Frank Gehry

Experience Music Project (1999 - 2000)
Location: Seattle, Washington


The Experience Music Project is a blend of exhibits, technology, media, and hands-on activities that combines the interpretive aspects of a traditional museum, educational role of a school, state-of-the-art research facilities of a specialized library, and audience-drawing qualities of performance venues and popular attractions.
The Experience Music Project is a building that presents opportunities to explore its history and traditions, participate in the music making process, experience great music, and learn the secrets of composition and performance.
The building is a commemoration to Jimi Hendrix, one of America's a most creative, innovative, and influential musical artists.It exhibits and public programs are envisioned as a three-dimensional floating puzzle formed by six elements, with each piece being critical to the shape and the nature of the whole.
The Sky Church, a concept inspired by Jimi Hendrix, represents the coming together of all types of people united by the power and joy of music and music making, and is physically embodied in the building's central public gathering area. Through a series of exhibition spaces, The Crossroads presents the collision of multiple viewpoints and traditions, which is American popular music.
The Sound Lab offers hands-on opportunities to create and illustrate some of the relationships between music, science, and technology. The Artist's Journey is a compelling history of the life and times of artists, illuminating the human aspect of their artistry and revealing the unexpected events and formative experiences that contributed to their creative development. The Electric Library is a multimedia archive of the Experience Music Project collection and information resources, and provides services that are available both on site and on-line.

Sources:
http://www.arcspace.com/architects/gehry/emp_n/
Accessed 30/09/2010

http://www.greatbuildings.com/buildings/Experience_Music_Project.html
Accessed 30/09/2010

Images from http://www.greatbuildings.com/buildings/Experience_Music_Project.html

Group Members

Wai Shun Chu, Jeremy Lay, Ian Manhuyod

Interactive Pdf

Download Interactive Pdf at http://www.filefront.com/17293608/Interactive PDF.pdf

Layar Model

Tinyurl : http://tinyurl.com/39expte

Digital A1 Poster

Rendered Habitat

I need to make reference to the users Biolo Kun & zerocold96 for the 3ds dragon models which i obtained from http://www.turbosquid.com/

Influences

Landscape Influences

























Building Influences

2 Architectural Pieces

Saint Paul's Cathedral

Saint Paul's Cathedral St Paul's Cathedral is an Anglican cathedral on Ludgate Hill, the highest point in the City of London, and is the seat of the Bishop of London. The present building dates from the 17th century and was designed by Sir Christopher Wren. It is generally reckoned to be London's fifth St Paul's Cathedral, all having been built on the same site since AD 604. The cathedral is one of London's most famous and most recognisable sights. At 365 feet (111m) high, it was the tallest building in London from 1710 to 1962, and its dome is also among the highest in the world. Important services held at St. Paul's include the funerals of Lord Nelson, the Duke of Wellington and Sir Winston Churchill; Jubilee celebrations for Queen Victoria; peace services marking the end of the First and Second World Wars; the launch of the Festival of Britain and the thanksgiving services for both the Golden Jubilee and 80th Birthday of Her Majesty the Queen. The Royal Family holds most of its important marriages, christenings and funerals at Westminster Abbey, but St Paul's was used for the marriage of Charles, Prince of Wales and Lady Diana Spencer. St Paul's Cathedral is still a busy working church, with hourly prayer and daily services.Reference:
http://www.answers.com/topic/st-paul-s-cathedral
Accessed 30/08/2010

Royal Observatory, Greenwich

The Greenwich Royal Observatory, or The Royal Observatory, Greenwich as it is currently known was founded in 1675 under King Charles II. Until its official closing as a scientific institute in 1998, it was the oldest in Great Britain still in operation. It was Sir Jonas Moore, Surveyor General for King Charles II, who first proposed the building of the observatory and it furnished the buildings with equipment and instruments with his own money. The final site was on the foundation of the old Duke Humphrey Tower, not the most ideal spot, being aligned 13 degrees from true North, but all that could be afforded on the £500 budget. John Flamsteed was the first person to serve as director of the Greenwich Royal Observatory and first to hold the title of Astronomer Royal, which came with the directorship. Flamsteed immediately went to work on his new stellar tables and charts. The Royal Greenwich Observatory was also a time-keeper. It housed two of the most accurate clocks of the time, having a margin of error of +/- 7 seconds per day. Since 1833 a Time ball on top of the Octagonal Room of the observatory rises halfway up the mast at 12:55, fully at 12:58, and falls at 13:00 hours every day and provided a central time for ships on the Thames to set their clocks by. Later, a telegraph cable would link this time ball to a sister on the southeast coast that would be used by ships in the English Channel. In 1928, Greenwich Time was chosen as the base of world time and given the name Universal Time. In 1884, The Royal Greenwich Observatory was adopted as the site of 0 degrees for longitudinal measurement – the Prime Meridian, which had been established locally years before in 1851. The Prime Meridian was originally marked through the courtyard grounds with a brass strip, which since has been replaced with stainless steel and since 1999 there is a large green laser pointing north over London.

