Browsing by Author "Bliznakov, Milka T."

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    A community of individuality-- or the individuality of a community: an artists' housing for Mission Hill
    Galletta, Luciano N. (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1989)
    A community of individuality allows each person an opportunity to grow and to see himself in his environment, both physically and spiritually. The individuality of a community is realized in a collective identity, shared qualities and physical boundaries which.
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    Defining a place: focal point for a fragmented town
    Edwards, Teresa L. (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1994)
    As many small town populations continue to migrate toward growing urban centers, individual outlying communities become fragmented and disparate, with a loss of focus paralleling their loss of activity. The fabric of these towns becomes irregular, with holes appearing where occupants left. The street no longer holds a rhythm or cohesiveness. It struggles to maintain some inkling of its form, but becomes only a loose string of leftover elements. Over time, these remaining elements become increasingly dissociated and become isolates along the street. Most of these are not strong enough to stand alone, therefore a lack of cohesion leads to disorder The purpose of this project was to re-establish that order by redefining the town as a concrete unit. It was also important to define a character that would render the town unique. As a nearby city continues to expand, this tiny community must be secure enough to withstand the gobbling effect of the larger city’s annexation efforts. It must have defined purpose and distinctive traits too precious to destroy. Being situated within a heavily populated Mennonite community, this location provides the perfect opportunity to establish this individuality and make a special place, a place familiar to those who live and work there and curiously inviting to those who may visit. The primary vehicle for this project was a Mennonite community center and farmer’s market. This new center would provide a place to rejuvenate activity and commerce while bringing in a large and unique sector of the local population whose transportation needs are currently ignored by the present town’s conditions. The site is Dayton, VA, a small town of about 1100 people. Established in 1833, the town is situated along Cooks Creek, south of Harrisonburg. The creek and its branches surround the town on three sides, making a distinct separation from the surrounding area. The fourth side backs up to a hill which leads out into the countryside. The presence of these natural boundaries offers a special opportunity to accentuate the location of the town; to pronounce the feeling of arrival at a distinct destination. Once inside, the town is laid out on an irregular grid that extends westward from Main Street and out over the hill. A physical differentiation among the primary and secondary streets is one of the significant defining elements that articulates the town. Further definition and emphasis was critical to accentuate the existing order. The town’s relation to a bypass that borders it on the east has been, up to this point, one of default. As traffic was detoured around the community, the activity that once made Main Street a lively place was pulled away from the downtown area. The principal buildings that face Main now turn their backs to the majority of people that pass them everyday. Again, in trying to make this an inviting place to visit, it seemed critical that the town re-address this formal boundary. Such a crucial element can no longer be overlooked. As the nearby city continues to grow in size and population, it will continue to spread over more of the surrounding countryside. If previously settled areas are not significant enough to justify their preservation, they too will become absorbed into the city. In an effort to lose such a special locality, every attempt must be made to emphasize its assets and show it as a place of history, character, and purpose.
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    Envisioning the Mind: Children's Representations of Mental Processes
    Rice, Rebekah R. (Virginia Tech, 1990-03-14)
    Inspired by writings on creativity and by Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences, I conducted a series of ten "exercises" -- each of them a guided visualization followed by an opportunity to produce -- with nine- and ten-year-old students. The visualizations, which were designed to encourage the students to explore some of the many ways our minds have of knowing and learning, began with a simple relaxation exercise and proceeded to more challenging exercises involving, for instance, kinesthetic learning, sensory awareness, the logical and linguistic mind versus the spatial mind, and intra- and interpersonal intelligence. Following each visualization the students discussed what they had experienced (transcripts of the visualizations and the discussions are included in the thesis). The students responded in visual terms as well: after each visualization, each student created a two- or three-dimensional piece of art from materials such as matboard, construction and origami paper, glue, felt-tip pens, pipe cleaners, and plastic-coated wire. These visual responses have been photographed, described, and scored according to the number of materials used, the number of colors used, and the dimensionality of the piece (photos, descriptions, and scores are included in the "Gallery". I found, surprisingly, that the visualizations in which the students were the most imaginatively engaged did not always produce the most interesting art, and that girls were much less likely than boys to create three-dimensional pieces, although girls tended to use more colors and occasionally used relief on otherwise two-dimensional pieces.
