Studio Design - Pattern Language #116 Cascade of Roofs & #117 Sheltering Roof

Pattern Language # 116 Cascade of Roofs

Few buildings will be structurally and socially intact, unless the floors step down towards the ends of the wings, and unless the roof, accordingly forms a cascade (p. 566).

The studio, relative to the house, is a small and simple building yet the architect, Jonathan Aitken, managed to work in three different roof levels at three different angles.

Inside the floor steps down towards the south end of the building reinforcing this pattern.

Here is a classic example of the Cascade of Roofs, a stave church in Norway. The roof shape also emphasises the entrance as in Pattern # 110 Main Entrance which I discussed in the previous post. 

This building also illustrates Pattern #117 Sheltering Roof where the eaves are low enough to the ground they can be touched. 

The solution to the Cascade of Roofs pattern is to visualise the whole building, or building complex, as a system of roofs. Place the largest, highest, and widest roofs over those parts of the building which are most significant (p. 568). Jonathan most successfully satisfied this pattern for the studio.

Pattern #117 Sheltering Roof

The roof plays a primal role in our lives. The most primitive buildings are nothing but a roof. If the roof is hidden, if its presence cannot be felt around the building, or if it cannot be used, then people will lack a fundamental sense of shelter (p. 570).

The Pattern Language research team have concluded this is one of those patterns (along with #110 Main Entrance and others) that describes a deep and inescapable property of a well-formed environment (p. xiv). This pattern has a profound effect on the building.

The sheltering function cannot be created by a pitched roof, or a large roof, which is merely added to the top of an existing structure. The roof itself only shelters if it contains, embraces, covers, surrounds the process if living. This means very simply, that the roof must not only be large and visible, but also include living quarters within its volume, not only beneath it.

How does the studio measure up to this pattern?

The studio building is most visible from the main rooms of the house which are on the upper level. From this viewpoint, the studio roofs form a massive part of the building. Check.

Another requirement of the pattern is the space under the roof must be useful. A space used every day. In the studio building the slope of the main roof and the height of the corresponding east wall was decided by the size of the design wall I wanted and the need to have a set of high, opening windows as part of the passive solar ventilation system. I will be working daily under the roof - check.

 The height and width of the porch roof was dictated by the angle of the sun shining into the building. Jonathan did a lot of computer modelling to work out the optimum angle of the main roof and the height of the different walls. He looked at the different times of the day and different times of the year before settling on the dimensions of the walls, windows and roofs.

The view from the main room down into the sunny room gives the feeling the of being surrounded by the lower roof. The top of the opening into this room can be touched which is the third requirement of the pattern. On the outside of the building, this part of the pattern is not present. Though the porch roof is lower than the main roof I can't touch it. It was a compromise because I needed the natural light to go far into the main room where I will be working and this sunlight is needed to heat the solid mass of the 8" thick walls and heat the interior space as part of the passive solar heating system.

The solution to this pattern is to slope the roof or make a vault of it, make its entire surface visible, and bring the eves of the roof down low, as low as 6'0" or 6'6" at places like the entrance, where people pause. Build the top story of each wing right into the roof, so that the roof does not only cover it, but actually surrounds it (p. 573).

Studio Design - Pattern Language #110 Main Entrance

Pattern Language #110 Main Entrance

Placing the main entrance (or main entrances) is perhaps the single most important step you can take during the evolution of the building plan.

The position of the main entrances controls the layout of the building. It controls the movement to and from the building, and all other decisions about layout flow from this decision....The entrance must be placed in such a way that people who approach the building see the entrance or some hint of where the entrance is, as soon as they see the building itself (p. 541).

The entrance to the studio is placed in the centre of the wall. This pleasing symmetry is reinforced by the matching sets of windows on either side. Garden beds built up in front of the building will create a winding path ending at the front door.

The porch sticks out beyond the building line (p. 543) emphasising where the main entrance is. Raised garden beds along the porch and arcade, either side of the steps up to the entrance, will also emphasise where the main entrance is along the wall of the building.

