South Bank, London - an iconic (infamous?) landscape

To kick off the first focus week, a friend and I decided we'd take to the streets of central London to brush up on our camera work and, well skateboarding. Video recording and editing has been a hobby of mine for a number of years, but lately I do find it difficult to get the time to continue with my hobby. Luckily however, Kingston uni has a great camera rental shop so for those wannabe Speilberg's there's no excuse not to take a camera out for a few days and get shooting.


The camera we took out was a Sony VX1000 which we used to film all of the video contents. Although this camera is somewhat old, it captures a very distinctive quality of video that some cameras fail to record (HD), this distinctive quality is a result of its 3ccd or 3-chip image/colour processing system.

The aim behind my filmed site visit was to develop my visual communication skills but also to examin more closely at a location of shared space that is left unauthorised in terms of accessibility and artistic intervention.

Below is the video that my college John and I shot over the course of a day. Although we both worked together on the post production/editing the credit has to be given to John for the final edit result. Enjoy!

FOCUS 2 (LD3005) wk1 from John Barnes on Vimeo.

Good old scientology

I found this during the week and thought I'd share it here. I apologize if you are a member of Scientology, but for those who aren't you're bound to find this very entertaining. Enjoy!

Focusing on role models

With uni over and done with now for the year I've got some free time to spend doing my favorite thing- looking for role models and inspiring people. Sounds a bit daft I know, but I think everyone should constantly look for something inside of someone else that really resonates with them and gives them motivation to aspire to something.

As well as my appreciation and enthusiasm for Landscape Architecture, I also have a great passion for music and moving image. When both are done right together, I can think of few art forms that appeal to me more. I found a great site that has interviews with loads of different musicians, artists, directors and other creative people. I came across an interview with someone I would consider a role model in way because of his attitude on life and how to live it - Mike Mills. Mike Mills is mostly famous for his music videos but is also a great director and professional graphic designer.

Pretty Cool People Interviews says this of him,'

'Mike exploded onto the international scene with his original music promos for the French band AIR's first album. His promos for the songs "Kelly", "All I Need" and "Sexy Boy" are legendary and it's hard to separate the music from the visuals now. After the success of the AIR videos, Mike could have been directing for major bands and artists, but instead he chose freedom and independence – only directing and designing for products and people that he can relate to, which is a very fortunate position to be in for any designer.

Here's a video of him from Submarinechannel.com -

http://prettycoolpeopleinterviews.submarinechannel.com/interviews/item/24


Sorry but I can't seem to get links to work on this blasted thing...

Trip to the Bargehouse and the Barbican

Me and a few mates went to the Bargehouse to see the 'Speed of light' exhibition that was there. It was quite a well executed exhibition with some of the coolest lazer shows I've seen in my life. Naturally they saved the best for last and on the top floor they had a lazer+sound show that left me mesmerized for a few minutes. I felt sorry for the supervisor who had to sit and endure this extreme display of light and sound for god knows how long.

On the same day we also popped into the Barbican to see the Céleste Boursier-Mougenot rock n roll birdies. This meant queing for 40 mins. I guess it was worth it but we caught the birds at what must have been lazy hour so they're wasn't too much abstract music coming from the guitars and cymbals.

It was a very original and fun concept but in practice (in my opinion), it wasn't as exciting as it was mad out to be. I had to resort to playing the guitars myself out of frustration! As per usual as well, there was a zero tolerance on taking pictures of the exhibition. Surprise surprise









The video of the Céleste Boursier-Mougenot bird's exhibition is worth a watch if you have a minute or two..

UCAS Fair- Kensington Olympia

Steve Cole, one of his work mates (I'm sorry for not rememvering your name mate) and I, manned the 'I Want to be a Landscape Architect' station and talked to the thousands (it seemed) of hopeful students trying to figure out what the profession is all about. If only it could be summed up in less than ten minutes!

All in all it was another fun few days with LI promoting and making the most of the free coffee and Minstrels. (BTW, the best way to get a 15 y.o kid to gain an interest in anything is to lure them with Minstrels).

