Thesis (M. Arch)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 1988. / Bibliography: p. 98-99. / This thesis is a study of the relationship between continuity and change. It's premise is the idea that architecture can be receptive to the need for growth and change while still being rooted to the continuity of its relative setting or community. Accordingly, this is an exploration of how a building can represent the continuity or associative identity of a community. The process will be to look for positive, place-making elements, or patterns, within the context and community. By working with an appropriate range of uses, sizes and forms from within the community, I hope to be able to generate a sense of meaningful space and form, or 'place.' I will be looking for ways to enrich a place within it's community - to give it meaning for those who use and experience it. The basic question is how can we conform to an existing context, yet still accommodate the need for change, and to advance our understanding of our place in the world. The design for an artists' community will be set at the edge of Boston's Back Bay, an architecturally rich and clearly defined community. The design of a small community within a larger community will enable me to focus on the activities, spatial qualities and social patterns that are essential for inducing a sense of place. Ideally, the artists' community should become a microcosm of the larger community - a place where a diverse range of people and activities can combine to create a rich environment with continually changing social relationships and the potential to reinforce the total form of the community, while still allowing different yet similar uses. Design is an exploration of the possible, an awakening to the wisdom of the world to which we all aspire. It is the literal reflection of the ways by which we relate to our universe. In other words, it should reveal our greatest potential, reflect our highest hopes and dreams and increase our understanding of where and how we are in a particular place and time. / by Kenton Leland Duckham. / M.Arch

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 1992. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 74-75). / Change in historic buildings is inevitable. If these changes are not well-managed, the cityscape will be threatened because a city is composed of buildings. A good city should combine both growth and preservation. Controlling change in historic buildings is one way to get this balance. Because a city can not simply preserve all buildings nor demolish all of them, there should be a methodology to decide what buildings should be preserved and which should be demolished. Furthermore, which building should be preserved as a museum, and which should be allowed rehabilitation could also be decided by this same method. Since the concept of combining history into people's daily lives is prevalent, historic buildings can be changed according to contemporary needs. Change in historic buildings should be recommended in different degrees. The degree is decided according to the significance of the building. This thesis studies building category systems that have been used in downtown surveys in Boston and San Francisco. In order to develop an objective evaluation system, the system used in The Canadian Inventory of Historic Building will also be examined. A framework for criteria and an evaluation system will be developed. Buildings can thus be categorized into groups. Suggestions for changes will be based on these groups. For example, a building of high significance in history or in architecture should be preserved at all cost. Change in such a building should be invisible because retaining its original status and keeping its authenticity is the priority. For a building without particular significance, demolition is recommend. Its demolition provides space for city growth. Between the two extremes of preservation and demolition, there is buffer room for blending the new and the old in a single building. The value of such building is usually contextual, without individual architectural or historic significance but of integral importance within an environment. For this kind of contextual building, change is recommended, but the new elements should be clearly distinguishable. Such as building can be rehabilitated with a contemporary design. A new addition is also allowed, as long as the new is compatible with the old. The compatibility between new and old will be examined through cases of buildings recently completed in Boston. The cases raise many issues: How does a city solve the controversy regarding preservation and development? How can the new be properly integrated into the old? How does the city control design qUality? The answers will be provided after the examination of case studies. Finally, principles and recommendations for controlling change in historic buildings will be provided. / by Chien-Ni Yin. / M.S.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 107-114). / La Red de Alamedas de Bogota is a new type of public space project consisting in a network of tree lined pedestrian streets with bicycle paths. Alamedas connect parks and natural systems as well as residential areas and urban facilities. In general, .£!,Iamedas have been proposed for the periphery of the city where there is a lack of public space. La red de Alamedas was developed during the administration of Enrique Perialosa, Bogota City Mayorfrom 1998 to 2000; improvement of the quantity and quality of public space was one of Penalosa's government plan priorities. Moreover, a new general plan for the city, Plan de Ordenamiento Territorial, POT was developed during those years. Thus, alamedas became public space projects in more comprehensive interventions in the city. Alamedas proceed from a range of concerns in the construction of the city such as the development of public space projects to overcome the difficulties of general plans when dealing with particular problems and specific areas, and as a way to improve the quality of life in the city. Besides, alamedas can be considered a reinterpretation of promenades and paseos, an urban type which has been present in the city since colonial times. Alamedas have been proposed as a new public space which is superimposed to the existing urban structure in certain areas in order to reorganize the urban structure and at the same time as a new way of building the city that is, through the construction of public space in the first place. Most the alamedas are still urban design projects, only two of the alamedas included in this document have been built. Alamedas have different characters according to the areas and the urban conditions of the proposed corridors. Alameda EI Porvenir, the most ambitious one has been studied in more depth. Alamedas work as an alternative path for pedestrian and bicycle circulation and are at the same time a recreational space; besides, alamedas have also started to become a representative space much in the way of the traditional plaza. / by Marcela Angel Samper. / S.M.

