Design Progression

After reviewing our research and ideas, we decided that we would try to bring our the "sensory history" of the site, both as a way to educate and a way to design the for of our folie. We wanted to create a connection with the bunkers at the site and let people learn through observation of the surrounding space and by experiencing the sounds of the site through the folie. We wanted our folie to be an alternate section of the path along the wharves to allow people to pass through on their own accord.

Above are some rough sketches of the initial concept showing how we wanted to bring sound into the structure. Having a polished concrete wall on one side and steel (or some other metal) cones on the other side to direct sound into the structure. These would be of varying sizes, similar to one of the example structures looked at in the previous post.

And these sketches show some of the layouts we explored:

• Straight concrete wall, curved cone wall, and hollow metal pipes/pillars scattered through the middles (these would be open top to create echoing when the wind blows over the tops of them, they would be different heights to produce different sounds).
• Curved concrete wall, possibly with some form of seating in the curve with a slightly straighter cone wall. Steps would lead down into the folie to create the kind of "bunker" feel we were going for.
• Another option was a semi-enclosed circular space, allowing some vision through the curved set of cones, with several angled beams above head to create changing shadow formations across the ground throughout the day. This idea wasn't that popular as we felt it didn't have the same potential for experience as the through-type structure the other layouts would provide.

Having the sound pillars seemed like a really good idea, and we soon started considering the different possibilities with them: different heights, lengths, widths, thicknesses of materials, having them on the ground or suspending them. We brought back the idea of having a pendulum which would swing with the wind channeled by the structure and strike the sound pillars, creating different effects. After much consideration, the cone wall idea was ditched as it became to impracticable to deal with and we felt that it wasn't really a strong feature of our concept in the first place, more of just an interesting idea to play with. So the cone wall became a solid metal wall (we were thinking wrought iron to relate back to the story bridge/history of the site or some kind of coppery or aged steel kind of look as we felt it matched the character of the surroundings).

Above are some images of our rough scale model (which we had been testing out a few of our ideas on) and a final concept sketch of how we wanted our folie to look. We would need to draw up some final diagrams/plans/sketches for our poster, but we were very happy with our design at this stage.