Affective Environments Publication

1, Grand Avenue, San Luis Obispo, CA, United States

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Other Projects by Eric Nulman Thesis Studio 2009-2010

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Refractive Forest

Affective Environments Publication

1, Grand Avenue, San Luis Obispo, CA, United States

Firm

Eric Nulman Thesis Studio 2009-2010

YEAR

2010

Our studio has pursued a collective design agenda concerned with the creation of charged and active spaces in which the occupants are not passive recipients of information but are actively contributing to the production of affects. Spaces best described as affective environments. In this pursuit we have shifted our interest away from the standard production of objects – via abstraction and the virtual – towards the production of atmospheres and effects – via materiality, surface, and the real. Since our experience is affected by how we perceive the material and immaterial matter that surrounds us, it is of critical importance that this matter becomes the subject of design investigations. The production of atmospheres and architectural effects requires one to work with real or intended materials and environmental conditions at or near full-scale in order to properly understand and experience a material’s qualities and sensory affects. The studio learned how to design and employ architectural effects through a series of exercises including: studio installations, small group material effects prototypes, and individual material effects prototypes. These exercises successfully introduced the studio to a design research approach that utilizes full-scale prototypes to develop design concepts. The resulting projects are by no means timid – all with vivid colors, reflective materials, enticing texture, strategic lighting, irregular patterning – but they produce environments that are affective.The first two studio installations utilized a previous structure – Legato – as an armature onto which new surfaces could be applied. Meat produced a red glowing effect through the deployment red colored balloons to diffract the overhead fluorescent lights. Paper Light Scoops produced sublime visual effects by capturing the overhead light with strategically positioned translucent sheets of white paper. Fog Bank relied upon the transparent and reflective qualities of clear plastic tubes to create a rich perceptual surface whose appearance is dependent upon a one’s vantage point. Six small group material effects prototypes demonstrated a diverse range of interests within the studio and a variety of tools, techniques, and methods used to produce architectural effects. Intangible gave spectral light physical and spatial qualities by bouncing platonic projected images off reformed glossy plastic, bending the light into ethereal wisps. It felt Natural cultivated a living texture by growing rye grass on synthetic felt and perforated the felt to create a draping grass curtain. Flux Cascade formed an interactive environment by linking motion sensors to light controls, producing a cascade effect of light ribbons. Plastered enhanced the play of light and shadow across a surface by utilizing a single rotatable panel pattern and produced a dramatic textural effect. Refractive Forest shifted the users spatial perception through light refraction by overlapping multiple layers of water filled plastic tubes. Polymorph produced variation and surface directionality through the tessellation of differing component shapes that utilized a two-sided material. Full of fresh ideas, each student explored different methods of engaging the occupants of their thesis projects via form, materials, atmosphere, lighting, movement, and events. The difficult challenge for all was maintaining a rigorous link between their thesis concept, design objectives, and the final formal/spatial product. Cultivating the ideas is what matters most. Measure their work by the degree to which the ideas are evident in the architectural proposal.