Client Brief

A few months ago, before I began designing any part of the apartment building, I met with the client to discuss his vision for the project. I prepared a client brief discussing his main goals and ideas for the space so that I could create a design the client would like. Then, I created adjacency and critera matrices prioritizing my plans for the space with the client's needs in mind. Interviewing the client helped me understand his ideas for the space and improved my ability to combine my design ideas with the client's.

Residence Design

Now that I have learned about kitchen and bathroom design and reviewed my designs for two apartments and a common space with my peers and professional interior designers, I created a final summary of my designs and their process. I created four posters describing my design. 

The first poster summarizes the development of my concept with my concept statement, inspiration quote, 2-D parti, 3-D concept model. It also includes some of my early process work.

The second poster shows a floor plan at 1/8"-1'0" of the one bedroom apartment and the common space with a few elevations of the apartment.

The third poster includes more elevations, a 1/4"=1'0 floor plan of both apartments and the common space as well as a few furniture pieces for the living room and perspective drawings.

The fourth and final poster shows appliances and furniture for the bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen, and a perspective drawing of the kitchen.

Using my concept and knowledge about kitchen and bathroom design, I developed a floor plan for the space. I chose materials and then drew elevations and perspectives of how I designed the apartments and common space. The biggest improvement I noticed in this project was my ability to visualize and draw a space through elevations or perspectives. I think my project has a lot of strengths, and I put a lot of thought into my design. However, there are many weaknesses as well. After presenting my final design to practicing designers, I realized that I should have focused a lot more on natural lighting. I also struggled to arrange all the images on my four posters.

Here is my volumetric model of the one bedroom apartment.

These are a few of the materials I chose to install in the apartment.

Residence Design

Now that I have learned about kitchen and bathroom design and reviewed my designs for two apartments and a common space with my peers and professional interior designers, I created a final summary of my designs and their process. I created four posters describing my design. 

The first poster summarizes the development of my concept.

The second poster shows a floor plan at 1/8"-1'0" of the one bedroom apartment and the common space with a few elevations of the apartment.

The third poster includes more elevations, a 1/4"=1'0 floor plan of both apartments and the common space as well as a few furniture pieces for the living room and perspective drawings.

The fourth and final poster shows appliances and furniture for the bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen, and a perspective drawing of the kitchen.

Using my concept and knowledge about kitchen and bathroom design, I developed a floor plan for the space. I chose materials and then drew elevations and perspectives of how I designed the apartments and common space. The biggest improvement I noticed in this project was my ability to visualize and draw a space through elevations or perspectives. I think my project has a lot of strengths, and I put a lot of thought into my design. However, there are many weaknesses as well. After presenting my final design to practicing designers, I realized that I should have focused a lot more on natural lighting. I also struggled to arrange all the images on my four posters.

Meeting with Designers

Over Thanksgiving break, I met with a few designers from The Tin Roof in Spokane to discuss my apartment design project so far. Now that I have designed a bathroom and a kitchen for a two bedroom apartment, I am working on finishing the design for that apartment. I'm also designing a one bedroom apartment and a common space between the two apartments. I brought my current floor plan ideas and a materials board to The Tin Roof and three designers gave me feedback on my ideas. 

The meeting went very well-- the designers were able to give me helpful, constructive ideas while also praising my hard work and pointing out the strengths in my designs. One of the most helpful suggestions they gave me was to consider what type of person would move into the space. Since the apartments I am designing are located in a historic building, people who would want to move into this space likely want a unique, quirky, loft-like apartment with an open plan. My current floor plans have a lot of walls and relatively closed-off spaces, so now I plan to remove some walls and make the space more unique. The designers also helped me consider light in the apartment and how to incorporate colors that reflect my concept. I wanted to use a deep red paint color for my living room walls, but the designers pointed out that I should use a lighter color for the walls and use the deep color for something that won't detract from the room's light, like an area rug. The designers from The Tin Roof also gave me general ideas for improving my floor plan in order to make good use of the square footage.

Another idea the designers had was to add a fireplace to the common space. I chose to incorporate that idea into my design because it makes the common space more welcoming as well as adding an adventurous element to the common space, which fits with my concept.

The meeting helped me realize the strengths and weaknesses of my design so far. I think, overall, I put a good amount of thought into my floor plans and materials. The designers liked my material choices and great ideas for improving my floor plans. It was very helpful to get practical, logical ideas for my floor plans in order to improve them for their real purpose. I learned that when designing plans, I should consider who would realistically want to move into the space and what they would like in addition to what the building owner wants.

Thanks to Heather, Molly, and Nancy of The Tin Roof for your time and help!

Bathroom Design

I designed a bathroom based on my earlier concept of home. The bathroom is meant to be visitable, so the sink and toilet are wheelchair accessible. Once I decided on a design, I drafted different drawings of it, then traced them and scanned them to put them on a digital poster.

