertainment area, which can be accessed easily from every other program.
DORM
The dorm area creates a nicely enclosed neighborhood space for students and instructors, in close proximity with the residential blocks of Dessau’s commercial area. The shifting of the second floor enables every natural sunlight and an individual balcony. The dorm area provides a convenient living environment for communication while protecting privacy. The middle courtyard provides a place for recreation. Every room is designed to be as simple as possible so that students can create and utilize the space in a way full of personality, using their own design prototypes. The rendering shows a scene of the interior side of the dorm.
DORM
For every single apartment, there is a space between the room and the exterior. This is a space leaving for students’ impromptu exhibitions. When they do one work, they can just hang it outside for tourists to see. In this way, the dorm area becomes a place for creation and exhibition as well.
STUDIO AND DINING
The dining area is located at the center of the whole building, which is accessible from every other program. The studio and classroom area is accesses directly to the dining area. The glass wall provides abundant natural sunshine to the studio area. The difference in height between the two levels also provides visual variabilities and communication between the two programs.
COURTYARD 2
The massing creates two adjacent courtyards. The North courtyard, surrounded by the dorms is a private living space for students. This courtyard provides a place for recreation and entertainment for students who live on campus. There is also an accessible staircase that leads to the dining area on the second floor.
