So while everyone is enjoying a quiet Saturday and Sunday, sipping hot coffee on their front porches, looking into their gardens, with children playing around, people walking their dogs and more, Our studio is in full production mode, enjoying the humming of drilling machines and clincking of metal rebars.
Its been a super productive weekend and I will love to give a brief of all our days.
Friday, 17th November 2017:
We were all on-site at 2pm, eagerly waiting to pour concrete for the other half of the slab. Unfortunately, the truck was delayed by an hour and a half. But! we made awesome use of our time by blowing off some steam with a basketball match.
Working with concrete throughout the week was an epiphany. Understanding concrete as the texture, the weight, the composition, the rebars and most importantly water has been a huge learning curve. This reminds me of the text that we read “The Thinking Hand” by Juhaani Pallasmaa and the importance of understanding the material we design with. As architecture students, while working on any project, we quickly come to a material choice as concrete but to mindfully choose it and understand the structure and materiality, is an essential aspect of our profession. I am very glad we are getting a chance at this through Studio V and there has been a huge increase in respect for concrete workers who do an excellent job.
Friday night, we finally had a shiny new slab !!
Saturday, 18th November and Sunday, 19th November 2017:
Saturday and Sunday primarily went in trying to cut and build the formwork for our concrete piers. We used Melamine as the inside surface and 2×4 as support on the outside. Shop drawings were super helpful in a situation where multiple people were assembling different piers. Tomorrow on Monday we are planning to assemble the formwork on site and do the rebars in the piers and get ready for a pour on Tuesday. We also need to assemble the sink formwork and are simulatenously developing shop drawings for the storage shed and the roof.
This really has been a super productive weekend!
Hopefully, all that works out before we move into the Thanksgiving break 🙂
Ciao!
