What does it mean to arrive at an edge? Is it merely a limit, a boundary… the end? Or does an edge imply something more? An apotheosis, maybe.

An analysis of Le Corbusier’s Unité d’Habitation in Marseilles, France, yielded a under­standing of the edge as opening rather than closing, as possibility rather than hopelessness, as mythical rather than ordinary. In his attempt to create an ideal (micro)city that completely juxtaposed Marseilles, Le Corbusier explored how to endow the edge with revelatory qualities. In my understanding, he designed the building as an architectural promenade that “transformed” the subject as he/she wandered through its halls. First and foremost, the building gathers in what is understood as unstructured (chaotic) movement of the city. Once in the Unité, Le Cor­busier sought to structure not only the city, but the individual. The building includes numerous programs that deal with both the activities of the city and the nurturing of a human being: private residences, a hotel, a kindergardten, shops that include retail stores as well as pharmacy and butcher, gym, outside theater, among others. Although I will not push forward a humanist reading of the program tied to the medieval soul, somewhere within his intentions lays a Greek philosophy of nurturing the body and spirit.

Architecturally, nevertheless, the building has its moments of “revelation.” As one moves through the Unité, it directs movement on a center axis, but also propels movement away from the center. As such, the a person is always being directed towards the edge. On the lower levels of the building, arriving at the edge means a relationship with nature. The most important moment of arrival occurs in the crowning moment of the roof, where Le Corbusier creates a space where people can come together as a collective (as an Utopian city), but also individually, promotes a relationship between Man, the Earth, the Sky… and maybe even the divinities.

Learning from the findings about the Unité, I set out to apply these principles in the Commons area in Ithaca, New York, for – as the final project’s guidelines prompted – the Women’s Council Building. The program of the building al­ready resembled a city, with its need for flexible spaces that could accomodate a wide range of activities, from the completely public to private realms. And further, the ide­als of the WCB not only further women’s rights, but offer a space for the whole city to come together as a collective.

My goal became clear: to open up a space that accomodated the needs and philosophy of the WCB, but more importantly, that offered any visitor an experience of compression and release, i.e. of revelation. In the end product, an experience that relates man to “something” else became a gradual process. Several moments occur as one traverses through the building. Beginning on the roof, one is impelled towards the edge that overlooks Greent St. At this point, one only has a visual relation to the Commons and so the visitor is redirected inwards to the building. Once inside, he/she arrives at the reception space where he travels through a semi-open plan. Then the traveler reaches the west edge where a relationship is instituted between the individual and the sun comming in through the skylight and a green wall adorned with a kind of garden. Then, one moves through the most private spaces, which are architecturally de­scribed by their serial nature. Actually, the design process was catapulted by the formal quality of these repetitive volumes which served as a limits to the distance a floor slab would slip and slide according to the ideas of movement topologically interpreted from scheme of movement in the Unité. Finally, one reaches the most open space, the ground floor, which has the ability to morph accordingly to a desired program, but also spreads out towards the Commons, activating Green St. and motivating it to become the culture infused street it has always wanted to be.

These is the plot with I assembled for my final presentation. Click to enlarge.

For the final studio project with Prof. Jim Williamson, we designed a facility for visiting scholars. The site was set on a relatively small sports facility with squash courts in the Cornell Campus. One of the purposes of the assignment – which heavily influenced my proposal – was to begin to understand how to read a site as a tool for design.  We were each asked to envision a building that would reflect (or reject) the life of a visiting professor.

For me, visiting professors live in constant negotiation. Travelling endlessly from one academic institution to another, they repeatedly have to come to terms with new places, other people, and the world of ideas. This project recaptures this condition of having to negotiate between different and often opposing aspects of life. In the proposed building, architectural elements – such as walls, doors, level changes, sky lights, and floor patterns – co-exist in conflict and tension to each other, displacing notions of cohesivity. Thus, the disagreement and miscommunication within the architecture summons people into a kind of communicative action, i.e. individuals are called to reconcile these oppositions. Nevertheless, there is no right way of dwelling in this space, but it is always up to the inhabitant to decide in which manner he/she wishes to experience it.

Here are the plots and model I used in my presentation…

A few weeks ago I spent two days at the Archives Center of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. It was a dream visit, merging my interests—design, anthropology and photography—in one whole experience. (To add to the excitement, I had just finished reading Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol, so you can imagine how cool it felt to do research in DC.)

As I arrived, two seventh-grade girls did as well. I was instantly impressed with their excitement, formal communication and eloquence as they interacted with the archives’ staff. With a to-do list, a legal pad, and pencils in their hands they were keen on finding primary sources for a school project on nuclear energy. They were prepared to do some serious work, but were soon caught off-guard when the archivist asked: “Did you do a Google search?”

It was interesting to witness the dynamics between those who work at the archives and the younger folk. Clearly, the age range of these two young girls is not the primary audience for this place. Nonetheless, the staff was cordial and helpful. Simultaneously, the girls seemed to be under the impression that if they behaved like serious grown ups, they would be treated as such. Their formality was almost flawless.

