"So in order to achieve clarity and be fully and positively engaged in what you're doing, you must
(1) know the goal or outcome you're intending and
(2) decide and take the next physical move to propel you in that direction."
(David Allen)

TheCASTLE participants werent as confused as it sounds...

theCASTLE: Week 13

Week 13 dawned bright and early and we all arrived at the workshop again with some of the group not knowing what was decided in the previous weeks class. Luckily it was not too hard to explain and we divided into supposedly even groups to work on both the test rig and a 1:5 model. Hannah, Gabby and I chose to work on the little model and we were initially led on a merry dance by Ian, who wouldn’t tell us the probable size of the timber we were going to use so we had to sit in the office and ring around suppliers and look at websites until we could come up with our own informed decision. Appearing in the light again we told Ian we had made a decision “70 x 35mm EcoAsh Ian” and we received handshakes, a laugh and were told “well, only took you 1 ½ hours!” -yeah thanks for your help Ian. Thanks a lot.






From there we set about cutting some pieces of wood exactly to scale to make the model, this of course took a lot of time and it was only after we finished that Robin showed us the special magnetic saw aid thing that helps you cut small pieces of wood. Thanks once again. Finally we had some scale timber and were going to set about getting drill bits and pins to make the construction method look realistic, but Andrew Maynard turned up and suggested that rather than waste time with that why not just hot glue the model together. For what seemed like the tenth time that morning we headed off on a different direction now gluing the frames into a stud type construction that we thought would easily be put together and manufactured at Student Works. When it came to cladding we got very excited because we found some white plastic sheet that we were allowed to cut up, modelling the extremely pliable plastic material Robin had been telling us about. Andrew pointed out that the plastic is really not good with heat, even direct sunshine and it pops and cracks and deforms as soon as it gets hot. The test rig itself at this time was being taken over by the male population of the class and turned into some kind of wishful thinking cubby house. Rafters and roof battens were put onto the roof and some very structural looking mezzanines were constructed and looked to hold several people climbing around on them. The overall look of the Castle now was becoming more of a Balinese home with huge extending eaves made from drapey hessian, which I think distracts from the pure aesthetic of the portal frames, that explain our ideas of customisation and manufacture very succinctly. But it did look like everyone was enjoying themselves and Andrew was flitting about with a pen in his hand drawing on whatever surface was available to describe his thoughts on what we should do for this or how we could try that.

At afternoon end everyone looked exhausted and it looked as thought the whole semester was threatening to finish through everyone getting tired and going home, but we pulled it together and did hear what Andrew and the other tutors thought. The main thing that was stressed was ‘don’t worry, you have achieved a lot’, which is what I pretty much wanted to hear. The journey of going through the group work and design process was tedious, repetitious at times, frustrating and incomprehensible, but we wanted to know that what we had done was meaningful and was going to help the disadvantaged youth of Launceston in some form, and provide an exploration of small housing. We had quite a few suggestions on the running of the unit, but we also identified that our unwilling-ness to put forward definite suggestions at times made everything go a lot slower. Andrew suggested that an in-between had to be reached in group work, where it wasn’t bogged down by diplomacy, but wasn’t run by dictators that say ‘it’s my way or the highway’ either. It has been almost epic in effort, but I think that we have put forward a really interesting model, and if we could get a CAD monkey to model up some combinations of Castles and create a web page or something to show how you could choose a Castle in the future, through the personalisation and customisation through manufacturing, we have definitely proposed a winning idea. It’s won in my books anyway!

theCASTLE: Week 12

Week 12 started as a 1:10 modelling class to try and reinterpret the diagrammatic conclusions that we got to last week. Kristy and I decided to work together and so we pooled some ideas and set to work on a model that demonstrated a tilt-up opening that allowed ventilation and light through, based on one of Geoff’s sketches. We were beavering away really enjoying using the materials and things and we modelled a way of changing the vertical height of the Castle. Another group worked on the idea of the panellised system and created different openings for different panels that people could then choose out of. Another group made a model of some slide out openings and walls that became cantilevering decks as well. This was all brought together in a discussion after the model making. Richard, Ian and Robin shared some research they had done separately over the time about slide out mechanisms from the Independence Caravan or something, and there was new hollow core door technology supplier found who could make doors any size and with lots of different materials and insulative fillings. This seemed to push aside the fact that we had spent the last morning modelling, and Kristy and I had put a lot of effort into ours, because suddenly we were trying to decide on a direction and what that meant for the test rig. Once again after all our achievements this semester we were back to conversations full of umms and ahhh’s and pregnant pauses. When asked what we thought we should do next there was a pause and then “…lunch?” which got a laugh, but what after that? “well… dinner… and breakfast!”. I thought that it was supremely obvious nothing was going to be achieved by pushing a conversation that was going nowhere, and in utter desperation it seemed, Richard cracked and explained what HE thought the direction we had come to and were working towards would be. A system of standardised parts of the Castle that can be customised through a manufacturing line of multiple versions of roofs, wall panels and openings to achieve a personalised Castle; personalisation by production line manufacturing (which I thought previously couldn’t have gone together). After this little revelation my feeling was ‘well why didn’t you say so? Can we go to lunch now?’ which I must have said out loud because we were released and agreed to meet back to discuss this development.

