Typescript (photocopy). / Digitized by Kansas State University Libraries

In the UK, boom periods of construction combined with typical building styles of the day, have resulted in a large stock of ageing office buildings at risk of structural vacancy and obsolescence. Despite their lack of insulation, high air infiltration, and solar gain, many such buildings from the 1960s-1970s are still in use today. Moreover, with UK buildings replaced at a rate of less than 2% a year, the majority of today's buildings will still be in use in 2050. Due to the impact of the facade on such aspects as thermal performance and aesthetics, façade retrofit is seen as a key solution to the problem of today’s ageing office building stock. Unfortunately, façade retrofit comes with a complex decision-making process. The cost and long-term nature of the investment means that façade decisions are strategic, while the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industry is prototypical and multidisciplinary. Decision theory suggests the use of normative decision-making methods to arrive at a well-reasoned course of action; therefore, this thesis aims to discover how decision-making can be improved to support façade selection in non-domestic building retrofit. A state-of-the-art literature review of office building façade retrofit decision-making only returned nine case studies, of which six reported real-life façade retrofit selection. One real-life and one theoretical case demonstrated the use of normative decision-making in the form of the payback period method, while one theoretical case used multi-criteria analysis. Many sources of information were revealed as guiding the façade selection process in general. To examine the actuality of façade selection in practice, an exploratory study was conducted. This study involved (1) semi-structured interviews on the topic of façade selection with thirty UK AEC industry members from twelve professions, and (2) a case study of an over-clad 1970s office building, involving in-depth interviews with two UK AEC industry experts, a documentary evidence review, and post-retrofit thermography. Three semi-structured interviewees revealed the use of normative decision-making, in the form of the payback period method, while information sources were greatly used in general. The exploratory case, however, revealed only a minimal use of information and no normative decision-making. To determine the representativeness of the exploratory case study, an in-depth study of façade retrofit decision-making was conducted. This study involved (1) a specific literature review to set the context of UK university building façade retrofit decision-making and (2) four exemplifying case studies of real-life university building façade retrofit. The university estate features many ageing buildings from the 1960s-1970s that exhibit the same typical building style as the UK’s ageing office stock. The specific literature review found five cases of university façade retrofit decision-making, of which three reported real-life façade retrofit selection. Normative decision-making was revealed in theory, with the two theoretical cases of university façade retrofit using the payback period method. The exemplifying case studies involved eight UK AEC industry experts, a documentary evidence review, and post-retrofit thermography. The case buildings ranged from the late 1950s/early-1960s to the 1970s, with three being over-clad, and one over-clad and re-clad. The exemplifying case study findings support the exploratory case study findings. The key actors in façade retrofit decision-making are the architect, client, and planner. Numerous information sources are used to support the façade selection process, relating chiefly to performance, cost, aesthetics, and collaboration, and the use of normative decision-making is not evident. From the research findings, it appears the process of façade retrofit selection functions naturally within the realm of the architectural profession. Architects appear to be making initial façade design decisions based on ideas resulting from cognition and drawing on past experience, which become more detailed as the project progresses. The façade selection process is supported by the voluntary use of numerous information sources, many of which are quantitative in nature. This thesis did not find evidence of normative decision methods being used in the current practice of façade retrofit selection. Thus, the recommendations proffered are not characteristic of normative theory, but instead opt to support the façade retrofit selection process by reinforcing current process via the following points: (1) use expertise in the form of advisor-led information sources to guide the façade retrofit selection process; (2) maximise communication by encouraging an ongoing dialogue between AEC industry members involved in façade selection, involving specialist external bodies at an early stage, and documenting the façade selection process; and (3) aid the energy efficiency resulting from building retrofit by engaging stakeholders during design, construction, and in-use, especially in regards to proposed new energy efficiency practices. This thesis contributes to the knowledge of non-domestic façade retrofit decision-making in actual building design practice. Having found only limited evidence of normative decision-making being used in the non-domestic façade retrofit selection process, it appears that efforts to develop multi-criteria decision-making tools for use in this area may be misguided.

Master of Architecture

The Art Department at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University is based in the leased space of the Armory and in the basement of Owens Hall. The Art Department also holds classes in as many as four other buildings on campus. My proposal is to consolidate the Art Department’s activities into one formal building. I call this building The Visual Arts Plant. The Visual Arts Plant contains the rooms, equipment, machinery, tools, instruments, and fixtures necessary to facilitate and promote a visual arts education. This thesis is a documentation of my ideas for The Visual Arts Plants. / Master of Architecture

This architectural thesis proposes a Mi’kmaq Learning Centre on the Dalhousie University Campus in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Indigenous-led and Indigenous minded content in the post secondary environment creates space for cultural continuity and inter-cultural dialogue. First Nations faculties and support spaces are increasingly being established in post-secondary institutions across Canada. These buildings must negotiate the continental: North American First Nations culture, as well as the regional: in the case of this thesis, the Mi’kmaq culture. While the content and mode of First Nations and Mi’kmaq modes learning is hugely beneficial to all cultures, the architectural space for its application is often overlooked. This thesis project applies many methods of research and interpretation to interweave the ideas of Mi’kmaq land and First Nations learning, creating place for this pedagogy on Dalhousie University Campus.

