Thesis: EXISTENTIAL SCHEMA

- The reconstruction of sacred space through a new qualitative design method

Background

My main motivation for this thesis originates from my deep belief in architecture’s potential to define life and inform us about our existence & identity. This aspect matters to me because of my background, which features a crisis of identity during the age of rapid industrialization, a crisis caused by the serious conflict between the ancient tradition and modernity, and between East Asian and Western civilization.

For this reason, the expression of meaning is always important to me, and for the first 2 years in college, the narrative is almost always my focus and starting point of design. However, as the rigor of each design project increased, the program and site condition become more complex, it becomes more and more challenging to maintain the integrity of narrative in design. My bathhouse is one of my favorite project in terms of narrative, but it still got criticized by Professor Ficca for its poor circulation and tectonic strategy.  My middle school design started from the program and flow and eventually worked well in terms of these, but I feel dominated by the technical concern for most of the time that the room for expression become small. 

Conflict: quantitative & qualitative aspects in architecture

There seem to be an irreconcilable conflict between the qualitative and quantitative aspects in terms of architecture design, partly because they require different types of mindset which is sometime incompatible with each other: The mindset of the artist & the mindset of the engineer. 

The new method

THE Crematorium project

For the sake of developing the design method, I proposed to design a crematorium in Gifu, Japan. The site locates in a valley of cemetery, and already has a crematorium on it, but I assumed that it doesn't exist and planned to reconstruct the crematorium more based on the narrative of death. 

The typology of crematorium was chosen because of the rigors of its design in terms of both the qualitative and quantitative aspects: For crematorium, experience and technical performance are equally important. 

pure qualitative schema

The pure qualitative schema depicts only the feeling, the perceptual qualities. It features the creation of moment/scenario based on the intuitive understanding of the narrative.

These representations are narrative oriented, therefore, for any other irrelevant aspects, they present the most default state (e.g. simple platonic form & symmetry). The less information, the better.

These representations are also scaleless & vague because they do not directly refer to any concrete reality. As a result, they allow ambiguous interpretation. In other words, they are the very first rough translation that bridge the meaning & the form

Week 3

Schema 1: Transition / partition / consolation

Schema 2:  Reflection / nothingness / life cycle

                    The circular movement facilitates the reflection upon the life of the deceased as well as that of each living person

Schema 3: The individual & universal nature of death; Partition / transition

Week 6

Schema 4 - Committal Space (where the mourners witness the final departure of their deceased to the crematory)

Metaphor of ascension
From the reflection above, the casket looks like its ascending to a brighter space as it is moved into the crematory

Completeness  
The hemispherical space presents a metaphor of life & afterlife as 2 incomplete & inseparable parts of a greater whole 

Hierarchy of procession
The casket proceeds through the central “bridge” while the mourners proceed along the sides
 

Schema 5 - Entry experience

Metaphor of the acceptance of one’s mortality through an abstract representation of the final journey

Death is:

1. Individual - reaching authenticity through realizing mortality & deviating from the social norm

2. Gradual - a process of struggle before final acceptance, as opposed to death as taken for granted

Next steps: the 6 schemes

The schemata above are the pure qualitative representation, while the 6 schemes below are influenced by the master plan, which is based on the quantitative program & quantitative site. They are different in terms of whether quantitative thinking is integrated. Even though, both the pure qualitative schema and the 6 schematic models can be considered as the existential schema because they do not aim to directly represent the reality.

Week 10

Week 12

project narrative

PRELUDE
The experience starts from the oratory, where the farewell ceremonies take place. When the mourners pass through the oratories, the experience feels like crossing a boundary that separates the incoming "sacred space" and the exterior world, a boundary implied by the disconnected path, the narrowing tree line and the double arch above them. After this, the long procession leads people to the distant destination, where the monument-like committal room dominates the shrine space.

CLIMAX
The committal space symbolizes the gateway to the afterlife, and it is in this space that the mourners witness the final departure of their deceased to the crematory. From the mirror reflection above, the casket looks like its ascending to a brighter space as it is moved into the crematory, and the hemispherical space presents a metaphor of life & afterlife as 2 incomplete & inseparable parts of a greater whole.

EPILOGUE
During the process of cremation, the mourners will be in the waiting room, where the unobstructed lake view & privacy facilitate the process of reflection and tranquilization. In the meantime, as people move through different programs around the shrine and maintain the visual connection with the "monument", the notion of homage is reinforced. When the cremation is finished, the mourners will be notified to go to the enshrinement room, where the enshrinement experience represents a metaphor of the burial in the mountain. 

thesis Exhibition

Apr. 19 - Apr.25, 2018

Miller gallery, Carnegie Mellon University