Michael Lu's Blog

Nanogram Studio (www.nanogram.co) and Phoenix Urban CoLab (PUC) join forces to create a pop-up park in downtown Phoenix deep in the heart of the Roosevelt Row (RoRo) Art District. This urban intervention is inspired by my belief in guerilla architecture as the solution for blighted areas in perpetual neglect. Thanks for the help to all of our supporters! If you ever want to expand the project contact us and lets build Phoenix.

Grad school…remember the dreaded time-consuming and painstaking figure grounds that had to be manually traced in CAD? Nope there is an easier way. Use Maperative and export to Adobe Illustrator. I ran across a method of streamlining this process so I felt compelled to share. Spend more time designing and less time with context maps.
For full article : http://braincrunch.tumblr.com/post/9947074703/maperitive-tutorial-generating-osm-map-for-adobe

STEP 1. Download Maperative for free here: http://maperitive.net. Save to desktop and unzip. Run run Maperitive.exe (on Windows) or Maperitive.sh (on Linux/Mac).
STEP 2. Get Map/Download OSM Data: Visit: http://www.openstreetmap.org/ . Search for a location. I will choose Phoenix, AZ

STEP 3. Export Data: Click on Export data on bottom left side of openstreetmap. Save file to desktop. File name is map.osm.

STEP 4: Open with Maperative. Launch Maperative. Choose File>Open Map Sources. Choose map.osm.

STEP 5: Turn off Web map. Click the star icon off for Web map located on bottom left of screen. Then Choose Tools> Export to SVG (For Adobe Illustrator). Note the location of the illustrator export file (Found on the bottom command line screen)

STEP 6: Launch Adobe Illustrator. Click File> Open> Navigate to the file called “output” and open.

STEP 7: In Illustrator, color vector lines as required.

The wall mounted nanogram|studio business card holder. Quick deployed marketing.

AIA Jury stands by Nanogram|Studio Competition Entry

Boustrophedon

[boo-struh-FEED-n] noun: an ancient method of writing in which the lines run alternately from right to left and from left to right

In 2013, Salt Lake City introduced to the world its Boustrophedon, a tribute to the dialog between the disciplines of poetry and architecture. Selected stanzas of North America’s great poets were painted upon the Sixty-Nine and Seventy blocks of downtown Salk Lake weaving themselves through alleyways, streets and buildings of its booming arts district. Viewable from the air to the ground plane, the Boustrophedon is the first of its kind and scale, educating the public while creating a cultural landmark unique to this western city.

Poetry is inextricably linked with architecture. Simile, personification, paradox and rhythm are each devices imbued in anthropogenic build form. The Boustrophedon remains an exemplary case. Open spaces are literally transformed by the written word. Poems weave their way back and forth in a rhythmic dance upon the surfaces of Sixty-Nine Seventy, anchoring each to the other with the creativity of our literary greats.

The Boustrophedon personifies Salt Lake’s commitment to sustainability physically, fiscally and socially. The low cost creation of community open space is complemented by the reuse of construction waste to form strategically placed canopies. The templates used to paint the Boustrophedon are reintroduced into four pavilion structures. As the sun makes its pass throughout the year, shadows cast by the pavilions dynamically express the poetry upon the ground.

Here’s to you, Salt Lake City. You have impacted a community, a nation and the world with an artistic gesture blending literature with architecture. In a city defined by the road less travelled, this IS the place where the arts, history, culture and goodness illuminate the road to enlightenment.

Team: L. Michael Lu

Now introducing elementPARK, an urban injection of sculptural PVC. elementPARK is iconic and ironic. A triangular park is made linear, a rectilinear pavillion is formed of extruded circles. element|PARK rests as an anchor between two extant bustops. While families anticipate the arrival of public transportation they are met with a playground for all. Sit-Lay-Play, Eat-Sleep-Unwind. Sustainability is at the core of element|PARK. Its roughly 5600 extruded plastic elements sculpt an openspace based on human form and activity. For the community it stands as an educational piece reminding passersby of the limitless possibilities of re-purposed materials salvaged from landfills. Its construction is basic, from the PVC pipes retrieved from construction sites and city dumps to the synthetic grass donated by sports arenas. Held in place with a combination of screws and bonding agent donated by local hardware stores and the sweat of community participation, element|PARK will remain a symbol for Jackson + Homan. A defunct park is once again activated by the discarded remains of human occupation and the ingenuity of its inhabitants. .