I remember in school we designed a winery and in order to do that we had to learn all about the wine-making process so that we could create a design that allowed their process to take place easily and efficiently. To this day I probably know more about the wine making process than your average person. The same is now true for processing a detainee into the jail.

It’s not enough just to understand the process though; you really have to fit your design to that process so it improves the client’s use of the space. The best example I can think of that fails to do this is the Guggenheim Museum by Frank Lloyd Wright in New York. This building’s biggest error is the inability to hang artwork correctly along the ramp. This just shows that no matter how great the design is and how good it looks, if it doesn’t function, it can be thought of as bad. It’s important to make sure the design of a building allows it to be used.

They’re not just looking at a way to reuse a building for its second life, but actually its third life. The building was originally a carpet warehouse built in 1984, 15 years later it was converted into a church and is now being looked at for the new location of the city library. This isn’t a new concept for the city whose current library is located in the old fire station.

I expect as this recession continues and construction remains minimal, we will see more renovations instead of new buildings. Not only will this make us more sustainable but will also hopefully give new life to some neighborhoods. I hope to see this trend realized in the near future.

With this great feat of structural ingenuity and design, come quite a few questions. The first is one of economical feasibility. Does it seem odd that it is opening during this time of great recession? This building was not without its financial problems. In fact, it might not have been completed without being bailed out by neighboring ruler Sheik Khalifa bin Sayed Al Nahyan, hence the new name of the tower. It is not alone though, according to an article in The Christian Science Monitor, nine of the buildings that have become the world’s tallest building over the past century were finished during economic hardship. This makes sense since right before most downturns in the economy, it is at its greatest. During these times of heightened economy, these great architectural and structural wonders are realized and started just before the bottom falls out.

The second question is one of design. It’s not unusual for the aesthetics of these structural masterpieces to fall under great scrutiny. It’s no secret that when the Eiffel Tower became the world’s tallest building in 1889, many in Paris thought it to be an eyesore. Other tall buildings that received much criticism were the World Trade Center Towers with its blocky silhouette and the Shanghai World Financial Center that looks like a giant bottle opener. For the new Burj Khalifa, though, I have yet to here any negativity about the design. Instead I’ve heard much praise of the design including comments like “slender needle reaching high into the sky” and “a giant sand castle in the sky.” Personally I enjoy the look of the new tower and think it’s great that structural ingenuity and architectural aesthetics were able to come together and create such a great design.

The final question is one of safety. Is the building structurally sound? By increasing the height of the world’s tallest building by over 1,000 feet, one of my coworkers said it’s just asking to fail. According to the developer, the tower’s reinforced concrete structure makes it stronger than steel-frame skyscrapers. Only time will tell, but I hope this building will stand for a long time to come.

When I step back and look at the big picture, we are, of course, still far better off than other areas around the United States. For starters, I still have a job, while many of my classmates that are just as talented and some maybe even more are being laid off across the country. I’m not safe though; there are firms in town that have started lay offs and there’s always a chance my firm will have to make those same tough decisions.

For now though, the upside to working in San Antonio is the quantity of large projects that have been awarded lately. They include such projects as the $300 million Performing Arts Center renovation, $750 million UHS hospital, $80 million downtown UHS hospital, and the $130 million Federal Courthouse. The great thing about these projects is that they have been dispersed among five different large San Antonio firms. These projects, along with a few smaller ones, will hopefully keep the San Antonio architecture community afloat until the economy has a chance to recover.

One of the things that was fascinating was the many different types of glass patterns that were used. I am sure a lot of that has resulted from changes in the technology of glass making. As windows broke and had to be replaced, the old ones were no longer being produced so they used a different type. This does call to question what do we do in situations like this where we have historic buildings and can’t replace it with the same type of glass pattern. Part of me wishes we could replicate the glass and be able to put in the same type for historic purposes. At the same time though, it was amazing to be able to see all those different types of glass used in one building, which wouldn’t have happened if they had replaced it with the same types.

I don’t really know what the right answer is, but for me, I just credit this trip as a great learning experience and a chance to see glass types that I would be hard pressed to find somewhere else. I’ve included a few pictures I snapped that show just a small sampling of the glass types and patterns.

We are using a horizontal line fritted glass for all glass above a certain height. Half of this glass occurs where we have a ceiling, so we want to conceal what is behind it and the other half opens into a tall open space that we want people to be able to look through. There will be two spots in the building where the different types of glass will be sitting next to each with only and 2 ½-inch mullion between them. The question becomes how do we get these two types of glass to look the same from the exterior.

