Light pours in through large windows on the top floor of Perloff Hall as students work in their studios to innovate and craft their own architectural projects and designs.
Mitsuhiro Komatsu, a graduate student in architecture, works in his studio long after classes are over to design a building which will be located in Helsinki, Finland.
Meanwhile, on the mezzanine level located at the other side of the floor, Max Kuo and Danielle Wagner, who are both also graduate architecture students, said their studio focuses on a very different kind of architectural design.
Kuo said their project involves combining traditional roof-thatching techniques with hairstyling techniques from pop culture to make the craft of roof thatching more contemporary.
Komatsu said that as part of the curriculum for classes in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design at UCLA, he and other students have to take studio classes during their third year. In a studio class, students typically work with a professor who gives them a project to complete that quarter.
The professors who oversee the studios are practicing architects who explore their areas of interest while teaching, Kuo said.
Kivi Sotamaa, a professor in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design, said the school offers three research studios and four advanced topic studios.
Kuo said the studio gives him an appreciation for what it takes to put a building together and an idea of the importance of arguing for his designs and philosophies.
Komatsu said that as a third-year graduate student, he has flexibility to choose which studio he would like to participate in.
He chose to work in a studio which is currently working on making architectural designs for a new national library in Helsinki.
Komatsu said this library will actually be built in the near future, and as a student he has the ability to design the building from scratch using existing computer technology.
Though his building design will not actually be implemented in the real world, Komatsu said making a building proposal prepares him in pursuing his goal of becoming an architect.
“This is definitely going to be helpful, especially for my generation because we have to be able to use computers somehow,” he said.
Sotamaa is the instructor for Komatsu’s studio, and also oversees another studio which focuses on the architecture of a marina in Helsinki.
Komatsu said that he and the 11 other students in his studio think about practical considerations such as location, lighting and space, when designing the building.
Sotamaa said the building is not just going to contain a library but will also include a research facility, a museum, urban squares and restaurants.
“On one hand, it requires very cellular and contained space, while on the other hand, it calls for approaches that are open and continuous,” he said.
He said the Finland project was chosen because, as an ongoing real-life project, it was ideal to give students a taste for reality and, more importantly, for its practical components to teach students designing techniques using the computer.
An example of a computer technique students use is liquid animation, which simulates the flow of water in a space. The students have the ability to freeze the surface of the water in the simulation to create surfaces for their projects.
“The power of the computer as a tool is very incredible,” Sotamaa said. “The computer doesn’t do the design for you, but once the students know what they want, they can use it as a creatively supporting tool.”
In the fifth week of their quarter, students are already starting to build models of their proposed designs, Komatsu said.
To do so, students have the ability to print their designs three-dimensionally by using specific printers which use powder and glue to mold designs for their projects.
“The printer moves back and forth and prints tons of layers until (the powder) becomes a 3-D object,” Komatsu said.
As part of their class, students make several presentations throughout the quarter and use both figures and animations to describe their proposals.
“We can simulate everything from how the light works during the day and night, to how people move around the building,” Komatsu said.
On the other side of the studio, Kuo and Wagner work with hair to design a roof.
Kuo said roof-thatching is an ancient technology which was an artisan trade present in both traditional African and English huts and varied regionally.
The materials used for this technique were typically bundles of reeds or grasses, but Kuo said he substitutes bundles of hair for his project. In the real world, synthetic material would be used for the project instead of hair because of the practicality of the material, he said.
Kuo said working with hair is very different from other approaches to architecture because of the ability to blur geometric lines.
He and Wagner work to airbrush the hair to produce certain colors and effects which give roof-tatching a contemporary edge.
“We’re trying to go for something that’s a bit loose and whimsical like the feathering in Farrah Fawcett’s hair but also dealing with the nostalgia of Judy Collins’ album covers and trying to push it in the direction of psychedelic flamboyant progressive rock,” he said.
Their goal is to produce the effects of halos and afros in their work, Wagner said.
Komatsu said though he himself has not had the opportunity to travel with the architecture school, other studios often travel to the actual sites for which they are designing to gain more knowledge and ideas.
Kuo said his studio attended a one-day workshop given by Vidal Sassoon hairstylists who taught the students to understand that the bone structure and shape of the head influence the way one cuts hair.
Kuo and Wagner incorporate this technique in the way they designed the shape of their roof.
Wagner said she enjoys working with hair for her project because it involves a very hands-on approach.
“There is a lot more tactile engagement,” she said.
The field of architecture has a lot to do with engineering and practical issues, but also offers architects flexibility in being creative in what they design, Sotamaa said.
“The bottom line is that it’s about your fantasies and how you build and develop them,” he said. “On one hand, it’s very serious and on the other hand, it is borderline ludicrous.”