City Grove Final

Program: Chair Co-op Building
Description: Urban Agriculture / Chair Growth and Design
Site: Addis Ababa, Ethiopia


| Concept |

The City Grove is a proposal for the commercialization of a natural resource through its transformation into a profitable constructed unit. It brings a program of agriculture into the city by joining it to the the consumerist aspect of the urban condition.

The walls of the co-op are used to dry and store freshly harvested bamboo. These partitions function as structure for the roof, storage for bamboo, and serve to control the amount of light entering the interior spaces. The views and privacy of the interior is variant depending on the placement and density of the bamboo.

| Facts |

- 67% of African bamboo and 7% of the world's bamboo is grown in Ethiopia.
- Highland bamboo (Arundianira Alpina) grows to an average size of 60 feet by 4 inches.
- Tensile strength of the bamboo is 15,000 lbs/sq. in, which is similar to mild steel.

| Program |

Urban Space
Workshop - 3000 sq. ft.
- Cutting - Finishing - Assembling - Storage - Metal Shop
Show room - 1200 sq. ft.

Commercial
- Office - 400 sq. ft.
- Bathrooms - 400 sq. ft.

Other
- Circulation - 200 sq. ft.
- Storage - 300 sq. ft.

----Total Sq. Ft. 5500

Agriculture Space
Bamboo Grove - 9000 sq. ft.

----Total Sq. Ft. 9000


Chair Showroom with empty racks


CITY GROVE | chair monoculture
Chair Showroom with nearly full racks

Quotations

So we have architect Peter Rich visiting the studio to give some tips and assistance with our eventual chair co-op project. He's an interesting guy, and quite entertaining to listen to.


"You have to visit architecture. To not do so would be like having a girlfriend and just holding hands" - Peter Rich

Chair Finale

Debundled Chair

The chair was designed so that it could be constructed by a single individual with the most rudimentary and commonplace construction tools available. The focus of the project was the evolution of design form through simple methods. The final product relies on the precision of the human hand so while the design may remain the same, the actual object would change slightly with every iteration. With a single person working on the chair, it could reasonably be constructed within 2-4 days. The bonding agent doesn’t have a particularly long curing time, so completing the chair ultimately depends on the efficiency of the builder. Pieces have to be sanded, marked, cut, drilled and glued, but while one segment is drying another can be started. Overall the project cost roughly $330, but only $75 of that grand total was used for material in the final chair. The rest of the amount went to other supplies and prototyping the design.

A simplistic unity is achieved through the employment of a singular material with different uses- beams for structure, dowels for connections, and scraps for surfaces. The material was chosen with the context in mind; lumber is abundant in this region. It is easily acquired, economically transported, and is workable by a singular person without difficulty. In its raw form it is frequently used in a wide variety of applications, and when refined it radiates aesthetic virtue.

Process Work

Got the frame for the final pieces ready to go.

Featured Article

One of the projects me and Justin worked on last semester got noticed, there's an interview type thing over at CityFarmer.info. Pretty exciting. It's not a major news netork but hey it's a start, ha ha.

Chair Mockup

Here's a full-scale mockup of the skeleton for the artist's chair. I'd like to take this time to thank my dad for making me learn how to handsaw wood as a child.

Week 4 Update

Here's presented a view of the last studio for UF, with my trusted grey chair poised and at the ready. The chair project is developing, and what started as simply a cantilevered chair that was designed to reflect the context it was placed in, transformed into a monstrousity of its own. In an attempt to entertain myself, I started to stack the iterations of the chair on top of each other. Upon seeing this, it was declared that what I had just put together should be the chair. And bravely (though some would say foolishly), I agree to these demands.

So now the chair is programmed for an artist, and is being envisioned as a chair and an easel all in one, so one can paint while they sit and sit while they paint.

Featured Work

Posted my portfolio work up on a design site called Coroflot, and one of the projects (The Urban Farm), got placed as the featured work for January 29th. That's not too bad.


Coroflot Profile - Trevor Boyle

Final Updates

After all is said and done, finally have the printable version of the portfolio ready to get assembled and sent out. It's unbelievably how much of a time-consuming process it can be, something that can probably be worked on and tweaked infinitely. But there is a deadline so it had to be finished over the break.

Return to the Forsaken

Long time, no post.

My sincerest apologizes for the lack of love to this wonderful empty canvas on the interwebs. Unfortunately, about when I left off is when things started to get real in the semester. Updates are going to much more frequent as of now, coming every Friday as a way of discussing how the design studio is progressing- this last semester as an undergrad at UF.

Pictures of the new studio are soon to come, how it looks is complete madness. While last semester dealt primarily in New York, this semester's focus is going to be in Africa- Ethiopia more specifically.

The portfolio I posted pieces of is also finished by now, I'll upload more of that as time goes on.