Unfortunately for the group decision-making process, there was only a few of us that did meet back after lunch, the combined pull of history essays and hitting the road to Hobart. Quickly in the break I had sketched what I though Richard was trying to describe, the parts that were to be standard and all the different types of wall panels, roofs and openings you could choose from. We tried drawing versions of the idea on the whiteboard, and the suggestion I threw in was why not have the two standardised parts as one whole solid ‘cup’ and a half ‘cup’. Based on the model of the test rig, one ‘cup’ would be the box frame portal system, and the whole one would have a back wall and include the toilet/shower and cooking/drinking solid service areas, which would help brace the frame so it didn’t have to be too heavy construction. The other half ‘cup’ would be a similar box frame but with no width walls and just supported by some torsion box shelving or something on the sides, but relatively open. From these two parts of the Castle, the whole and the half, the spaces between the two halves can be in-filled with the customised panels of your choice to then make up the 2.4, 3.6 or 4.8m long Castle. I can imagine that this would be very easy to put into a web page or something where someone can log in their details and requirements and go through a step-by-step selection of all the Castle parts. This then could provide a sketch up model they can explore at the end to then understand the implications of what they have chosen and how big they actually want it to be. I’m basing this idea on the way archiCAD works for example, you can make your own elements in detail and then have them saved to a library where you can bring up any project and drop that library part into it. You can imagine it would be like a probability and statistics maths equation, where you have to work out all the different possibilities of combinations for walls, roofs, materials, openings and arrangement. There would be so many different variations but the point is that those numerous combinations could consist of three roof types, eight different wall panels, two types of apertures (louvers or plain glazing), two door placements and a few internal shelving/stove/sink/toilet cubicle plans –it could be so easy! We were all agreed that this is a good end revelation for the Castle to finish on and that next week we can identify things to do to the test rig to make it into this idea, as well as making a model at 1:5 scale to show how it all could be put together. Yay!

theCASTLE: Week 11

Week 11 started off with the imminent threat of people coming to visit our class to see what we have done, which is always a good way of getting us going. We had several things to prepare, like a presentation of all our work so far (it had been at least 2 weeks since the last presentation) and the actual test rig to make it look presentable and like a lot of work. The people visiting were the couple Narja and Nick from the firm of PlusCreate and the designers of TS1, Geoff Clark who is lecturing 5th years, Lisa and Harry from Youth Futures and ??? and students from Student Works. As people started arriving we all suddenly got shy and nervous and we kept flitting around trying to avoid talking to anyone. Thankfully we had managed to patch together a presentation of our work, right from the beginning with the posters we made for Youth Futures and the Castle, to slides drawn by Bek for the buildability presentation and also some photos of us building our structures out of cardboard and the test rig. For some reason no one wanted to be the presenter again, so I stepped up and said a few words on what we had been doing, with may have seemed hasty and rushed, but if anyone actually realised how out of character it is for me to even contemplate stepping up to be spokesperson, then they would understand. Anyway, we got a bit of feedback from people at the time, like Geoff who said something like; “during that you were obviously thinking about redeemability” (or some word like that) and I think we/I shrugged and said “if you say so”, which may not have given the best impression. Also when Nick was mentioning the embodied energy of different materials they may have got a varied impression of Matt who, when talking about re-use of wood, said: “and then you can burn it!”. Shoving their preconceptions aside I thought it best if we moved straight onto the demonstration of the test rig and how adaptable and flexible we had made it through our investigations. Initially we decided to show how it slid back and forth and created different length spaces in between, but then we decided to go the whole hog and change the height in the space. Again, with a common goal and a few hammers our whole crew were mobilised in trying to lift the top halves of the frames and re-bolting them, which took a bit of hammer smashing and bolt-forcing but in the end was done. Because we hadn’t actually raised the whole structure like that before it was very exiting for the people watching, but also very much for us as well. It could’ve fallen on any of our heads at any time, but we managed to pin it up and that became another classic Castle moment.