Thesis (B.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 1913. / Accompanying drawings held by MIT Museum. / by Gordon Howard Robb. / B.S.

Thesis (M.Arch.) Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Architecture, 1956. / by Frederick T. Kubitz. / M.Arch.

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 1987. / Bibliography: leaves 54-55. / A digital image processing technique is presented that allows conventionally produced images to be prepared for undistorted printing in one-step holographic stereograms. This technique effectively predistorts the source 2D image set for a holographic stereogram to compensate for the distorting effects of its display geometry. The resulting stereograms can have undistort ed images that occupy space in front, back, and through the hologram surface. This technique is much more convenient that the current alternatives which either require unusual large optics, or much more intensive use of computer resources. It should therefore facilitate the fast and convenient production of one-step stereograms which are excellent 3D hardcopy displays with potential for applications that require fast visual communication of complex 3D information. / by Mark Holzbach. / M.S.

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 2004. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 94-96). / Recent advancements and increased availability of technologies have led to the design of surfaces and materials that can encode physical properties into digital information that can be manipulated at will. While research at the nano and micro scales continues to develop new materials, the availability and improvements of microcontrollers in recent years has allowed designers to become involved in the developments of human and macro scale physical-digital surfaces. In this thesis I will develop a set of aesthetic issues and attempt to show examples of how I tackled those issues through a series of projects in the domain of physical-digital surfaces. These projects will range in scale and level of refinement from design proposals to working prototypes. The set of aesthetic issues developed for this thesis will contextualize the surface studies that I have been working on within an art historical context and also suggest areas for further investigation and experimentation. / by James Tichenor. / S.M.

Thesis (M. Arch.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 2011. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 180-181). / A two meter rise in sea levels projected by the end of this century threatens the sovereignty of the Maldivian nation state. While flight from the Maldives to establish a new homeland elsewhere has been proposed, the culture and economy of this country is inextricably entrenched in its geophysical environment. Although the Maldives is known for super luxury resorts, the nation's government is poorly positioned to defend a population of 400,000 people spread across 1200 islands. This thesis proposes a strategy by which the international resort operator, an autonomous and independently funded entity, can be mobilized as an agent of coastal defense. Also investigated are issues of artificial reef ecology, defensive coastal infrastructures, and prefabricated composite construction and modularity. / by Buck Sleeper. / M.Arch.

Thesis (M. Arch.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 1997. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 48-49). / The condition of being migrant is peculiar to modernity. Being migrant is often a result of political estrangement from one's homeland, or dislocation due to economic pressures. It is a status which requires the individual to be temporary, shifting and dynamic. If the position becomes static, the migrant becomes an immigrant alien in a new and unfamiliar geographical location. Thus immigrant is the radical instability of the modern experience. Immigrant is not only a consequence of modernity, but also a metaphor for the process of modernity. Being migrant has the trauma of dislocation, of relearning communication, rethinking a cultural dialogue. It is also an interiorized alone sense of loneliness, and even a longing for a return to a familiar place and time. Being immigrant is a journey, both mental and physical. This thesis concerns itself with the issues of being an immigrant. In particular, the debate will revolve around immigrants of the last twenty years, the Asian community. I am interested in this group because they are still struggling to assimilate themselves into the American experience. The town of Lowell, Massachusetts has a community of recent immigrants from Vietnam, Cambodia and Korea. These people have been encouraged to resettle their lives due to government programs and a strong manufacturing industry in Lowell. They inhabit a part of Lowell known as Acre and the Lowlands. These areas have been home to the first Irish settlers in Lowell in the 1850s. The site for the project is itself a borderland condition, precisely where the existing Lowell community stops development and the immigrants begin their settlement. The area is currently a residential fabric on one side and an industrial locality on the opposite. The Pawtucket Canal, a man-made canal, runs through the site, acting both as a boundary and a seam. / by Afshan Hamid. / M.Arch.

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 1985. / MICROFICHE COPY AVAILABLE IN ARCHIVES AND ROTCH. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 100-102). / This thesis is essentially the description of the shelter components of a World Bank co-financed urban development project in the new town of Lazaro Cardenas and its twin, the poor city of Guacamayas. The document presents the different stages the project went through, as well as identifies its changes and adjustments, and draws conclusions from the analysis of the past, present, and future situations. / by Juan Marcos Lawrence. / M.S.