STUDIO ARC300: THIRD YEAR DESIGN
University of Kansas, School of Architecture and Urban Design
Nils Gore, Assistant Professor

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Angie Stutte

Transparent Cubes

In order to achieve the illusion of transparency by using cardboard for a one cubic foot volume box, there are several ways to accomplish it. But in order to achieve a sense of a spectrum of transparencies is much harder and can’t be done as easily. The effect of illusion is hard to define and to accomplish, but can be completed by different uses of the cardboard than the standard box. The reason for the transparency is to make a normal cardboard box have more character and to give more definition. I found that when trying to accomplish this, there is one way that really gives a spectrum of transparencies and a great sense of illusion from a closed box to a completely open box.

In my first attempt, I stumbled across the idea of making a box transparent by making long rectangular strips to attach the top and bottom pieces together. This made a jail-like appearance for the box. But I realized it wasn’t enough to create illusion. On my next attempt, all I did was turn the strips to 45 degree angles in order to make people want to turn the box and look for something more. This helped with the sense of illusion and transparency, but still wasn’t enough. Finally, the next time I did the box I varied the width of the strips making them larger as they went back to opposite corners. This gave great illusion and depth when looking at the
box from any angle. Even though I was happy with that, there was still something missing and it seemed too symmetrical to me. I decided to expose the corrugation and make it different from one corner compared to the other. When experimenting with this, though, I came across the problem of strength of the cardboard. At the same time I was experimenting with the corrugation I decided to change the shape of the rectangular strips into triangles. But with the combination of the two it wasn’t strong enough to hold. In order to solve this, I decided it would be best to stick with varying size rectangular strips to hold the box up and still to reveal the corrugation on one side of them

Here are a few more words of caution in trying to create a spectrum of transparencies that I ran across while making these boxes. Be careful not to put the corrugation from side to side since it will make it weak, instead you have to put the corrugation running vertical for the strength that it instills. Variation in the shape of the rectangular strips can be helpful, but can also leave the box too open or closed. Also, strategically placing the strips further and further apart as they go from smaller to larger helps a lot with the transparency and doesn’t make the box seem to lopsided or uneven.

Trial and Error of Construction
The process of building is defined as the construction of objects in order to create something of greater significance. There are many different ways to achieve this and there are also many different materials that can be used in order of which will work best for the outcome desired. The art behind creating something desirable is determined by personal preference and varies from person to person. Precision is important only if the final outcome desires it. Another important aspect of the building process is the character that is desired on the final product.

To design my whirligig I chose to use prefabricated objects to use for the construction. By choosing this instead of hand making pieces, I found the difficulty level was greatly increased. I chose Legos, which only come in certain shapes, to make my whirligig. The Legos proved to be a difficult task, but helped me to compromise what I had imagined and what the Legos were capable of. I found this to be very helpful in the fact that I will have to do this on many other projects in the future. It also helped me to define the final concept through trial and error of what I was able to do. In a certain way, the Legos set a standard for me that I had to work around in order to come up with a final working model that I was happy with. This trial and error process went on for a while and changed my idea everytime I worked on the whirligig. Going from one idea to the next was difficult at first, but in the end helped me to understand that during the construction of projects many things come up that have a larger

When first starting my project I decided I didn’t want my whirligig to be to dominated by Legos, but I wanted people to be able to recognize that they were how the whirligig actually was able to operate. When dealing with my initial thought I had to realize that the pieces I had to work with from Legos were very few in the variation of them. All of them come in a standard square or rectangle and only few have a place for tires to go which allows the only movable object made by Legos. The tires were used to help produce a string that wraps around several of the attachable tire pieces allowing me to create a moving object above. Two helicopter blades glues together out of a helicopter Legos’ set power these tires and strings. But I found this didn’t give enough power just from the wind so I needed to create something to help the blades spin easier than they were. I found that balloons cut in half worked great to give it enough power to spin at the slightest wind. Then all that was left for me to figure out