As expected, EDSA has brought on a lot of firsts. First internship, farthest distance from home, most learning, longest time spent away and so on- a lot of things are different. EXCEPT . the beginning of a new project!
This past week we received a new project with the title: Marassi. It is a high-end residential development, intended for vacations or holidays. To kick start ideas and get the design process flowing, we had a mini workshop with our studio and two special guests outside of our studio. We got the low down on the project, the three housing types: V18 (large) QTY: 27, V16 (normal) QTY: 26, TH (townhomes) QTY:48 (total), and of course twenty rolls of trace paper.
During this time everyone got a base map and the opportunity to throw down ideas through diagrams and other sketches. Every few seconds you would be hearing a new piece of trace paper being freed from the roll. It was just like the first few days back in our college studio after being introduced to a new site and project. Iowa State does a great job of encouraging quick sketches to get ideas out. Most of us started with bubble diagrams showing access points, views, green space and circulation of some sort. Each sheet of trace got a little more detailed but I say that very lightly. Everything was quick- you could see the design process on each sheet.
I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to borrow some of our diagrams from the workshop. One thing I have noted while interning here is the use of EDSA's ability to do quick diagrams that still read well and are, believe it or not, visually appealing (shown above).