The Pattern Language also mentions the relative color of the entrance, the light and shade immediately around it, the presence of mouldings and ornaments, may all play a part too (p. 544). The black door with its plain door handle and minimal mouldings make the main entrance blend with the wall. This works with the general aim to have the building blend in with the surrounding forest. However with the full length of glass in the door there is a lot of play with reflected light and shade created by the sun shining through the trees over the day. It is like a changing picture on the wall as one walks along the winding path towards the door. Sometimes I see myself reflected as I walk towards the building. I hope this isn't a bit disconcerting to others as they approach the door.

The Pattern Language solution to the placement and and shape of the main entrance is to place the main entrance of the building at the point where it can be seen immediately from the main avenues of approach and give it a bold, visible shape which stands out in front of the building (p. 544). 

The studio's main entrance does not fit this pattern as strongly as it could have because of wanting to make the building blend in with its surroundings but I am hoping the landscaping will work to strengthen this pattern.

Studio Design - Pattern Language: #107 Wings of Light and #109 Long thin House

Pattern Language #107 Wings of Light

Modern buildings are often shaped with no concern for natural light - they depend almost entirely on artificial light. But buildings which displace natural light as the major source of illumination are not fit places to spend the days.

The studio is designed to have light entering the building on three sides.

The solution to this problem is: Arrange each building so that it breaks down into wings which correspond, approximately, to the most important natural social groups within the building. make each wing long and as narrow as you can - never more than 25 feet wide.

Our house is long and only 2 rooms wide with windows on all sides. By placing the studio only a few steps away from the house, it is like a private wing of the house. 

Pattern Language #109 Long Thin House

The problem is: The shape of the building has a great effect on the relative degrees of privacy and overcrowding in it, and this in turn has a critical effect on people's comfort and well-being.

Another influence on designing a separate building for the studio is to make 'a room of one's own', a private space to work for long periods of uninterrupted time. I want a private space. A shed.

My parents gave me a book about women's sheds for my birthday. It is about women and their sheds what they are like and what they do in them. This Pinterest board has lots of images from the book. 

Women's Sheds on Pinterest

The Pattern Language solution is: In small buildings, don't cluster all the rooms together around each other; instead string out the rooms one after another, so that distance between each room is as great as it can be. You can do this horizontally - so that the plan becomes a thin, long rectangle; or you can do it vertically - so that the building becomes a tall narrow tower. In either case, the building can be surprisingly narrow and still work - 8, 10, and 12 feet are all quite possible.

 The studio's outside dimensions are 20 feet  wide and 40 feet long as limited by the space between the trees. The walls are 8 inches thick making the inside space smaller.

Studio Design - Pattern Language: #105 South Facing Outdoors, #106 Positive Outdoor Space

In an earlier post, I explained how I have used The Pattern Language design method for the studio and the Back Yard Project. The first pattern I used was #104 Site Repair. Next I used #105 South Facing Outdoors. The back of the house faces south/south-east. I needed to place the studio so it too faced south. 

The book describes the problem as: People use open space if it is sunny, and do not use it if it isn't, in all but desert climates. It goes on to say This is perhaps the most important single fact about a building. If the building is placed right, the building and its gardens will be happy places full of activity and laughter, p. 514.

The above image, looking south, shows the first layout of the building as guided by pattern # 104 Site Repair. The area in shade fits with the need for a place inside the building to store textiles and threads away from any sunlight. The rest of the building needs to reach out into the sunny area.

The sunny area looking to the shady north.

 This pattern's solution is: Always place buildings to the north of the outdoor spaces that go with them, and keep the outdoor spaces to the south. Never leave a deep band of shade between the building and the sunny part of the outdoors.

The front of the building needs to face where the lawn is sunny to satisfy pattern #105 South Facing Outdoors. 

The next pattern I worked with was #106 Positive Outdoor Space. The problem is stated as: Outdoor spaces which are merely "left over" between buildings will, in general, not be used. It explains, "There are two fundamentally different kinds of outdoor space: negative space and positive space. Outdoor space is negative when it is shapeless, the residue left behind when buildings - which are generally viewed as positive - are placed on the land. An outdoor space is positive when it has a distinct and definite shape, as definite as the shape of a room, and when its shape is as important as the shape of the buildings which surround it," p.518.

The image above shows the view from the SE corner of the house looking out towards the proposed studio site. We need to make sure the studio building relates to the house and forms a distinctively shaped positive space between the two buildings. I used this pattern when incorporating that space in the Back Yard Project. 