This red-headed chap worked in the stall beside me and at the end of the week told me how unnerving it was to work beside me. This was because I apparently looked EXACTLY like his, even more coincidentally strange, Irish cousin.

He probably just says that to all his exhibition neighbors...

Ecobuild-Earls Court

During the first week in March, Earl's Court conference and exhibition centre was host to the country's (perhaps Europe's) biggest convention on sustainable design, construction and the built environment- Ecobuild 2010. The five day exhibition saw over 41,000 visitors coming to see and converse with 1,000 innovative exhibitors and soak up information at the daily eco-lectures.

I was lucky enough to work there for a few days with the Landscape Institute so I made the most of my spare time exploring the different stalls and learning as much as I could off the different exhibitors.

Although the majority of stalls were aimed at the ever more eco-conscious residential and commercial construction market, there were some interesting companies that dealt with innovative designs on green walls, water filtration and purification and also natural energy harvesting.

I came away with some fresh perspectives on sustainable design and was quite enthusiastic about some of these innovative ideas and products on green power energies that have/and are being developed right now.



If you didn't get the chance to visit this year I highly recommend you take a trip to the next Ecobuild convention which will be at Excel Centre 1-3rd March 2011 (if you can remember it!).



I regret not taking any pictures while I was working there, but you learn from your mistakes.. To compensate, here's a good old moving image account of the events and happenings at the convention this year-

Takuya Hosogane, whoever you are, I'm inspired!

On a creative ramble through the web I came across this gem on a visual media site. It might just be the best visual graphics music video I have seen yet...

Vanishing Point from Bonsajo on Vimeo.

Growing Communities at Castle Climbing Centre

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As part of my 3rd Focus Week I decided to take part in a day of volunteer work at the Growing Communities organic vegetable plot near Finsbury Park in centralish London.

On Tuesday 26th Jan a group of Kingston Uni Landscape Architecture students from all years took a trip across London to help out. The day I was there the site was in its early development stages, with only a few areas cleared for planting. We spent most of the day, well I did anyway, tearing down bushes, clearing branches and generally making as much room as possible for the proposed garden areas.


Growing Communities is a collaboration of gardeners, farmers, activists and generally eco-motivated people looking to produce as much organic fruit and veg for communities within the metropolis that is London. I find it encouraging to see how just how much demand and enthusiasm there is for organic, and locally sourced food in London now-a-days with social enterprises like Growing Communities springing up all over Greater London and beyond.

If you have a passion for organic food and want to meet similar people, take a trip down to Stoke Newington Farmer's Market every Saturday at William Patten School, Stoke Newington Church Street, London, N16 0NX. 10am to 2.30pm.

Design Your Future, Excel Centre Exhibition

For two days during mid November I managed to get some work with the Landscape Institute representing the course at the Excel Centre, near Canning Town in East London. It was a quite a lot of fun to do actually. It consisted Steve Cole and I (Matt my tutor was there for the first day as well) chatting to students and trying to convince them that Landscape Architecture is the most ultimate and satisfying profession in the world. Well maybe I was acting like more of a mad salesman than the other two... I really got into it- my voice was gone after second day.

All in all, I think we managed to bag about 70 or 80 students on our sign-up sheets so I'm sure the LI will be getting some fresh interest thanks to our heartfelt sales pitches and passion for the profession.


These videos give a quick insight into the Landscape Architecture profession if you'd like to know more about it yourself...






Man fair play to Matt and his team that went on that cycle. Here their website that they set up in conjunction with that
eco-adventure

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Laban dance centre

This brief project looked at the outside of the Laban dance centre in Deptford, south London.
The landscape outside the Laban centre has some amazing geometric shapes that compliment the contemporary design of the building itself. We used this site as a means to explore some interesting grading designs and techniques. Through working in small groups, we grew on our site analysis skills by accurately measuring the shapes, gradients, contours, slopes and spot heights.

Here's base plan I made up to map the angular contours and gradients of the site..

