Thesis (M.Phil.)--Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 156-173). Also available in electronic version.

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This thesis explores the mental, physical, and emotional healing benefits of nature and the built environment to oneself. Strategically located across from downtown Wilmington, North Carolina, along the Cape Fear River, the site serves as a social and active place that promotes engagement with the natural surroundings while healing the individual. The addiction crisis in the United States is deadlier than ever. The number of overdoses, hospitalizations, and relapses is at an all-time high. Rehabilitation centers, sober housing, and transitional living programs are failing to provide the mental and physical stabilities in which patients wish for in sobriety. Most rehabilitation centers in the country create an isolated environment in which patients primarily focus on detox and therapy while being disconnected from societal engagements for weeks or months on end. Mental well-being is a prominent cornerstone of those institutions, but what about incorporating education, life, and building career proficiencies? According to the SAMHSA, "work is one of the best predictors of positive outcomes for individuals with a substance abuse disorder." Wilmington is one of the strongest addiction recovery communities in the southern region. Unfortunately, as a result, Wilmington thus faces a higher rate of drug and alcohol relapses. By providing educational resources and career-building programs, recovering addicts are better equipped to reengage in society while finding purpose in sobriety. This thesis creates spaces for recovering addicts with programs that promote healing and provide education within a nurturing atmosphere to create a foundation for one's journey to sobriety. Natural lighting, ventilation, materiality, vegetation, and views of the landscape engage the mind and body by activating the five senses: the auditory, visual, olfactory, somatosensory, and gustatory. Winding, natural pathways on the ground create an intimate and direct interaction with the landscape, whereas the elevated pathways above the landscape create a dynamic and social interaction with the surrounding trees and nearby pedestrians throughout the calendar year. The design creates a therapeutic community that accommodates the social, educational, or therapeutic needs of each individual resident. A transitional living development focused on being a place of learning, growing, and recovering in Wilmington generates a stronger sense of community between the recovering addicts and the city. My thesis focuses on the master plan development of the site, as well as developing the boathouse and boat building facility, where individuals learn the process of building and restoring boats. This boathouse is a safe space for collaboration and creativity; therefore, offering the tools used to exercise one's mind and body while contributing to Wilmington's historic boating destination. The boathouse is one facet of the overall master plan, providing a foundation to reconnect with the environment, engage the five senses, and find purpose beyond sobriety. / Master of Architecture / This thesis explores the mental, physical, and emotional healing benefits of nature and the built environment to oneself. Strategically located across from downtown Wilmington, North Carolina, along the Cape Fear River, the site serves as a social and active place that promotes engagement with the natural surroundings while healing the individual. The addiction crisis in the United States is deadlier than ever. The number of overdoses, hospitalizations, and relapses is at an all-time high. Rehabilitation centers, sober housing, and transitional living programs are failing to provide the mental and physical stabilities in which patients wish for in sobriety. Most rehabilitation centers in the country create an isolated environment in which patients primarily focus on detox and therapy while being disconnected from societal engagements for weeks or months on end. Mental well-being is a prominent cornerstone of those institutions, but what about incorporating education, life, and building career proficiencies? According to the SAMHSA, "work is one of the best predictors of positive outcomes for individuals with a substance abuse disorder." Wilmington is one of the strongest addiction recovery communities in the southern region. Unfortunately, as a result, Wilmington thus faces a higher rate of drug and alcohol relapses. By providing educational resources and career-building programs, recovering addicts are better equipped to reengage in society while finding purpose in sobriety. A transitional living development focused on being a place of learning, growing, and recovering in Wilmington generates a stronger sense of community between the recovering addicts and the city. The design creates a therapeutic community that accommodates the social, educational, or therapeutic needs of each individual resident. My thesis focuses on the master plan development of the site, as well as developing the boathouse and boat building facility, where individuals learn the process of building and restoring boats. This boathouse is a safe space for collaboration and creativity; therefore, offering the tools used to exercise one's mind and body while contributing to Wilmington's historic boating destination. The boathouse is one facet of the overall master plan, providing a foundation to reconnect with the environment, engage the five senses, and find purpose beyond sobriety.

As our technologies evolve, the world gets smaller, and it becomes easier for people to travel and mix. Some people travel, some move permanently, creating an exchange of cultures and knowledge. I believe our architecture should also change and reflect this new aspect of our communities. For that aim I propose a new typology of building. It is a place for people to gather, relax and stay a while, without relying only on other individuals to make the building live and have purpose. The building itself shall be a source of knowledge and experiences akin to tastes and feelings of places abroad. This will be achieved by combining vernacular architecture from different parts of the world, not by having a French room, an Indian room and a South African room, but by studying the vernacular architecture of these places, and creating a whole new language that can express the multiplicity of those places as one. Someone walking in a room will see an aspect which will be reminiscent of his/her place of origin, whereas someone else entering the same room might notice a different architectural element which will bring forth the image of a totally different place. As the individual traverses the building he/she will experience a multitude of spaces with different conditions such as height, width, size, but also a change in temperature, humidity, lighting and smells. Washington D.C. is a very diverse city, with people coming from all over the world, which is a prime example of the melting-pot that is the United States of America. From there, the site was chosen to be in the Dupont Circle area due to the high density of embassies and consulates, business buildings and restaurants. The building will be similar to an oasis for nomads who would like to go to a place that reminds them of their homelands or for locals to sit by the watering hole and listen to stories of lands far away, while actually experiencing those stories through the building. / Master of Architecture / Since a Thesis is one of the rare moments where one can design his own project from choosing the site and program as both client and designer, I wanted to have a project that would be something new and unique. I decided to think about what I could design that would be different, and thus looked inward at what made me different from others. As such I decided to imagine a building that would reflect some aspects of myself, but that would also be relatable for others too. I am French from my parents but also Venezuelan since I was born there in Venezuela. I spent kindergarten in France, was mostly raised in Asia (Bangladesh and Malaysia), and after a year in Cameroon I now live in the United States of America. So when someone asks me where I'm from, I often find myself making an awkward smile accompanied by a silence as I try to understand what the person is asking and what answer I should give. I decided to design a building that would represent the mixture of today's community, a community of nomads where most people have more than just one origin, where we are influenced by the cultures of others. As such my building will be a place for all, with rooms of different conditions allowing the visitor to go to a room that fits his/her preference of size, temperature, lighting and humidity. Similar to how I don't have a Venezuelan leg, a French arm and a Malaysian shoulder, the building was not designed by just copying vernacular architecture from across the globe, but by seeing the common points and combining styles in an all new style that unites and merges the origins together. This is a building that shows how our community is changing and how we can all get along together to make a cohesive whole no matter the differences of the different parts.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Rutgers University, 2009. / "Graduate Program in Philosophy." Includes bibliographical references (p. 158-161).

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Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2008. / The entire dissertation/thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file (which also appears in the research.pdf); a non-technical general description, or public abstract, appears in the public.pdf file. Title from title screen of research.pdf file (viewed on July 28, 2009 Includes bibliographical references.