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    An exploration of a hyperbolic paraboloid as an office building
    Cohen, Valerie (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1993)
    The purpose of this thesis was to create a structure that is a result of a hyperbolic paraboloid shell (hypar). As a result of this, a certain order evolved which dictated the form, the structure, and the environmental aspects of the two buildings designed. Through the design of the hypar walls, came the opportunity and/or need for daylighting. This is the conscious design of a building form to use direct sunlight for illumination and thermal benefit. Buildings so designed respond both to direct sunlight and to sunlight modified through diffusion or reflection by the sky vault, clouds, natural or man—made elements of the landscape, and the buildings, themselves. The workers occupying these buildings spend a major portion of their day in a place that could have psychological and physiological effects. Sunlight gives reassuring orientation to time, a place, and weather, as well as producing interior environments that are comfortable, delightful, and productive.
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    History museum and archive of the lesbian and gay community of New York City
    Plitt, Joel Ivan (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1994)
    This thesis is an exercise in responsibility regarding my actions as an architect. It is based upon the belief that architecture is a product conveying culture. While architecture can convey culture, it also has the potential to shape and facilitate change q in culture. Therefore, one can view the architect as more than a technician, making architecture stand and work properly, or an artist, concerned with the aesthetic/architectonic qualities of architecture, but rather as an active entity who can both convey and change cultural values through the built environment. The struggle in this thesis regarding responsibility has been to make my role more than an active entity in culture, but a consciously active entity in culture. Since I have long viewed culture as a political product and one's existence in culture as a political act, then one’s responsibility as an architect could be to make architecture as the conscious embodiment of a political ideology. For me, feminism is the political ideology, and Liberative Architecture is the conscious embodiment.
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    IAWA Newsletter, Fall 1998
    McMillan, Gail; Dunay, Donna W.; Bliznakov, Milka T.; Marshall-Baker, Anna; Horton, Inga S. (International Archive of Women in Architecture, 1998)
    Fall 1998 No. 10 - Recent Acquisitions: The Work of Sigrid Lorenzen Rupp, Architect - Diversity of Donations: Ten Highlights from the Archive - Lois Gottlieb: Continuing the Legacy of Frank Lloyd Wright - International News - New Advisors for the IAWA Board - Preserving Your Personal and Professional Papers - IAWA Board of Advisors
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    Learning in Architecture
    Tyupkina, Maryana (Virginia Tech, 1999-09-17)
    Two entities, town and university, each playing different functional roles, different in scale and structure, come together at one point. The architecture of that point is a transitional condition. Each element has integrity on its own, and at the same time is a part of the system. The primary requirement for the architecture of this place is to be elegant and thoughtful. This idea is addressed in five scales within the project: the axis, the street, the paths, the wall, and the room.
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    A mixed income housing community
    Lukowsky, Tania Ruth (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1994)
    “It would be something if everything we made encouraged people to become more closely acquainted with their surroundings, with each other and with themselves… so that the world, in so far as it is amenable to our influence, becomes less alien, less hard and abstract, a warmer, friendlier, more welcoming and appropriate place; in short a world that is relevant to its inhabitants.” Herman Hertzberger The purpose of this thesis is to create a mixed income housing community in Old Town Alexandria. While people who share similar lifestyles tend to cluster together, this project encourages people of difference to find a common ground. The community will be the size of a residential Old Town block to encourage a fulfilling amount of human interaction. The interior of the block will be subdivided into a variety of places: places that provide the opportunity for people to sit in quiet contemplation, another place for children to play, other places that encourage people to interact with one another, and places where one can passively observe the surrounding activity with the option to participate or not. The houses have a variety of living spaces in response to the diverse social groups that will inhabit the blocks. These houses follow the language of Old Town in terms of materials, details, rhythm, and the way in which they meet the street, and so connect this community with the larger order of the town. This project maintains the privacy of the individual houses, encourages human interaction in the public areas, and at the same time recognizes the responsibility of designing these houses using the same structure and patterns that are inherent in Old Town.