Designing the bathroom was a lot of fun. I chose more fixtures than in the kitchen, like the bathtub, shower doors, toilet, sink, mirror, and task lighting. I like my design and I think the details regarding accessibility and and relation to my concept are well done. There are a few things I would change, however. If I were to re-do the poster, I would darken the background so it matched the paint color better. I would also hand draft my titles using marker lettering and draw them bigger than the typed titles. Another issue with my poster is the darkness on the edges of some of the scanned images, which I would fix with Photoshop.

3-D bathroom model

Kitchen Design

I designed a kitchen for a two bedroom apartment designed for two people. The kitchen is designed around the concept of "home" that I developed last month (can be viewed here).

Throughout the kitchen design process, I learned that there are a lot of small but extremely important details involved in designing a kitchen. Every dimension, fixture, appliance, color, and surface affects the overall function and appearance of the space. I am proud of the outcome of my project, but there are a few details I did not include, such as an elevation bug on my plan relating to the elevation and section drawings. Some of the strengths of my project include the lettering and organization.

Kitchen design poster with 2-D parti, 1/2" kitchen floor plan, materials, appliances, concept statement, two 1/4" elevations, one 1/4" section, and four rendered perspective drawings

Floor Plan at 1/8" = 1'0"

3-D model of apartment with detail in kitchen

3-D model of apartment with detail in kitchen

Showrooms & House of the Immediate Future

In Seattle, I was able to visit the Seattle Design Center, the Pental Stone showroom, the DalTile showroom, 3Form Light Art Studios, the Knoll showroom, and the Habitat for Humanity's House of the Immediate Future.

By visiting these showrooms, I learned about the relationship between designers and showrooms. I was also acquainted with a lot of new materials and how to go about choosing materials for a client. I enjoyed seeing the warehouses, and learning about molding resin at 3Form. It was impressive and inspiring to hear how 3Form Light Art Studios and Knoll got started, and how they have continued designing on a large scale. As a designer, visiting the showrooms showed me the grand possibilities my future may hold.

I sketched two chairs at the Knoll showroom. I had difficulty with the perspective lines in the first sketch, and ran out of room on the page for the second sketch. I did pretty well with my hatching, but struggled with spacing.

Here is a sketch and a photo of the House of the Immediate Future. The house is very environmentally friendly with net zero energy use, and has a bedroom on the main floor which allows for easier accessibility to elderly residents. After volunteering with Palouse Habitat for Humanity, it was cool to see the organization's work on a larger scale.

Urban Sketchers

Last Saturday, I visited the Olympic Sculpture Park with the Urban Sketchers in Seattle. After about two hours of sketching, we all viewed each other's work. It was really cool to see all the experienced sketchers' drawings as well as drawings of my peers.
Here are two sketches of mine from the Olympic Sculpture Park.

In my sketch of The Eagle, I experimented with a color repeat technique by applying red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet to the entire sketch and concentrating certain colors in each area. I think the sketches turned out pretty well, but I should have focused more on the horizon line in the perspective.

Job Shadow

I spent a day job shadowing with Jennifer from Jennifer Randall and associates. A classmate Miranda and I accompanied Jennifer to a client's home in Seattle, and we watched Jennifer and her client discuss possibilities for remodeling her kitchen and dining room. It was interesting to see the interaction between Jennifer and her client. Since the client's home was pretty old, some of the original designs in the kitchen are no longer up to code. Jennifer used her design knowledge to come up with possible solutions to design problems in the kitchen. Miranda and I also helped Matt, one of Jennifer's coworkers, measure in the kitchen and dining room. After visiting the client's house, Miranda and I went with Jennifer to buy a few items from Builder's Hardware and Supply. I had never seen a big hardware store with so many different pieces before (doorknobs, cabinet knobs, doorbells, etc.), so it was fun to look around at the products.

Here is a photo I took inside the hardware store.

Overall, I really enjoyed the experience of job shadowing. Jennifer was very friendly and offered Miranda and I advice whenever she came across anything we might not know about. She described the differences between life as a residential designer and a commercial designer-- like how a commercial designer might have more freedom when it comes to design decisions since a business is not as personal to the client as a home.

Habitat for Humanity

Last weekend, some of my classmates and I volunteered with Palouse Habitat for Humanity. I spent most of the day installing fiberglass insulation, and then spent a bit of time putting up sheetrock. It was a great experience! I learned a lot about the process of building a house. What I thought was most interesting was how similar building a house is to the interior design projects I've been doing in school-- like cutting against a straight edge and using a T-square to measure. It was great to be able to interact with the family who will be living in the home, the different workers on site, and my interior design classmates. 

Ride, Don't Walk

This Friday, my friend Nicki and I rented a wheelchair for about an hour. Even in such a short period of time, we noticed many design flaws that make maneuvering a wheelchair very difficult. In order to fully experience using a wheelchair, Nicki and I helped each other as little as possible while in the wheelchair. We attempted to open doors ourselves and did not allow our partner to push us in the wheelchair.

