First designs put forward

25 February 2016: For the first time, the small groups have been formed and are putting forward their very first ideas: If there are two in a group, they show two, and the same for three or four. 

AASK - Shoreditch

ZOG - Blackfriars

LAX - Blackfriars

OMY - Blackfriars

OMY - Blackfriars

OMY - Blackfriars

ShLu  - Shoreditch

Joana Goncalves visit the studio for Climate, Culture, Context analysis

18 February 2016: Joana Goncalves, from Brazil visited the studio for the presentation of the Context, Culture and Climate analysis stage, but three large groups. Each group looked at both Blackfriars and Shoreditch, and also offered some outline volumetric proposals along with their analysis. Next week, they break into small working groups.  

At the middle of the day, Joana offered a public lecture to the whole school, based on her seminal book on the Environmental Design of Tall Buildings. 

Here, she is discussing the matter of density, and different urban forms to achieve density. 

Issues of light at the ground plane

Floor plate depth, outriggers

Solar shading

Commentary on the GSW Building, Berlin

Comparison of the Commerzbank, Frankfurt; GSW, Berlin; the Gherkin, London

Criteria for analysis

Selfie fun during London walk about 3 February 2016

3 February 2016: Selfie fun during London walkabout. Timed perfectly to see all the buildings on the itinerary. Sara was our 'queen of the selfies'! 

(Author's note : I have done this walk so very often that I prefer these photos to the conventional architectural photographs)

Forecourt of the British Museum

Visiting the Gherkin

Emerging from the Leadenhall Arcade, we find the south elevation of Lloyds Building

Playing with the spire of the London Shard

Star photo near the Shard

Again, the Shard....

First semester portfolios pinned up

22 January 2016: The Hong Kong project is now on the wall! Seven designs for pocket tower in the Wan Chai district.

Anran and Dongjie, design for rehab hospital on Hennessy Rd, HK

Marionne and Laxman, design for fashion tower on Percival Rd, HK

Parth and Vivek, design for Mixed use tower with vertical farming, Russell Rd, HK

Ghulam, ecotower on Percival St

Lei and Yiwei, school tower, HK

Jiawen and Xiaoyi, museum and college tower, HK

Ongky, ecotower on Percival St, HK

Semester one final review 19 January

19 January 2016: Final Review of the semester. We had Huzaifa as a guest, shortly before he returns to India. There is always a sense of celebration and relief at the final crit: we do not spring nasty surprises on the students. Guillermo Guzman joined us for the afternoon. 

Graduation December 2015

Pro Vice Chancellor Karen Cox opens graduation in the Conference Centre (because the Sports Centre is being rebuilt)

Ren (Trong), Robin, Sifan, DNC, Teng, Eric	DNC with Teng Li, CTBUH winner

Sifan Guo with DNC	Nhan Le Trong with DNC

Huzaifa Chawhala with his family

STB Graduates, Teng Li, Sifan Guo, Xuan Luo, Preetika Verma, Nhan Le Trong, with DNC

DNC and Xuan Luo

Eric, Robin, DNC and Jackie

DNC and Xuan Luo

10 December end of term review

10 December 2015: The last Thursday of term, and an end of term review. Huzaifa Chawala, one of our graduates from 2015 is visiting as a reviewer. Akshay Sethi is visiting us from Gensler. 

Huzaifa and Akshay meet Marionne and Laxman for their Hong Kong project.