It only took a few minutes for one of the staffers to realize that the information requested by these girls was not found in these archives. The girls would have to search other places, like the collection at the Library of Congress. The archivist booted a web-browser and showed them the sites of other collections, doing a few searches and generating some results. Then she asked the girls if they had done a Google search. The girls’ expressions of disbelief was astonishing. Sensing that something was wrong with the idea, the archivist followed with: “A Google search can be a very powerful tool if you know what you are looking for.” After a pause, one of the girls challenged the suggestion, but she was met with a few good reasons of why it serves as a good starting point for serious research. Then the archivist was called off for a few minutes and as soon as the girls were alone, one told the other: “You see, Google has everything! We could have stayed at home.”

I can imagine the story behind the scene; hours and hours of educators teaching the idea that research happens beyond a Google search, and here are these girls, at the core of an archives center, being asked if they have considered Google.

I worry about the state of contemporary junior and high school education. The technological disconnect between older sans digital technology faculty and the up-and-coming generation of students growing up with and within digital technology is getting larger, and schools keep ignoring the situation. Here in Puerto Rico, even some of the most well-known and privately run schools are out of touch. On a recent visit to my old alma mater I had the opportunity to interact with the senior class who will graduate in a few months. Most of them complained about how computers were not allowed in the classroom for note-taking, nor in the hallways; and on how the faculty does not know how to use them. (It’s still mostly the same faculty of ten years ago and back then many were already technologically outdated.) The scarier story was about a kid who got expelled from the school because he made a comment about one of the faculty members on facebook. With such an act, the school’s ignorance becomes public. (Specially with so many sites like www.ratemyclass.com changing the way students choose teachers and classes in the contemporary world.)

Faculty need to get their act together and understand the social, pedagogical and psychological implications of the digital world they teach in. By keeping the unknown computer world as far away as they can, they do not realize how much they are also missing on. YouTube, Wikipedia, Skype, SecondLife and AIM (among a million others) are powerful tools with almost never ending positive educational qualities. And, if skepticism is on their side, there are options where faculty could begin exploring with tools specially made for the classroom, like Junnip.

Today, as I remember those two intelligent young girls who visited the Smithsonian, I worry about the faculty who sent them there, not because it was a bad idea to have young students research the “right way”, but because they probably ignored tools that were available from within their own classroom. A two-minute look would have helped the girls make an informed decision on which archives they needed to visit for the information that they needed.

This past February 7th, Magacín, El Nuevo Día’s Sunday magazine asked my father to write about one of the most important design traditions in our family: the design of wedding anniversary commemorative bracelets.

It all started twenty-one years ago, on occasion of my parents 10-year wedding anniversary. Emulating renaissance designers who explored multiple mediums, my father conceptualized a bracelet that, as designed [see #1 in above image], commemorated the initial years of the couple. In the piece, both my father and mother are recognized as the important elements who bring the family together (the two big bands), while the offspring are three tiny specs who are begin to grow.

Ten years later, his original gesture was by then a precedent. A conceptual look at twenty years of marriage [see #2 in above image] now recognized the offspring as the primary actors in the family history. The parents were now second staged, helping as guides and unifying elements.

Alberto Rigau and Jorge Rigau, FAIA.

On the 25th celebration my father felt the urge to mark the important moment, but he found himself in a conceptual dilemma. He had established himself a tradition of designing a piece for the 10 year markers, so how to achieve his goal without breaking the rules he had established for himself? I was brought into the tradition and was asked to design the special quarter century landmark piece. Graphically, the silver bracelet tells the story of the years it commemorates through a weaved pattern of 25 positives and negatives [see #3 in above image]. These can also read typographically as a 2 or a 5. The two parents now grant continuity to the union while the offspring are embedded into the history that can now be told.

This past year, the couple reached 30 years of marriage. The now solid relationship inspired a solid creation[see #4 in above image], a 1 piece cast bracelet where all of the components and personalities, still evident, are fused into one piece.

As the family history moves on, we need to wait 9 years for the next instance in which our family’s story will be told through a piece of design…

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These bracelets were done in collaboration with jeweler Antonio Colón, who through the years has guided us in the manipulation of gold, silver, and other materials that are not present in the tool box of an architect or a graphic designer.

Completed design, worked in conjunction with architect in training, Celina Bocanegra.

I spent most of the last two years at the NC State College of Design thinking, talking and ideating about the design process. As a student, most of my efforts, be it the look into Elemental’s intervention at Iquique, or the speculation over the future of our digital identities, among others, were all framed to dissect design process. On a class-level, the explorations surrounding the issues of collaboration or a social problem such as water consumption also pursued similar ends. Today, as a working designer, I find myself re-learning my ways of working, and how these relate to my design process, and that of others.


Inside detail of completed residential garage door.

In my current daily routine I collaborate with architects and industrial designers, relationships that have made me realize that it is through similar strategies in our design processes that we successfully communicate to get work done. More importantly, it is through these commonalities in our ways of working that I am able to execute certain kinds of work that I would otherwise be unable to. As my explorations into design move forward, I am interested in understanding this thing as a mediator which is capable of shaping relationships in ways that these innovate through the construction of layouts, objects, spaces and the conditions for meaningful experiences.

