C/04

A Single Tree

Ursula Chandler

Ballot Video

Studio Description

The studio will consider architecture as the assemblage of materials, critiquing its intrinsic link to extraction.

Reflecting on a single tree, we will study and explore timber as a resource, researching its source, biology and taxonomy, materiality and make-up, possibilities for fabrication and construction, and how this might be fundamental to our concerns as designers.

We will locate ourselves in South Gippsland focussing on the township of Leongatha, which sits at the Strzelecki Ranges foothills. The town a historic dairy community, was once surrounded by vast forest, home to the Bunurong and Gunaikurnai people. We will investigate ‘the bush’, its history and management from pre-settlement, through to colonial bioprospecting and logging, bushfire, deforestation to present day management and timber plantations. We will explore these themes at a local level and reflect on them more broadly nationally and internationally.

Using this research, each student will develop a specific site and programmatic response of their choice, within that region and relating to a cultural, industrial or residential use.

Studio Outcomes

Exploring construction as the DNA of architecture, projects will be explored, experimented with, and resolved through detailed drawing. This will include; large and small scale mapping, detailed drawing- including exploring the construction resolution of conceptual ideas in large scale sectional drawings, and iterative physical model making and material studies undertaken in part at the Machine Workshop (MSD), as a methodology to investigate, understand and critique existing and unforeseen conditions and notions of architecture.

Informed by comprehensive research, a nuanced approach to site- both physical and metaphysical, and the idea of innovation and transformation, all projects will be underpinned by a clear theoretical position.

Students will be required to participate in a site visit, which will involve visiting Leongatha and artists, fabricators and timber mill in the area. The visit will be held as an overnight camping trip or day trip – details to be confirmed.

Studio Leader

Ursula has worked on projects across Australia, the United Kingdom and Africa. She currently runs her own practice [ursulachandler.com] having been employed as a Project Lead at Adjaye Associates and various Melbourne architects. The practice focuses on the specificity of each brief and site and has an interest in reuse and heritage, and regional locations.

Ursula has previously taught design studios from first year through to Design Thesis, architectural history and construction technology and is an examiner for the ARBV registration exam. She graduated from the University of Melbourne in Architecture and Landscape Architecture, and received the RAIA Bates Smart Graduate Prize and Robert Barber Award in Landscape Architecture.

Readings & References

To be provided in week 1

ABPL90437 Design Studio C is an Early start subject. The Studio Ballot will be held online at the beginning of O-week, opening at 9am on Monday 15th July and closing at 9am on Tuesday 16th July. The outcome of Studio Allocation will be announced on Canvas before the end of Thursday 18th July. There will be preparatory online learning work to be completed during this period. Teaching begins with an all day, in person, compulsory Symposium Day in Laby Theatre (L108), David Caro Building at 9am on Friday 19th July.

Schedule:
Monday 6:15pm-9:15pm in MSD 240
&
Thursday 6:15pm-9:15pm in MSD 240

Off-Campus Activity:
South Gippsland

Contact Handbook