Performance Pavilion

Open Call

The project for this year’s week-long intensive design/build studio is a lightweight, self-supporting Performance Pavilion. Studio participants will engage in a collaborative and iterative design process, striking a balance between form, material and craft, culminating in a full-scale, multi-functional Performance Pavilion to be used through-out the year. Ten applicants selected from an open call will work directly with professional craftsmen, fabricators, architects, digital specialists, and educators exposing the participants to emerging design, computation, fabrication, and construction practices in the field of architecture.  The goal of the studio is the investigation of matter and materiality as a means of interrogating affects, behaviors, and force within the context of fabrication and construction. This is achieved through a rigorous exploration of analogue and digital techniques allowing for new discoveries in form-finding and performance based architecture.

During the week participants will live in an 1860s house on a 300 acre farm while taking part in a fast-paced hands-on collaborative process. Participants will engage in all aspects of the project realization including iterative design sessions, focused discussions, group presentations and technical investigations into full-scale prototypes.  The studio will conclude with participants presenting the completed pavilion to the community for a public ribbon cutting and celebration.

The farm straddles a stretch of a long country road, and the Performance Pavilion will be a permanent structure that must be visible, stand out against the vast, rural landscape while remaining reverent to its surroundings. The Five Sisters Farm is a habitat of versatile ecosystems, and spectacular terrains.  Although farming is the predominate use of the land the pavilion seeks to enhance an emerging relationship with secondary user groups such as the local arts community.  Public events will be held at the pavilion to foster the relationship with local residents and artists.

Studio Culture

+FARM brings together a wide range of professionals to work directly with the participants during the studio.  The studio will progress from introductory to more advanced working sessions with technical content to address issues of: materiality, interiority, component types, and self-structuring architecture. A broad array of analog and digital tools from pneumatically powered shears, plasma cutting, tab/bolt connecting, sketching, solidworks, rhinoceros and grasshopper will be employed and available to the studio participants

During a fast-paced and hands-on form-finding design charrette participants will directly engage the topic of self-supporting architectural systems.  Analogue prototypes will test the performance of a stainless steel shell against harsh environmental conditions while simultaneously investigating the potential for the production of habitable spaces in similar climates.

Participants will work together as a team for the entire design, fabrication, and construction process and will share responsibilities in building the pavilion from ground up.  Consideration of the climatic, environmental, ecological, and material challenges of this rural site are crucial to the realization of the final project.

Project Focus

• Craft: Woodworking (Joinery, Blocking), Metal Fabrication (Pneumatically Powered Shear, Inverter Plasma Cutting, Hydraulic Press Brake Humping).
• Digital Design + Fabrication (SolidWorks), Parametric Design (Grasshopper), Physics-based Simulation (Karamba), and Modeling for Digital Fabrication (Rhino + Rhinonest).
• Construction: Fundamentals (Woodworking, Concrete, Advanced Carpentry), Metal Tooling (Tab/ Bolt Connecting), Electrical (Basic Lighting).

Project Team

Joseph Vidich is an architectural designer and educator based in New York City. He is a partner and founder of Kin & Company, LLC, an architectural design, fabrication and consultancy practice in Brooklyn, NY. Joseph is currently an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation where he teaches an advanced course in digital fabrication and representation. He is also an Adjunct Lecturer at City University of New York, College of Technology where he teaches a 3rd year studio course focusing on design development, construction drawings and digital fabrication. Joseph has worked professionally for Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects and Weiss/Manfredi Architects.   Kin & Company: http://blog.kinandcompany.com/

Lavender Tessmer, a designer, fabricator and material researcher, is currently a lecturer at Washington University in Saint Louis, where has taught courses in architectural representation and digital fabrication since completing her MArch at the school in 2011. Specializing in parametric design, material testing, connection design and visualization, Lavender has worked for three years with Yogiaman Tracy Design (yo_cy) on both residential and commercial projects, as well as a variety of architectural installations. The firm won first place at the 2012 TEX-FAB international design and fabrication competition, with their entry, “Cast Thicket,” which was installed at the University of Texas/Arlington in 2013.