Radical Nature - Barbican Exhibition

Between 19 June - 18th October 2009, the Barbican art gallery in London held host to an exhibition titled 'Radical Nature'. I took a trip down on Wednesday 14th October to see what was going on. Lots of things it turned out.

The Barbican interior (and some exterior) had been reinvented into one large 'fantastical' landscape with each piece of the exhibition representing a portion of organic/nature art. The exhibition includes displays of work from some of the pioneers of Land Art-Ant Farm and visionary architect Richard Buckminster Fuller, artists Joseph Beuys, Agnes Denes, Hans Haacke and Robert Smithson are shown alongside pieces by a younger generation of practitioners including Heather and Ivan Morison, R&Sie(n), Philippe Rahm architects and Simon Starling.

Some displays were more inspiring than others, but overall I used it as a fresh perspective on my own landscape designs and conceptions of what is possible through organic experimentation.

Music and its relationship to landscapes

Music for me can create different emotions while being in landscapes. Whether it's cycling through suburbia on the way to uni or looking out of a train window with my headphones on, I feel connected to something in my surrounding in a way that's hard to achieve without hearing a song. I sometimes imagine myself in a music video or part of a movie in my own made up reality.

I found this little video which came from the director of a low budget New Zealand movie called 'Eagle vs. Shark'. The director of the movie, Taika Waititi, shares my same mentality. I think everyone does in a way (I hope)..

Taika Waititi - Pretty Cool People Interviews from SubmarineChannel on Vimeo.

Crane's Park

''The idea of a wheatfield is quite simple. One penetrates the soil, places one's seed of concept and allows it to grow, expand and bear fruit... It's all so simple yet we tend to forget basic processes.''

Agnes Denes, Wheatfield - A Confrontation


My first project of year 2 kicked off with an imaginative theme. Crane's Park was the canvas we would use to encompass a design concept. Working in groups, an object was given to each team to inspire the design. We were given a diaper. This diaper was the basis of the design orientation to create a landscape that celebrates, protects, creates, hides, multiples, grows, destroys, or contains our given object.

Back to blog

So as you can see from my lack of posts, I haven't been putting words on this blog for quite a while. With summer over and a new term started, it's time to be getting into the swing of things and get this blog growing once more.

If you haven't been to the south west of Ireland yet, I highly recommend you take a trip down. When the weather's good, it's gotta be my favorite place to be. I thought I'd show some pics that summarize the summer for me..

New Brighton - Project 5(b)

''The place where a route meets the sea is a destination, a pause, a meeting point, a beginning or journeys end, a change of speed, a change of activity, an arrival or a stepping off to new places. The coast is distinctive due to its big spaces, large sky and infinite horizon.''

The second part of project 5 looked at the New Brighton area on the Mersey estuary in Wirral, Liverpool. During our Liverpool/Manchester trip we visited New Brighton on two separate occasions. New Brighton is a seaside resort town located in the town of Wallasey, on the north east tip of the Wirral Peninsula near Liverpool city.

Liverpool/Manchester Trip - March 2009

Practice Profile - Latz + Partner

Latz + Partner

http://www.latzundpartner.de

1968 founded in Aachen and Saarbrücken, the office was
transferred to Kassel in 1974 and into the region of Munich in 1988.

Project offices exist in Duisburg and in Bremerhaven.

Since fall 2006 office Latz+Partner also have an office in London.

Latz + Partner work on an international scale.

Realized plannings contain projects of town-planning and urban design as well as large-scale landscape architecture, planning of open space and ecological building up to research work in the field of alternative technologies, connected with the achievement of long-term development and maintenance programs.

Latz + Partner stands not only for quality of design but also for technical competence and know-how. Since the mid eighties a focus of the work is dealing with the metamorphosis of postindustrial sites.

Dependent on the type of the project, the office has working – teams with partner – offices and specialists.

Latz + Partners have projects have spanning across the globe

Poocc

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London First Sights Trip 2

On the 26th Febraury we went on another first sights field trip into London to look at some historic and contemporary buildings and places from the Barbican Exhibition Centre all the way down to Spitalfields and Brick Lane.