—Alexander Solzhenitzyn, The First Circle

The Third & The Seventh from Alex Roman on Vimeo.

This past week, via Jason Alejandro of Made by Archetype, I was made aware of this wonderful creation which, in more than one instance, made me question the truthfulness of the reality that it presented. It is remarkable to see the work of someone who can manipulate softwares to generate such great work. If you have not seen it, give yourself 10mins of peaceful watching…

This exercise consists of a series of bills that have been tagged, marked, and released into the open public as an experiment that will hopefully lead to a better understanding of how currency travels. It works something like this: once a person comes across one of these bills, before it’s passed along, he or she can register it on a website and write about how the currency was acquired. The website then keeps track of how the bill moves around, and if you choose to, it can notify you of further movement of your bill.


Screen shot of how my trip back to Puerto Rico added a few miles to the dollar bill. Funny that the website sees my trip as possible foul play.

The website component, although interesting, is a bit hard to use. If you do come across one of these bills, I recommend some patience with the interface and the information architecture found on it. As a data freak, I appreciated the information given to me, but it is hard to read and understand. Nonetheless, I am always thrilled when I come across projects like this, so be on the lookout, a tagged dollar bill might be in your wallet.

Please rest assured that we’ve taken great care in the shipping of your DVD.

We hold true to an ancient DVD shipping tradition passed down for over 5000 years. This very intensive practice is only achieved after years of training, meditation, purity of mind, and deep breathing exercises.

After a rigorous 17 step process of verifying the authenticity of your DVD, we donned silk gloves and placed it into a sacred box made of magic and lined with Unicorn fur, tied the box with a strand of Gypsy hair, and wrapped the whole thing in a snazzy looking faux gold leaf paper, with elm leaf inlay from Costco. Unfortunately, by the time it gets to you, all of that fancy stuff will likely have been picked clean by the greedy postal service employees. Please don’t be surprised to see just a plain cardboard box.

It’s surprising to see how my opinion of a seller can be so suddenly shaped but such a small detail. I now only wonder if this is the only message, or if there is more than one. I guess I will have to order another movie to find out…

The Manifesto Lounge, by Tania Allen, Brooke Chornyak, Ryan Gottfried & Rebecca Knowe.

Through ideas such as soul, normatives and community engagement, main stage lecturers Elliot Earls, Brenda Laurel and Jon Sueda presented different, but rather engaging perspectives on design’s (and a designer’s) relationship to “authentic” experiences. Then, Joerg Becker from the University of Illinois at Chicago got the audience’s heads spinning, questioning the very nature of anything that a person may call authentic: “As soon as we call something authentic, it stops being authentic.”

On saturday I moderated a break-out session, Technology Preventing Authentic Nuanced Communication, which I shortly framed to produce a dialogue from the attendees. The level of discussion, as in other sessions in the symposium, proved to be meaningful and insightful.

Useful Ambiguity exhibition by Cady Bean-Smith & Samyul Kim.

Detail of Useful Ambiguity exhibition by Cady Bean-Smith & Samyul Kim.

I owe a round of applause to Tania Allen, Kelly Bailey, Cady Bean-Smith, TJ Blanchflower, Brooke Chornyak, Gary Dickson, Sidney Fritts, Tony Fugolo, Ryan Gottfried, Lincoln Hancock, Samyul Kim, Rebecca Knowe, Dan McCafferty, Caroline Prietz, David Raymond, Laura Rodriguez, Lauren Waugh, and Liese Zahabi, coordinators of the event. Special shout-out to first year graduate student Gary Dickson for having had the courage to present his work Mutation Breeds Authenticity in the main stage of the symposium.

This past week, while researching through Dr. Arturo Dávila’s personal library, I came across a stack of pamphlets, about 11 of them in total, sewn and bound in varied marbleized papers. Trim-wise, these are considerably small, ranging from 3×4.5 inches to 5.5×8 inches, and yet, they called my attention. Don Arturo, as wise as he is, felt as my eyes were drawn to the colorful spines. “Pick them up; take a look“. In the process, he explained that these reproductions were used by the Church to spread its message. Little did I know, my curiosity had brought me to a series of original 18th Century texts—printed versions of homilies recited by Catholic priests in Mexico.

To share these, I took the time to scan one of the leaflets in its entirety. Please note a curious type treatment that has been killing me since I became aware of it: at the end of every page the typesetter included the first few characters of the word that follows on the next page. I had never seen this kind of strategy employed, and it was used in almost all of the documents, printed in a range of many different years, which means it was not a one time thing.

In their time, these documents would have probably not attracted any aesthetic conversation, but today, I can’t help but see them with a clinical eye, and hold them in my hands with admiration. Right now, everything about them—texture, color, smell, sound—is just fantastic. More importantly, each and every one of them holds some kind of typographic lesson that I can learn from.

Click on any of the images for a larger look.