xOrdinary.Things

David Penka
Student

ARCH 511, Spring 2013

Not only are disciplinary intersections needed to address the widening separation between civil engineering, landscape architecture, and architecture within the contemporary urban sprawl but a serious engagement into the architecture of the undesirable is needed. Gas stations, large-scale box stores, fast food, strip malls, and poorly design apartments, continue to liter the horizontal urban landscape, yet few of these types of buildings have had serious, if any, design-research engagement. The project creates a prototype for a fairly ordinary bit of ëstrip mallí with one floor of residential above and matching apartment buildings wrapping around the rest of the block. The project proposal is in Lincoln, NE and is kept low to match the surrounding horizontal context. This height limit also allows private entries for each apartment with direct and level access to the communal green space on top of the parking lot roof in the courtyard behind.