Les bâtiments universitaires en France ont énormément de défis pour atteindre aux exigences de transition écologique pour la croissance verte. En même temps sont des éléments clés pour la propagation des objectives du développent durable à l'échelle du bâtiment, du campus universitaire et de la ville. Les universités sont des institutions capables de promouvoir des changements dans la société, mais aussi sont des institutions qui ont besoin de changer. En d'autres termes, avant d'être un modèle pour la société, les universités devraient mettre en œuvre un comportement durable favorisant des pratiques durables dans le campus. Il est possible d'affirmer que la consommation énergétique, les émissions de CO2 et le manque d'intégration avec la ville sont les problèmes majeurs auxquels font face les universités françaises.Actuellement, l'implantation de stratégies pour améliorer la performance de durabilité dans les bâtiments font face à de nombreux défis, parmi eux le manque d'expérience et d'information pour soutenir la prise de décision. Un outil participatif d'aide à la décision a été développé et testé pour mesurer la performance des stratégies de la rénovation du bâtiment Aile Sud de la Bergerie Nationale. La performance des stratégies de la rénovation du bâtiment Aile Sud a été évalué et des solutions pour améliorer sa performance ont été suggérées dans une approche d'amélioration continue. / In France, the university buildings have significant challenges to meet the environmental transition requirements for green growth. At the same time, they are key elements for the spread of the sustainable development objectives at the building, the university campus, and the city scale. Universities are institutions capable of promoting changes in society, but also are institutions that need to be changed. In other words, before being a model for society, universities should implement sustainable behavior through the promotion of sustainable practices on campus. It is possible to say that energy consumption, CO2 emissions and lack of integration with the city are the major problems faced by French universities.Nowadays, the sustainable strategies implementation to improve buildings performance faces many challenges, including the lack of experience and information to support decision-making. A participatory tool for support decision-making was developed and tested to measure the performance of the ‘Aile Sud’ building renovation strategies in the Bergerie Nationale. The performance of the ‘Aile Sud’ building renovation strategies was assessed, and some recommendations for performance improvement were suggested in a continuous improvement approach.

No description available.

My efforts to discover a means of making a more effective sculpture led me to pursue architecture. The problem with sculpture as I saw it was that it had been deformed over time from that which marked a place into a placeless isolate. Just as I worked against that placeless isolate in sculpture, so am I now working against the placeless isolate in architecture. The aspects of architecture, the site, the plan, elements and materials, although acting phenomenally in conjunction with other coexisting elements, are often conceived as isolates. In order to elucidate the interrelation between these aspects at different scales, I turned to the work of the Poststructuralists such as Jacques Derrida, Roland Barthes, et al. They outline a deconstructive critical approach to linguistic/literary meaning, which I have used as a model for understanding the language of architecture. Architecture comes into being at the convergence of orders, when ordered and coherent human actions (institutions) take place in a locus or place which has been made architectonic. I am for an interrelational and interactive architecture, one which maintains a critical stance vis a vis its locus, its purposes, and its elements and materials. This is not a disassociated and detached abstract "ideal," but a self-conscious choice, made in conviction and commitment to a coherent and dignified order to human existence. The design project is an effort to make some of these thoughts operational. The proposal is for a University Museum at the parking lot at the northwest edge of the VPI Campus. The project begins with an analysis and critique of the current placeless condition of the site. The site is restructured with respect to the latent campus structure, which is itself clarified. The Museum building becomes the focal point of a new axis relating the site and the Campus. The site becomes a boundary for the Campus and promotes the growth of a coherent campus plan. / Master of Architecture

A pathway to go from the profane to a village of higher aspirations. A House of Visual Arts and an existing school of architecture flank the pathway as the realm of the mundane is received into the world of the sublime. Rows of trees define streams of space flowing into a reservoir of space, gateways marking the points of transition. From the reservoir, these gateways frame the distant mountains giving the urban room a location. The room itself is essentially empty, for it is hardly a statement but, rather, the preparation for one. The room is for the life of the academic village. Giving order where disorder reigned, providing clarity where ambiguity prevailed, bringing unity where discord was the norm, furnishing hierarchy, meaning, moments of movement and pause, MAKING A PLACE. / Master of Architecture

In the school there is meeting. If you thought of the nature of a school, you would never have a corridor in a school. You would have a hall in a school. Where it is a meeting place for people not in any way obligated to each other, have no source of being judged. And it becomes in a way the student's classroom. The corridor can never aspire to be a hall. But the hall can aspire to be of such importance equal to that of the library which is probably the most important part of school. Because the book is an offering...offerings of the mind. / Master of Architecture