This is the view looking south from the house. It is a vast shapeless lawn confined by the forest edge. There is no comforting defined shape to the back yard. There are no other buildings, but it is still felt as a negative space without a function. The property has no other outside buildings which is one of the reasons for the BackYard Project.

The solution to this problem is: Make all outdoor spaces which surround and lie between your buildings positive. Give each one some degree of enclosure; surround each space with wings of buildings, trees, hedges, fences, arcades, and trellised walks, until it becomes an entity with a positive quality and does not spill out indefinitely around corners.

The architect used a computer model of the building to move it around in the area we had chosen, tweaking it to satisfy the selected patterns. He finally found the right location. It is roughly perpendicular to the house making a courtyard between it and the house which feels like a positive space. It faces a sunny outdoor space and it fits in between the trees. I wanted a place in amongst the trees, but I also want the sun. They sound like contradictory requirements, but with the Pattern Language guidance, Jonathan's knowledge and and his computer modeling he found the perfect location for the building.

Studio Construction: Porch, Sunny Room and Electricity

The construction of the sunny room has begun.

It is called the sunny room according to the design book A Pattern Language.

It will be where I will sit and hand stitch, read, have tea and think.

This week the carpenters also built the porch and arcade that run along the west side of the building.

Those 6" x 6" cedar posts smell delicious while still freshly milled. They will be left unsealed to bleach to a soft gray. The oils in cedar will protect them from decay for many years. So no maintenance there.

The porch and arcade are designed to protect the west side of the building from the prevailing winds and rains. When it is raining, I will have a sheltered place to walk from the house along the arcade to the front door.

The architect, Jonathan Aitken, computer modeled the sun on the building over the year to work out how high and wide to make the roof of the porch. I want the low winter sun to warm the west wall and the light to penetrate right into the main room. While the porch will stop the strong summer sun from shining directly into the building. I need lots of natural light but not direct sunlight.

The porch is also wide enough to comfortably sit on.

The electrician made his first visit.

He put in some wires and the electrical box.

So it was a busy few days on the studio construction site.

Studio: Pattern Language #104 Site Repair

For my studio design I started with pattern 104 Site Repair.

'Buildings must always be built on those parts of the land which are in the worst condition, not the best.'

The idea is the building will improve the site and leave the beautiful places in tact.

We have a problematic area in our back yard that needs improving. 

During house construction 12 years ago, a septic tank and its accompanying field were built. Over the years the moiter ground has kept the Douglas-fir roots wetter than they like and they have become susceptible to root rot. During winter storms, a number of these weakened trees have been blown over and have fallen across the lawn. 

The fallen trees have made gaps in the forest canopy and changed the wind patterns making other trees susceptible to wind damage as they adjust to losing their companions. 

The Pattern Language  Site Repair Solution

'On no account place buildings in places which are most beautiful. In fact, do the opposite. Consider the site and its buildings as a single living eco-system. Leave those areas that are most precious, beautiful, comfortable, and healthy as they are, and build new structures in those parts of the site which are least pleasant now.' (p. 511)

I walked around the septic tank and field area placing stakes and tape while visualising a building tucked in the gap between the trees. Somewhere within this area is where the studio will be built.

Studio: Designing with 'A Pattern Language'

I used the 'Pattern Language' system for designing the reworking of our back yard and the conceptual design of my new studio.

Christopher Alexander and his Berkeley team in the Centre for Environmental Structure came up with 253 patterns or problems that occur in our environment and their solutions, which are like instructions on what to do.

The system works by wandering around the space while working through a selection  of the hierarchy of patterns, which start at a large scale and work their down to small details and specifics.

Here is our back yard - a large swath of unnatural and unhealthy flat lawn within a rain forest ecosystem.

Using the Pattern Language system, one uses stakes and tape to help with the visualisation of what could be where and how all of the parts will interconnect.

Over several weeks I wandered around the site, moved stakes and looked at it from all angles until I have a clear mental image of the new spaces.

Then I got out paper and pencils to record the design to the conceptual stage.

I handed my ideas over to the experts to come up with the realities of the design, construction drawings and legal documents.