Reference:
http://www.brighthub.com/science/space/articles/42903.aspx#ixzz0yKxRAxYu

Accessed 30/08/2010

Arhcitect

After a showing my tutor Steve my architect i was advised to find an architect that had some influence to my design. I have chosen Sir Christopher Wren the architect of Saint Paul's Cathedral as my internal design reminds me of a cathedral.

Here is biography from http://www.answers.com/sir%20christopher%20wren
Accessed on 30/08/2010

Christopher Wren was born in East Knoyle, Wiltshire, on Oct. 20, 1632, and educated at Oxford. Apparently destined for a career as a scientific scholar, he became professor of astronomy at Gresham College in London when he was 24. In 1661 he was appointed Savilian professor of astronomy at Oxford.

Wren did not give his attention to architecture until he was 30. No information is available to explain the development of his interest in architecture, but his training in science and mathematics and his ability in solving practical scientific problems provided him with the technical training necessary for a man who was to undertake complex architectural projects. His temperament and education, and the society in which he moved, would naturally have inclined him to wide interests.

Early Career

Wren's first venture into architecture came in 1662, when he designed the Sheldonian Theatre at Oxford, a building intended for university ceremonies. Based upon the concept of a Roman theater, his ingenious interior design left the space free of supports or columns, but for the exterior he had recourse to unimaginative copying from old architectural pattern books.

Wren made only one journey out of England, a visit of several months to France in 1665 to study French Renaissance and baroque architecture. The French journey had significant influence on his work and provided him with a rich source of inspiration.

After the Great Fire of 1666, which destroyed much of London, King Charles appointed Wren a member of the commission created to supervise the reconstruction of the city. He had already drawn up a visionary plan for a new London. His design was typical of 17th-century city planning and called for a combination of radiating and grid-plan streets accented by squares and vistas, but his plan was not accepted.

Wren was given the responsibility for replacing the 87 parish churches demolished by the Great Fire. Between 1670 and 1686 he designed 51 new churches; they constitute a major part of the vast amount of work done by him and are known as the City Churches. They are uneven in quality both in design and execution, and their varied plans and famous steeples reveal Wren's empirical eclecticism and his ingenuity. The churches are essentially classical in design or baroque variations on classical themes as adapted to English taste and the requirements of Anglican worship. His work on the City Churches firmly established his position as England's leading architect; he was appointed surveyor general in 1669, a post which he held until 1718, and was knighted in 1673.

While Wren was working on the City Churches, he undertook many other projects. One of the most important was Trinity College Library at Cambridge (1676-1684), an elegantly severe building derived from the late Italian Renaissance classicism of Andrea Palladio as transmitted to England by Inigo Jones in the early 17th century. By 1670 Wren was also at work on designs for a new St. Paul's Cathedral.

St. Paul's Cathedral

St. Paul's, which took nearly 35 years to build, is Wren's masterpiece. The Great Fire had so damaged the old St. Paul's as to render it dangerous, and the authorities decided that a new cathedral was needed. In 1673 Wren presented an impressive design in the form of a large wooden model known as the Great Model. The Great Model, which still exists, shows a cathedral based on a Greek-cross plan and dominated by a massive central dome. The exterior of the building was to have curved walls and an entrance block faced with a portico of giant Corinthian columns. The design of the Great Model is Wren's expression of baroque vitality tempered by classicism and reveals the influence of French and Italian architecture as well as that of Inigo Jones.

The English were accustomed to cathedrals built on the medieval Latin-cross plan with a long nave; the Great Model design, which was much criticized, departed from this tradition and seemed to the Protestant English to be too Continental and too Catholic. In the face of such opposition, Wren prepared a new design based on the Latin cross with a dome over the crossing and a classical portico entrance. This compromise, known as the Warrant Design, was accepted in 1675, but as the building progressed Wren made many changes which reflected his increasing knowledge of French and Italian baroque architecture gained from books and engravings. The Cathedral as finished in the early 18th century is very different from the Warrant Design; the building, a synthesis of many stylistic influences, is also Wren's uniquely organic creation. With its splendid dome, impressive scale, and dramatic grandeur, St. Paul's is fundamentally a baroque building, but it is English Protestant baroque in its restraint and disciplined gravity.

Later Work

After 1675 English architecture began to turn away from the sober Palladianism of Wren's Trinity College Library and to manifest influences from Continental baroque architecture. These trends are evident in St. Paul's and in his later works. English taste rejected the emotional drama and fluid design of Italian and German baroque and was closer to the classical baroque of France. Nevertheless, during the last quarter of the century English architects began to conceive of buildings in baroque terms, that is, as sculptural masses on a large scale, and to introduce elements of richness, grandeur, and royal splendor which reflected the temper of the age. Important example of Wren's design in the idiom of the English baroque are the Royal Hospital at Chelsea (1682-1689), the work done at Hampton Court Palace (1689-1696) for King William III and Queen Mary, and the Royal Naval Hospital at Greenwich (1696-1705).

Wren died in London on Feb. 25, 1723, and was buried in St. Paul's. His tomb bears a simple inscription: "Reader, if you seek his monument, look about you."