Jason is a founding partner of Schindler Crafts based in Buffalo, NY. Since 2004, Schindler Crafts has renovated a range of historic homes exploring traditional and contemporary woodworking technologies. Jason has worked with +FARM since 2011, providing the foundations for proper woodworking that intersects education and practice.

Founder Tim Brewster started T&T Welding in 1996, and has specialized in structural custom welding. Located in Silver Creek, NY, his facility is an American Welding Society certified shop and only utilizes steel purchased in North America. Tim Brewster worked directly with the +FARM Winter Studio 2014, and was a vital component to the success of the project.   T&T Welding

William Haskas is the Founder and Design Principle of LuStudio an emerging design collaborative based in Brooklyn + Buffalo, NY.  He specializes in the application of material performance, emergent design technologies and digital fabrication in contemporary design practices.  His studio is currently working on a 16acre industrial re-development, and Cycling Bridge in Buffalo, New York, and is currently collaborating with the Artist Kelley Walker (this work just opened in a show the Paula Cooper Gallery in NY).  He is Co-Founder of DESIGNCIRCUIT, a non-profit organization operating nomadically throughout multiple cities, hosting a range of events to propel research into action.  William is currently teaching at Parsons the New School of Design in the School of Constructed Environments, NY City College Spitzer School of Architecture, and New York City College of Technology.  In 2011 he formed +FARM.

Ed is an architect and the principal of smartDESIGN Architecture, pllc in Batavia, NY.  smartDESIGN is an award-winning firm that has completed large and small-scale commercial and residential projects throughout New York and the eastern United States.  Prior to establishing the business, Ed was a professor of architecture and design at two WNY colleges for several years and taught sustainable design strategies for a summer at the Monteverde Institute in Costa Rica. Ed is a member of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) and is nationally certified with the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB).  He has a Master of Architecture degree from the University of Buffalo and a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics from SUNY Brockport

Joseph Vidich
Lavender Tessmer
Jason Schindler
Tim Brewster
William Haskas
Rigidized Metals

Five Sisters Farm – Perrysburg, NY

The rural community of Perrysburg is neighbor to the Seneca Indian Reservations in Gowanda and Salamanca, where unique tribal communities rich in cultural heritage reside. Perrysburg is approximately a 1-hour drive south of Buffalo, New York, which has the closest train and airport terminals.

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Requirements

Applicants must be enrolled or have successfully completed at least one year of education at the university level or school of higher education, and we recommend that students not be out of school more than 4 years. Selections will be made based on the applicant’s previous work and presentation skills within the realm of art, architecture, design, and fabrication. Knowledge in architecture or construction is not required for this workshop. +FARM encourages a diversity of participants, as their unique experience will add to the complex equation of design.

Fees

The Performance Pavilion Studio is $1050 for each individual. Application fees will be deducted from the Studio fee. This must be paid in advance of the workshop.

Fee Includes:
Lodging and meals will be provided for breakfast, lunch and dinner. All design, fabrication, and construction sessions including direct interaction and guidance from the professionals participating in areas of woodworking, metal fabrication and tooling, digital modeling, advanced carpentry, construction with tools such as inverted plasma cutter, rhinoceros, and grasshopper.

Participants will be staying at the Hall House, the 1860 constructed Farm House that is the project Studio + Site. The house was abandoned for years and recently has begun a multi-year renovation.

Schedule

+FARM Pavilion Schedule

Summer Schedule

Jury

Joyce Hwang

+FARM and Beyond

+FARM will conclude with a community celebration to showcase the built structure. You will prepare a presentation to the guests to encourage a discussion that strengthens the dialog between design and user. In Fall 2014, we have a public exhibition in New York City featuring your work from the program. The gallery exhibit will offer an opportunity to interact and connect with a larger network of designers and professionals focused on similar topics of study.