Donut House
fall 2014
The project began with each student identifying a building or object in the city of Los Angeles that wasn't typically considered to be architectural. Randy's Donut Shop in Inglewood stood out ot me because of its exaggerated and obvious use of a massive donut in order to advertise the building's purpose. I focused on the unique geometry of the torus, and created an abstract shape using the inherent forms of the donut shop. From there each student was assigned an existing house within the historic Mar Vista Tract in Los Angeles, and asked to build an addition to that house using their previously designed shapes. The existing house was characterized by its orthogonal forms and clearly defined spaces, while the form I had designed was almost entirely made up of curves. This observation led to a comparative study of the two objects' abilities to function as independent, interactive living spaces rather than a simple addition to the existing house.
