Urban Emptiness

Downtown Crossing: Site Analysis

Nodes and Their Relation to Open Space

Streets with No Visual Connection

Forced Views 

Program: Redux

Statement: My program is set in an environment that is central to the majority of commotion within a city. More importantly, it lies in an are where pedestrian traffic is dominant. There will be extremely little vehicular traffic. The program will also feed off of its environment and react and respond to various types of contextual conditions. These may be something as ambiguous as circulation patterns or something as concrete as building typology.

Program: Conceptual Diagram

The blue space represents the void or empty space within the site. As one circulates downwards towards the site, their awareness of the vast openness becomes more and more apparent.

Activities + Circulation happen by circumstance and it cannot be clearly defined.  The emphasis on my program as a central, low-lying entity will draw people to it. As opposed to using walls and other architectural elements, I intend to use the programs physical presence within the city to influence people to move towards it.

Adjacencies and contextual relations are the main generator of this program. By using surrounding buildings as a means to define the space I create, the existing characteristics and qualities of the site will reflect itself onto the new program.

Downtown Crossing, Boston

MEET Downtown Crossing from Adam Flanagan on Vimeo.

The Materiality of Space

Storm King

The Positivity of Negative Space

A puddle is something too often overlooked. No more than a void in the ground that allows water in, it modestly reflects something greater than itself, the surrounding context. Like the puddle, all empty space has this quality. Humans move towards these particular places of emptiness just as water gravitates towards low elevations. It is the space between the solid forms where humans inhabit and life occurs. In turn, this space has more of an ability to give people deeper insights into their environment than solid mass does.

I propose an architecture that emphasizes the void over solid mass. We see ourselves in this space, not in walls and buildings surrounding it; therefore it is beneficial to human affairs to take the fullest advantage of this space.  It is defined by its context just as bronze is defined within its cast. Hence, space is contingent upon this context’s presence in order to mold itself. This space emerges from its context.

Thesis Site: One Franklin Street

I have decided to choose this site because it relates quite literally back to my idea that the void or empty space is much more significant than solid mass. It has the potential to change the way people view their city around them by influencing them to reflect on the context. Why is this void in my city? What has happened here?

The Great Boston Fire of 1872

This area also has quite the history.  It lies just one the western end of where the Great Boston Fire of 1872 had spread. This area has been devastated before and has since risen from the ashes. However, the site on One Franklin Street brings about these ideas of emptiness and harks back to the days of the fire.

Movement Through Empty Space

This clip is a simple observance of how people might use open space. In this instance a person is walking from a distance towards a statue. If there were obstacles in their way, they would not have experienced the same profound procession. The sense of scale also diminishes in such vastness.

European Plazas + Public Space

I believe that by studying typical European squares, I am able to better understand what makes that place so significant that an entire society would decide to leave it devoid of solid mass.

Amsterdam: De Dam

Rotterdam: Schouwburgplein

Hamburg: Rathaus Square