TARA MEHTA
This one story warehouse building is on Kane Industrial Drive in Hudson MA and houses a home insulation company. The walls are constructed with a concrete block. The space is open inside with 2 garages on both the north and south walls. The Main entrance is on the west side of the building.
The interior is open and is supported by 3 columns that run through the center of the building. There is a mezzanine accessed by a stairs in the Northwest corner of the building. The space below the mezzanine is has enclosed walls for bathrooms and office space. Steel trusses run north south spanning from the central to outer walls with exposed tube lighting fixtures running throughout.
This diagram shows the building as a kit-of-parts including a steel grate stair, steel IBeams, concrete steps, garage frame and door, glass panes, window and exterior door frames and handles, curtain walls, ceiling light frame and LED rods, bricks, corrugated metal, and steel trusses.
The media stuff map explores the categories of media and the products that are associated with each. Print Media being the oldest is slowly dying but is being moved online. The other two categories are Broadcast Media and Internet based media. Both are dominant but Internet Based media is all consuming. Computers, Tvs, Monitors and Smartphones have screens and other components. My ANT map details the Life Cycle of these materials and the Environmental impact of each of the stages. It is revealed that the phases during manufacturing and after consumer use are the most harmful. Furthermore, the ubiquity of smartphones and internet embedded in all things connects us to the internet of things which is perhaps the broadest in scope and has the deepest cultural implications.
The plant stuff map breaks down plant stuff into three categories: plants, plant innovations and plant accessories. Because of social media and the past years events, the demand for houseplants has skyrocketed. However this newfound cultural obsession has a dark side. More often than not, the origins of the plants have environmentally detrimental effects. For example, there are a number of plants that are becoming extinct or are subject to poaching because western demand is so high. This also leads to the rise in plant accessories. There are plastics and electronics. The plant electronics are becoming more and more part of the internet of things. So while consumers may think the plant industry is a fully environmentally friendly sector, there is a dark side being fuelled my media. However, there is hope: Plant innovations are showing a myriad of green technology that is actually good for the planet.
My design includes media and plant stuff assembled by aligning in a meandering organization. There is a maze that connects the rear and front doors that travels within the building. There maze also travels through glass biomes along the exterior of the building.
The maze is made up of walls that are covered arranged media screens displaying plants and their habitats. Along sections of the maze the images range from polar to tropical climates. Along the exterior of the rectangular warehouse space are glass biomes, each filled with a specific climates flora according to the section it is in.
On the southwest corner of the building is glass biome filled with tropical flora. This glass bubble is connected to the maze inside the building. Traveling from west to east in the maze, the images on the screen will transition through Earth’s climates from tropical to polar. Along the east side of the building there are two biomes: polar and highlands.
The spatial experience is marked the enclosed maze of media screens. The screens are aligned as if to give the feeling that the whole wall is a screen. As the screens are depicting plants, the intended experience is feeling like one is walking through the environment depicted. However, the maze experience is interrupted by glass biomes that house real plants.