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    The Ottoman külltye between the 14th and 17th centuries: its urban setting and spatial composition
    Hakky, Rafee (Virginia Tech, 1992-04-15)
    In order to serve the Muslim community, the Ottomans built nuclei which included educational and social services around the mosque. A nucleus of these was called a "külltye". Facilities in külltyes can be categorized under four main areas: religious, educational, social, and private. This research project attempted to examine the Ottoman külltye from an urban design point of view. It explored the külltye through two main questions: firstly. what was the relationship between the külltye and its surroundings. and secondly. how the kkülltye was designed. In order to answer these two questions, the külltye was studied at five scales: the state, the city, the immediate surroundings, the külltye itself, and flnal1y the individual open spaces in the külltye. This research work is basically a morphological study; however, when possible and appropriate the meaning behind the form is addressed. At the state scale it was found that a good level of sensitivity was utilized when planning for new külltyes. Larger cities had a larger number of külltyes and more complex programs for these külltyes. külltyes in small cities were programmed so as to serve the small community adequately without being oversized. külltyes in cities had more educational facilities while külltyes in the country were more oriented towards serving travelers. Within the city itself. central areas housed larger külltyes; while residential neighborhoods had smaller külltyes since they were intended to serve only that particular neighborhood. The number and kind of facilities were affected by the particular period during which külltyes were built. During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries külltyes were large and housed a large variety of services. That period was a period of growth and prosperity. Later centuries exhibited a different trend where külltyes became smaller and included simpler programs. Reasons for this new trend could be the existence of enough services and the economic deterioration of the state.
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    The Portals: a master plan proposal
    Cheng, Andrew Y. (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1988)
    The Portals proposal, “the restructuring of an isolated site into an existing urban fabric.” This weaving of the site back into the urban environment is accomplished by extending the project beyond the limits or boundaries of the site to try to increase pedestrian activity through the site and allow new access to the waterfront. The project is a microcosm of the city in the sense that it provides a place to live, work, and play. Incorporating these elements into the program assures a rich variety of social relationships which is the key to the vigor and richness of life in the city.
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    Prologue to performance
    Garud, Jyutika T. (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1994)
    "Having being fixed on paper or retained in the memory music exists already, prior to its actual performance differing in that respect from all the other arts. The musical entity thus presents the remarkable singularity of existing successively and distinctly in two forms separated from each other by the hiatus of silence. This peculiar nature of music determines its very life as well as it's repercussions in the social world for it presupposes two kinds of musicians: the creator and the performer." Igor Stravinsky This thesis is an investigation of how architecture becomes the threshold manifesting that hiatus of silence; preparing the spectator; preparing, reinforcing and introducing the spectacle, only to be completed by the final act, that of the performer. It is that in between through which one passes in anticipation and preparation. The form in which the creative phenomenon exists then becomes the prologue of the performance.
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    Study of the domestic open spaces in low-rise dwelling units in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
    Bahammam, Omar Salem (Virginia Tech, 1989-05-05)
    In the last four decades, Saudi Arabia has undergone rapid urban development. One consequence of this is the emergence of the villa-type dwelling unit as a standard contemporary house design. The domestic open space of each unit is the space surrounding the form of the house. This contemporary domestic open space has failed to meet the basic cultural need for privacy and the demands of the local climate. The aim of this study is to describe the need for privacy as a determining cultural aspect, and climatic comfort in the contemporary domestic open space within the existing cultural and environmental context. The study analyzes the traditional domestic open space to provide clues to direct and improve the existing situation. Design options or guidelines based on the analysis of the contemporary and traditional domestic open spaces are proposed to improve the domestic open space within the villa house pattern.
