URBAN RESONANCE explores the connections between architectural design and the multifaceted conceptual links to the idea of resonance in sound. This comparison is made in respect to the fact that a building is somewhat required to resonate with its urban context as well as to orchestrate the resonance relating to systems of people, built form and program, within itself. In using the concept of resonance, it is seen that these three systems, although separately definable, work together in one architectural environment – influencing each other in some way whether beneficial or not. I have chosen these three components of architectural design in response to Johannesburg’s urban and social context, and will explore their integration through celebrating their interstitial spaces of influence and resonance with each other. I seek to allow this idea in design, to produce new meaningful social encounters brought about by the exploration of cross-programming in a building coupled with an architectural response that enforces these social ideas. In the framework of Johannesburg, the question is not necessarily what the systems are but maybe rather how they can be unified and brought together in a building design. Sound is one of the least substantially manipulated and considered parts of building design, yet its relationship to inhabitants and their social connections to each other and space is powerful enough to allow people to perceive their surroundings solely through the things that they hear. URBAN RESONANCE is the explicit exploration of collective social ‘being’ in a building that uses sound and music to unify its programmatic and physical design within the context of Braamfontein, Johannesburg. Keywords:

This thesis describes a theoretical and experimental investigation of wireless energy transfer between high-Q resonant radiofrequency (RF) oscillators. A model used by Kurs \emph{et al} \cite{Kurs_original} was recast in a form which enabled expression of the results in terms of measurable electrical quantities. This model was tested using circular resonant copper loop antennas at a frequency near 10 MHz. Accurate calculation of the mutual inductance between loops was required in order to predict the loop coupling parameters, and was carried out using a custom-written computer code. Two resonant loop antenna RF oscillators were first used to check that the model predictions were accurate in the two-oscillator case. Based on the success of these tests, the model was extended to the case of three oscillators in two different configurations, the first having two receiving oscillators, and the second having two transmitting oscillators. Model predictions for both configurations were experimentally tested over a range of coil separations and angular inclinations. These experimental tests confirmed the model's applicability in the three-oscillator regime, with significant deviations from the model only being observed when any pair of loops was in very close proximity (i.e. when the separation of loop centers was comparable to the loop diameter). This may have been be due to either nonlinear dielectric losses (due to large amplitude RF electric fields) spoiling the Quality factors Q of the loop antenna resonators, or to increased capacitive coupling between loops at short distances (not included in the current model), or both. Further investigation would be required to definitively establish the origin of the deviation from the model at short distances, but from an engineering point of view accurate modelling of the performance in the "close loop" regime is not critical since the primary purpose of wireless power transfer is to transmit power over a reasonable distance.