Amid the hearty sniggers from our audience there were also a lot of impressed comments from people about what we have achieved through creating this adaptable, flexible thing. Narja, Nick and Geoff had some really nice comments about the test rig and what it was doing so far. Geoff particularly had a lot of suggestions about openings, apertures and swinging/sliding things, which we figured was the Troppo influence shining through, but the PlusCreate guru’s had some interesting comments from the industrial design angle and how we had manipulated the timber material to our advantage. The main conversations were about mechanisms and how we would go about moving a structure like the test rig up and down. This highlighted the paradigm of what we were actually doing, because the test rig in itself was not a full embodiment of what The Castle will actually become and look like, but people cant help seeing that it has a step down in the floor where it slides and that it has about 10 people needed to change its height, so obviously that’s why talk centred around block and tackle systems, wind-up/triple slide, weather shedding and flashings and things. It was good to hear though that an analytical or intuitive viewpoint could be taken in the process from here and it depends on the actual foci of The Castle manifestations.






Narja and Nick then gave a presentation on their object, TS1. Transformational Space One, apart from the interesting name, explored a lot of things that The Castle will never attempt to do, but also only identifies itself in its most urbane manifestation as a sleep-out, rather than a self-contained living unit that The Castle is/will be. TS1 was started as what sounded like a hobby project that then grew out of word of mouth and an increased sense of demand even when it hadn’t been designed. The demountable, flat pack room was a meld of Narja and Nick’s hair and make-up, sculpture and industrial design experiences, and looked the showy specky thing that would fit in on a cat-walk or glitzy, glamour-puss events. The process of design that they had been through had so many iterations that were so very similar to ours, i felt that either we were very good, or they weren’t, but then maybe everyone has the same ideas and throws out all the interesting, unrealistic ones to focus on something more realistic and achievable. There was a particular ease of assemble that seemed to be lacking from how they described early morning wakeups and 6 hour putting together stints, as well as some things that are apparently sealed with silicon each time they are demounted, but overall it was classy and really good for what its is presently being used for, the cat-walks, events, building shows and publicity. I’m not sure it really felt like home though. The market would be there I’m sure for things that are attractive and beautiful objects to enjoy, or have as a sleep-out for kids that want something more, but for someone that has no permanent home, it seemed less home, than show home. The brief that the couple had decided on was very good, a transportable structure that had to be carried by two people with no individual elements over 40kg, which made the 3.5 x 3.5m a simple item materially. The couple also had done some very detailed research into materials for their healthy-ness to the environment as well as the user, and they also had lots of precedents to share as well.

After lunch we split into groups with Narja, Nick and Geoff and had what were to be different types of discussions of their area of interest, but overall leaning towards what the conclusion to The Castle would be. As Richard pointed out at the end, all the parallel discussions were on a very similar topic; the test rig and how the actions it does now could influence the final design. Our group talked particularly about the use of colour within the scheme to create mood, lighting and interest, the use of the trailer as the prime structure for the Castle, and also how the decks around the sides of the castle could create a reveal that would hide the transportable nature of the Castle once it was on site. Geoff’s group were particularly interesting in the micro planning of the Castle (and it is very micro planning at this scale) and they discussed the exterior form and how it could be customised with a selection of parts, the use of the apertures to open the Castle for light, ventilation as well as access, and also the internal arrangement of the mezzanine inside the roof structure. The other group touched on methods of structure use and expression within the building and what could be used from this point. Richard asked if we all talked about the test rig as an actually design product just because its there and we can see it, or because its completely brilliant and that’s what we want it to be? I think that as an idea the finishing of that particular test rig idea is brilliant in what it explores, but that there could be many other alternate paths in the planning stages that we could have taken. Its still a pretty good design though and having made it, it does make it hard to leave the idea of how we made the structure for the test rig work, mainly because its our first exploration using such materials at such a humanistic scale, it’s an important step in all our design worlds. We decided that next week we would re-explore and try and create an understanding from all the comments and diagrams gleaned from today’s talk, to further the Castle and also come to some kind of relevant conclusion.