FOCHE PARK -SEMESTER PROJECT

Initial Concept Sketch

Sketch of Building Changes

Urban Building Exploration

Final Computer Model Elevation

Floor Plan

Site Section

Perspective of Sidewalk Interface

Perspective on top of Park Structure

Ground Level, Perspective of Park Structure

Foch Park is situated within the city of Lille, off of a major 

commercial shopping street and stretches towards the city canal.  This design was inspired by the organic, fractured layout of the french street grid and plays off of it in plan and 

elevation.  

The park structure filters the 

canal water down the 

structure’s path which leads people towards the canal basin.  The surrounding 1960’s 

buildings were  reworked to fit with the city’s established 

historical building scale by 

having setbacks and articulated 

elevations and better building to pedestrian interfaces.

COLONGE

Cologne Cathedral Easter Mass

Jeremiah and myself, enjoying a new hybrid food: 'Curry Wurst' 

Solar Panel clad building

For Easter weekend, we had our last full class field trip, in the city of Cologne Germany.  It was surprising how much of the city was built in the 60's and 70's, but as our professor pointed out, this was because of the intense bombings during world war two.  Today Cologne Cathedral still stands tall, with some interesting scaffolding, and the 60's buildings are steadily being replaced with more substantial better designed buildings.

BARCELONA

Kevin, Me, Lisa, Josh, Ari
Usual Travel Companions 

After Valencia we took a 3 hour train north to the city of Barcelona.  This was our 'Spring Break', we had over a week from our professor, but since a few of us had joined the French studio we had a 5 day weekend.  This weekend was also my birthday on the 18th and Ari's the 17th (St. Patricks day).  We found a good Irish pub for the night, and the bunch of us had good time.
We saved the last full day to take in the sights of Sagrada Familia.  It is shocking to see how far along they are, the outside is getting ever higher, and the interior of the structure is complete!  Everyone cannot take their eyes off of the ceiling.  It is amazing how a building that was designed a century ago, can now be completed with 21st century technology.  The architect had called for construction techniques that hadn't been used before, like the complex, swirling, concrete ceiling.

VALENCIA, SPAIN


     We took an overnight train from Paris to Valencia to get here for an extended weekend holiday, and to see parts of Spain, here we have what we call "Calatrava World".  This is a series of buildings done by architect Santiago Calatrava, who at the moment is pushing the limit of materials and engineering in architecture.  It is an architects students mecca, the buildings are doing things that we only wish we could get away with in more projects.  This complex consists of an Opera House, Planetarium, and a Science Museum.  Out of the famous architects that MPLS has gotten over the past decade, Cesar Pelli, Herzog and De Meuron, Jean Nouvel, Calatrava has yet to design something.  Milwaukee got him for their art museum, and after the 35W bridge collapsed, it was released that he had strong interest in the designing the new bridge, but it was instantly shot down for fears of cost over-runs and time it would take to construct.  
    We only stayed in Valencia for one day, and then it was time to head to Barcelona.   

AMSTERDAM
        
         We arrived here for a class trip, just before the weekend began, and found it to be one of the strangest, beautiful, and unique cities of northern Europe.  Before coming here, me and my companions knew little of it, except for its pop culture references as being a place with very open laws for their coffee shops, we had no idea that it was a historic city built over canals with great architecture (though leaning over).  Our tour with our professor took us through the newer sections, which consisted of newer developments on top of older industrial areas; it was not as interesting as the old town.  When going through the tourist areas, it was shocking to suddenly find us in the middle of the red light district, which was like the back door of disney with all the camera bags and fanny packs.  At the end of it I found one of my favorite bizarre French cars, the Cirtoen C6, it is very French as you can see, style for the sake of style, doing things you would never see an american car do; it even has a reversed curved rear windshield!  By the end of the trip, we were very happy to be back in Lille, the sun had come out, and we were in more familiar surroundings.    

AIGUILLE DU MIDI

This past weekend we took an 8 hour night train down to Chomonix in the French alps, here we toured the town and visited Aiguille Du Midi.  This is mountain top where an observation deck has been created, with only a cable car or helicopter to reach it.  It was terrifying, but had one the most beautiful views we had ever seen.  We had a close up view of mont blanc, and a saw over the 'Mer de Glace'  sea of ice in French, describing the endless view of glaciers.  Down in the town of Chomonix, we were surprised to find that the British outnumbered the French; in one bar we visited, even the bar tenders were all british.  On Saturday we took a day trip to Lake Geneva, walked around and made our way back.  The train rides may have been long for the whole trip, but it was all worth it.  

MARSEILLES

The north of France can be very grey this time of year, cloudy, rainy, and cooler; a trip to Marseilles on the Mediterranean with sunshine was very needed.  We took the train down at 6am Saturday and got there a little afternoon, checked into our hostel and explored the city.  Our first thing was to hike up the hill towards "The Basilica of Notre-Dame de la Garde", which is much smaller on the inside than one expects it to be.  From the top of this hill, we had a fantastic view of the city and the bay.  The sunshine was great to have, the second day we took a ferry to a few islands outside of the bay where we hiked around old military bases and enjoyed the ocean air.   

BRUSSELS

Here we decided to take a free trip (eurail pass) to brussels for a day.  We were not completely sure what we were going to do, or even how to get around, but we made the most of it.  Our first stop was an art nouveau music museum, in which consisted of old instruments and an headphone jack to here them be played.  Later we walked around, found a cafe, had lunch and made our way back to the station through the city.