One of the main problems we noticed was accessible bathrooms. Nicki entered the wheelchair accessible bathroom on the second floor of Carpenter Hall and noticed that it was difficult to enter the accessible stall because the door would not stay open as she entered. There was also very little room to turn around in the stall. The bathroom sink and paper towels could be reached from a wheelchair, but it was a bit of a stretch. 




Here are two photos and a sketch of Nicki at the Cougar Café in Carpenter. As you can see, the counter is extremely high, and ordering from the café would be difficult for someone using a wheelchair. The cart holding napkins and plasticware is impossible to reach from a wheelchair.

One of the most difficult parts of our experience was getting past this bicycle parked on the wheelchair ramp outside Carpenter! This is the only ramp between Carpenter Hall and Daggy Hall, and we had to get this bike in the exact right position so the wheelchair could get past it. Another observation we made was that it is pretty scary to go down steep ramps, and it's quite a work out trying to get up them. A good example is the ramp entering the ground floor of Daggy Hall from the parking garage.

The faculty/staff kitchen in Daggy Hall, however, is relatively wheelchair-friendly.

Nicki could easily reach the refrigerator and lower cabinets from a wheelchair. The top cabinets were not accessible, but there was plenty of reachable cabinet space.

While I was in the wheelchair, we went to the interior design resource room in Daggy. A few of the magazine shelf were easily reached from a wheelchair. Below is a photo of me reaching a magazine on the third shelf from the floor.

Supposedly the bathrooms on the second, third, and fourth floors of Daggy are wheelchair accessible, but I could not even enter the door to the bathroom. After a few minutes of trying to maneuver entering the bathroom, I realized that even if I had been able to enter the bathroom on the second floor, the location of the trash can made it impossible to even get to the accessible stall. The stall was very small, and it definitely would not be possible to turn a wheelchair around in the stall. The sink was also in a very narrow space which would be difficult to get to.

We went back to the Cougar Café so I could also experience the tall counter from the wheelchair. Here are photos from the perspective of the wheelchair.

During this experience, I learned that the design environment has many flaws that prohibit people using wheelchairs from easily getting around. I think that the built environment should be much more wheelchair accessible, even if it is a little more expensive. As a person in a wheelchair, it is very frustrating to feel like designers do not care if you are able to get around as well as everyone else. It is important for everyone to be able to function in a building. After just a short time in a wheelchair, I was offended to realize that the designers of these buildings (and people chaining their bicycles to wheelchair railings) did not care whether a person using a wheelchair could ever function in their building.

Concept Development

I began devising my concept by choosing a quote that describes the meaning of "home."

"Home is behind, the world ahead,
and there are many paths to tread
Through shadows to the edge of night,
Until the stars are all alight.
Then world behind and home ahead,
We'll wander back to home and bed."
-- JRR Tolkien

I decided to emphasize the comfort of home and how although we may venture away, we always return home.

In my two-dimensional concepts, I used various shapes to represent home with other, more daring shapes and lines representing adventure. Here are a few of my 2-D concepts.

Then I began to make some three-dimensional study models to represent my 2-D concepts.

For my final 3-D concept model, I chose to use soft, round, blue clay to represent the comfort of home and jagged wires to show journeys away from home and returning back. The wires jet straight out to show the first half of an adventure, and the curved lines show the relaxing return home. 

I am pleased with the outcome of my final concept. I wish the final model were bigger (the clay only has about a 1-2 inch diameter), but I think the model does a good job of conveying my parti.

Co-Housing and Multi-Generational Living

I worked with three other students to create four posters describing co-housing and multi-generational living. The four of us created a template in InDesign to create coherence between our four individual posters. My poster uses the example of a co-housing community called EcoVillage to show what co-housing is all about. I like the template that we created, and I think the colors work well. However, If I could make a few adjustments, I would move or delete the upper squares and make the lower squares smaller. Overall, I think the four posters do a good job of communicating descriptions and examples of co-housing and multi-generational living.

Room Project

For this project, I chose an object from nature that reminded me of Carleton Varney's design style. I picked a scallop shell and drew it from five different perspectives. Then I designed a two-dimensional concept model that reflected my ideas, and eventually designed a three-dimensional abstract room. I compiled all my work into three 20x30" poster boards.

2-D concept model

Process work that led to my final 3-D model

Final 3-D model

In addition to my digital process poster, I also created the following three poster boards including a more detailed description of the creative process of my room project.

In this poster: photo of Carleton Varney, concept statement, seashell sketches, inspirational quote by Varney

In this poster: 2-D concept process work, final 2-D concept model, room concept ("A Room with Five Columns"), 3-D concept process work, plan drawing of 3-D model

In this poster: north and south elevations of 3-D model