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    Towards a culturally identifiable architecture
    Chang, Chian-Yeun (Virginia Tech, 1990-12-09)
    This study proposes a systematic approach for investigators to judge how architecture of a given cultural group can be considered as culturally identifiable. More specifically, it proposes the steps in unveiling the relationships between chosen core elements of cultural distinctness and various design patterns. The suggested sources of core elements are political, social/behavioral, and economic influences on architectural design and approaches to create architectural signs. It is presupposed that a design pattern is considered culturally identifiable when important core elements are communicated via noticeable signs. The communication is perceived from a semiotic analogy of architectural signs, whereby the importance of one core element over the other is identified by the investigator through research into the cultural context under study. A case study on China's architecture is presented to illustrate these steps and test the proposed hypotheses. The steps are so designed that testing the relevance of core elements to architectural signs is essential. Forty-six sample buildings selected from China served as stimulus materials in the case study. These building patterns were rated as different types of signs on the basis of the core elements elicited from China's present-day culture. These buildings also were judged in a survey by forty-four Chinese students and their spouses at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University who represent samples of overseas Chinese laypersons. The findings show that survey results deviated significantly from the semiotic results as laypersons considered traditional architecture most representative of Chinese identity. The semiotic results show that culturally identifiable designs are the hybrid forms of traditional and modern architecture. Most laypersons ignored the relationships between their perception of distinct identity in architecture and core elements of economic meanings and sign-creation approaches. This deviation implies a significant cultural lag in perceiving distinct identity between professionals and laypersons, and led to modification of the presupposed hierarchical importance of core elements. Through the case study and findings, this research illustrates the procedure by which investigators can determine from a specific range of cultural elements the most effective means of communication of identity. It enables the inclusion of core elements of popular culture in comparing various design patterns and in differentiating built forms of one culture from that of others. The study ends with the factors and suggestions that are related to communication of Chinese identity in architecture.
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    Transfer of development rights as a tool for landmark conservation program at Calcutta developed through an evaluation of American programs
    De, Ramendra Narayan (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1988)
    This dissertation examines the question of whether Transfer of Development Rights (TDR), a technique developed in the United States, might prove useful in Calcutta for urban conservation. ln many cases, municipal governments in India have been unable to preserve structures of historic value because they lacked the funds to compensate the Iosses imposed by designation. The owners of the Iandmark structures suffer financial Iosses for not being allowed to develop their properties to their full potential. The TDR technique has the advantage that through this program the owner of a designated Iandmark Is compensated from the sale of the unused development rights In his property. The community is benefited because of the landmark being preserved without the community’s cost. The City is benefited by the additional tax from the development potentials transferred from the Iandmark properties, which would have remained untaxed otherwise. This paper begins by providing an overview of the developments in building regulations, and emergence of TDR as an useful means for land use management through flexibility in zoning. The ongoing TDR programs of seven American cities and a forthcoming one are then studied to identify the central issues and features of this technique. The next chapter is devoted to the analyses of the problems and prospects of TDR programs in the United States. This includes an examination of the issues derived from the case studies as well as a questionnaire survey. The discussion in the following chapter provides some background on the city of Calcutta. The demand for redevelopment in the central city is compounded by the salutation that the growth of population is not matched by physical expansion of the city. CaIcutta’s economic climate, political environment and conservation ethics are also discussed to provide a comprehensive perspective of the testing ground. The test of the technique in Calcutta is discussed in the following chapter with reference to some cases. The concluding chapter includes the general and particular principles that ought to govern the TDR program in Calcutta. The conclusion also includes the administrative and institutional details that will be necessary to apply TDR technique in Calcutta. To summarize the findings of this research, it can be stated that the existing programs in the US cities have entered a second generation. While the legal issues attracted most attention in the first generation, the emphasis has now shifted to the design and implementation of the programs. The need for the program's close coordination with the overall planning and urban design of the city has been recognized. However, each program is designed according to some bias, and in view of supplementing some other planning goals - some of them being compatible, while others are not. The main issues of the program are: balance between TDR supply and market demand, distance between the originating and receiving sites, urban design and planning in the receiving districts, overage limit ln relation to the zoned density, transfer from public landmarks, banking of TDRs, and a 'single window' administration of the program for easy and 'fast track' approval incentive. Although a general downzoning and suspension of other bonus provisions will facilitate the TDR program, the market does not seem to support such steps. lncorporation of a TDR program in Calcutta is possible without any change in the existing building by-laws, but with a relaxation in the regulations governing the land ownership limits. The TDR prices in the receiving sites in BBD Bag and Esplanade areas commensurably match with the TDR values in the sending district of the Bag. But a district-wise transfer will have to be allowed rather than only to physically attached sites. Other receiving districts in the north and south axis along the rapid transit line have potential for future transfers.
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    The wisdom of Jerusalem's past: design of a new neighborhood and the house within
    Brenner, Claudia (Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1989)