We have come up with two possible solutions and are waiting on samples to determine what we think will work best. The first option is to use a spandrel glass. Now usually the color is applied to the number 2 surface but since that’s where our frit is, we will be applying it to the number 4 surface. Our big question here is what color to use. We are going to experiment using black, white, gray, and a green since the glass we’re using has a green tint to it. Hopefully one of these options will achieve the correct look. We were a little surprised when experimenting with a glass sample we had in the office that it appears the white isn’t going to work well because it blends in with the white frit and the pattern doesn’t read very well.

The second option is to use a satin finish. Since this allows shadows to be visible through it, we would have to paint the studs and insulation behind it so that we don’t read the rhythm of the studs behind the glass. Again the question arises about what color of paint should we use. The satin gives a softer look and makes everything a little more obscure.

I personally think that the spandrel will look better but my colleague believes that the satin will. When we get the samples in we will set up a mock up and use natural sunlight to determine which will look best. I look forward to finding the verdict.

The program lets you import the project model, type in the project address, and it pulls information from online sources to give you data about the project. It can calculate such things as where is the best location on the building to put PV panels, what is the payback period for the PV panels, what is the annual energy and water savings for the building. By changing the design or orientation of the building you can see how these numbers change. One funny feature is that it grades your building’s carbon footprint by giving it an equivalent number of SUVs.

Ecotect is a more sophisticated software that deals with the impacts of the sun. It has many tools to visualize solar radiation, shade and shadow, and other solar factors. One cool feature of the program are the wizards that can help with the design. The one I saw demonstrated was for a window shade. You type in the months of the year you want the window shaded, pick the type of shade you want from a list and based on the design of the building and the location of the project, the software generates the minimum shape that is needed to shade that window. Architects can then take that information and design their shade using those minimums.

Of course all this technology comes with a pretty hefty price tag, about $4,000 per license, but it’s amazing to see what can be simulated on the computer. I would love to get my hands on the software and play around with it. I know this kind of information would have been extremely helpful when we were designing the library I’m working on. Hopefully on a future project I will get the opportunity.

The first counter effect we saw was that by moving the ducts to the traditional overhead position, the roof was not high enough to accommodate them. Therefore the first big change we had to make was to raise the height of the entire building up 2 feet. The second counter effect came after a discussion with the client. Some the previously built libraries in San Antonio had used exposed HVAC ducts, and they didn’t like that look. Therefore, our next change was to put a ceiling in the building.

Then came the second tier of counter effects. After putting a ceiling into the building, the full height glass we had on some of the walls is looking into an enclosed plenum space. So then came the decision to added fritted glass above the ceiling line. And the list continued on and on. It wasn’t until I took a moment to look back at all the changes we had to make, that I realized how one change could affect the entire design of the building.

It’s been a while since you guys have heard from me. Things are still super busy here in San Antonio. I could hardly believe it when I got a notice for my annual review which means I’ve been working for three years. At first it just seemed the time had flown by but when I started to fill out my review questionnaire, I began to realize just how much I’ve accomplished since I graduated.The obvious of course are becoming a LEED AP and any day now I will become a licensed architect. I’m just waiting on NCARB (National Council of Architectural Registration Boards) to finish up my paperwork an then I can consider myself the real deal. Aside from those though, it’s amazing how much I’ve learned.

I remember two years ago I received my first submittal to review and I just kind of stared at it and asked what I was suppose to do with it. I was terrified I would miss something that would cause the building to have some catastrophic failure and it would all be my fault. Now I hardly even bat an eye when I’m asked to review a submittal.

Another situation that would cause my anxiety to kick in was the thought of drawing wall sections and construction details. Because I jumped around on a lot of projects my first couple of years, a year ago I still didn’t have a good grasp on how to put a building together. Now I have completely detailed one project that is currently under construction and working on another one that Design Development drawings will go out in the next week. While I’m still a little shaky when I encounter a detail I haven’t seen before, I can at least take a good guess at what it might be whereas a year ago I would have been clueless.

While, yes I have learned a lot, I still have lots of questions and lots more to learn. I’m definitely looking forward to it and hope you readers are along for the ride.

For me, I think my fear of hand drawings is that they may appear unprofessional. I’m not saying this is true but more of a mindset I’ve acquired since I first started using CAD software when I was in high school. With CAD’s flawless lines and perfect lettering, it’s easy to see why hand drawings or quick sketches might appear inadequate.

My one regret though is losing the ability to draw and render beautiful perspectives for presentation drawings. With so much time spent at my computer, it’s easy to loose that ability to make beautiful drawings by hand. In fact, there are few people in my firm that are capable of this. A more common practice in today’s profession is to outsource this work to someone that has made this lost art their full time job.