For this step of the process, I have spent time focusing on the courtroom itself, as well as the court-set. Through diagraming and models I am exploring what I want the courtroom to become. Abstracting hierarchy of spaces and volumes is a prominent idea I am really focusing upon right now in the process of my design.
The beginning of my design concept looked specifically at the courtroom itself and the shape that is takes on.
The development of my concept particularly looks at the shape of the volume within the courtroom. I began to develop the idea that the judge, jury, and counsel table (law) area was a more prominent feature, and therefore should be more pronounced. I did the by increasing the volume of this area. I studied different ceiling styles to link the law area and the spectator area. Such as a sloped ceiling, a stepped ceiling, and a sloped/stepped hybrid ceiling.
I then realized that the hybrid ceiling was most conducive to link the two areas but still allow for the area to feel different. I then looked at the ways of stacking these courtrooms and the shapes they begin to form. From there I have begun pushing and pulling to form more spaces, which is where I will go for next week.
The courthouse works as a machine that moves people through the judicial system in order for them to get on with their lives. Therefore, the building should be able to help facilitate that movement and not be stagnant. At the same time, there are multiple streams of movement throughout the building that work at different paces and must not intersect: the public realm is fast-paced and has destinations along the way (courtrooms) and while the private realm is also fast-paced it has it’s own set of paths and destinations depending on whether it is the judge, jury or litigant.
This design begins to look at different ways of facilitating that movement focusing on the courtroom set through sketches and models.
I began developing the courtset by examining the experience of the witness. Elevated on the stand, being scrupulously watched and heard by the jury, counselors, judge, and a crowd of specators, the witness is more than likely to experience discomfort. I wanted the form of the courtroom to allow the witness to see views out to nature, even if such views were only to the sky, to give them something soothing to look out towards if being the center of attention becomes too stressful.
I developed a form for the courtroom that would simultaneously allow the witness to view nature, focus attention towards those involved in the judicial process (judge, counselors, witness, jury), and allow daylight to enter and reflect through the space.
I then made a set of models to look at how this form of the courtroom, when repeated, could affect the form of the whole building. I discovered a duality to the form: a tall, almost imposing facade on one side, and a lower, looser, more accessible facade on the other side. This form started to express the oppositions inherent in the judicial process and the courthouse, e.g. freedom vs. law, public vs. private, liberation vs. punishment. I also noticed an opportunity for the lower side of the building to appear to emerge out of the earth, visually bringing Bryant Park over the building and symbolically making the law accessible to the public, emerging out of ‘freedom’. The following images show a series of studies using this idea of the park flowing over the courthouse, as well as ideas about intersection of public and private spaces (making the courthouse most accessible to the public).
There are two trains of thought with the layout for the programmatic court set. The court, and auxiliary rooms, each have their own spacial layout that has developed differently.
The idea of a courtroom as an individual volume created the sketch model arranging the four individual volumes. The volumes allow for different formal shapes as well as affording unique views and site responses. This lets each courtroom have its own characteristics and formal expression. How can the manipulation of volumes work together to form a set of rooms which work together for a common program?
Using the strong traditional patterns of circulation with a courtroom (from back to front) the second study looked into forming an implied circulation and creating spaces through these implied moments and perpendicular planes. The courtroom’s form ends in a pinnacle that is formed from transforming the program circulation’s penultimate moment. It is the spaces between the planes that create new spaces within the transformed circulation. Can spaces be created from simple planes, and how can this new space interact with other spacial arrangements with the same form?
It becomes interesting to see how childhood past-times link into later life. As a child, I passed many hours playing Legos with my brother, constructing and taking down. This approach has now proven to be beneficial in my quests to determine massing of court-sets.
The first two concepts that were completed, had a primary focus on how to achieve daylighting in a courtroom, something that can seem counter-intuitive to preserving safety and security. However, these two forms became to domesticated in appearance and seemed to cary no meaning to the site and the surrounding community.
From here, I took on the approach of designing my concepts in a similar manner as playing with Legos. I build volumes and create combinations of volumes until something seems to work well with what I am trying to achieve in my building. Upon deeper thinking, I concluded what I wanted to achieve in my building. I want to reveal an order in terms of privacy, with the most public spaces facing the public in terms in height and footprint. I also wish to achieve a strong correlation to my site analysis. The use of shifting linear forms in my site analysis led to my aspiration to have shifting volumes to create shared spaces, overlapping volumes to create outdoor spaces, highlighting the three different court types, and allowing for large surfaces to be oriented to the north and south to allow for daylighting. With these generic parameters, I have created a sequence of massing models to create a path to finding the best solution.
For Friday’s pin-up, I wanted to continue my exploration of the section – to understand the relation of the courtroom to the exterior. I investigated the screen, and how to be transparent but also deal with solar control.
After Joelle’s suggestion to explore verticality, I made the wire model, which addressed the issue of weaving public, private, and secure within and up into the structure. I also looked at stacking paired courtsets on top of lobby/reception/flex program at the ground level.
I am currently pursuing the combination of these two models; how to integrate volumes within a framework.
During the site visit I was looking for areas of site placement that would connect the law school to the park and vice versa. The continuous red string denotes the path taken while on site and the volumes of red string denote areas of the site that I thought could serve as a possible placement of program. There needs to be a connective tissue within the site that brings the different programs together. Looking at the site I hope to bring these programs together and develop the overall site and not just the immediate site context.
The Bryant Park Community lies in the shadow of the ‘New City’ of Charlotte. The Site calls for the rise of a new neighborhood from the trash of the remaining community. Like the city of Charlotte, Bryant Park will connect to the past by rising above it and create a new active district hub. From the shadow of the new city to a beacon of the new south.
My exploration of the courthouse typology has taken me into an investigation of how community and law overlap. This stemmed from my initial research into Sentencing Circles and Restorative Justice, or the practice of allowing the community to attach a remedy or sentence for the crime committed. The principle behind this was to create a bridge that would allow for rehabilitation and re-admittance back into the community as opposed to the typical separation that exists in most courtroom proceedings.
I also researched an interesting precedent at the Superior Court in Portola, California that utilized strong vernacular architecture to blend the surrounding community and culture together with the establishment of law and order. It uses the vernacular materials and building design to create a synthesis with the surrounding landscape and culture.
This led me to focus my site research on the vernacular of the local site where the courthouse will be located. Specifically, I looked at site materials and the evolution of site typography. The connection between the physical (courthouse) and the written (law) is paramount in the formation of the legal system. If the courthouse was to be grounded in the community and of the community, I needed to understand the use of both materials and words within the community. I needed to understand how to weave the two together seamlessly.
[space + justice] 