Building design with Landscape Studio 413
UCLA - Architecture and Urban Design - M.Arch 2nd year - Fall 2022The fourth studio in AUD’s M.Arch I Core series and the first studio of second year, ARCH 413 initiates a move from more introductory studio problems of first year to increasingly comprehensive, complex, and real-world problems pursued through the second and third year. Building design indicates this course’s primary mandate as a continuation of previous building design studios, the building problem now being somewhat larger in size than those of first year (though not as large as buildings assigned in later studios) with more challenging programmatic requirements. Additionally, this studio introduces landscape as a subject and discipline unto itself, a field of study and work that often coexists around and through architecture. This course works to integrate building and landscape in novel and projective ways and requires that landscape be integral to the project. Further still, the design problem implicates urban design intentionally, encouraging its priority in the project by virtue of both site selection and program requirements.







PROBLEM: WATER AND POWER
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP, or simply DWP) oversees the largest municipal infrastructure in the United States. The scale of this network of streams and rivers, lakes and reservoirs, dams, aqueducts, culverts, pipes, stations, substations, and power lines is vast, spanning several western states. Physical evidence of this infrastructure is everywhere but goes unnoticed: everywhere yet nowhere at once. Usually its invisibility occurs secondarily, the inevitable side effect of ubiquity. In certain cases, however, the suppression of the system’s physical presence is purposeful, a conscious decision by its architects and engineers to hide certain objects in plain sight. This is especially true of the substations, buildings that fade into the urban background through dead iconography. This studio explores these substations for their potential to inform design at the intersection of infrastructure and architecture.









Students work by UCLA - Architecture and Urban Design - M.Arch 2nd year - Fall 2022
Reality + - 2022
Interaction, Virtual Reality, and Spatial WebSCI-Arc VS 2741 01 - Fall 2022
Reality + investigates the potential of virtual worlds within architectural spatial research.
Let’s dive into the exciting universe of the spatial web! We navigate the agitated waters of online collaborative spaces by looking at existing platforms like Decentraland, Monaverse, and Sansar. We learned about the core structure of Web 3.0 and understanding virtual worlds through the lens of Angela Washko, McKenzie Wark, David Chalmers, Alexander Galloway, and Joe Hunting’s We met in VR.
As of September 2022, there are more than 500 companies that are building the metaverse, 300 more than September last year. During the pandemic virtual living, gaming, socializing, and trading has exploded, and McKinsey estimated the metaverse at a $5 trillion market value by 2030. Architecture is a field of spatial design, and it is time to jump into the design of online virtual spaces.
These online collaborative social spaces are modeled after iconic movie sets from production designers Hannah Beachler, Alex McDowell, Adam Stockhausen, and Nathan Crowley.
These metaverses are minted on Monaverse.



Reality + Lobby https://monaverse.com/spaces/reality-+-lobby?invite=TnpBMU16UXpNQTphc2lh
The Tale of Hanna Hall https://monaverse.com/spaces/the-tale-of-hanna-hall?invite=TWpnd01qTXpOZzphc2lh
Zeitgeist Dispatch https://monaverse.com/spaces/zeitgeist-dispatch?invite=T0RnNE5EZzVNdzphc2lh
Hanna Pink pool in the forest https://monaverse.com/spaces/pink-pool-in-the-forest?invite=TlRRek5ETXlOdzphc2lh
Chauncy's Living Room https://monaverse.com/spaces/chauncy's-living-room?invite=TVRjM01EZzBOdzphc2lh
Jenny’s Holiday Party https://monaverse.com/spaces/jenny's-budapest-hotel-lobby?invite=TlRnd056UTVOQTphc2lh
Dream Alley https://monaverse.com/spaces/salih's-backyard?invite=TmpjNE9UUTJNQTphc2lh
Somewhere nowhere https://monaverse.com/spaces/somewhere-nowhere?invite=T0RnNU1ESXpNZzphc2lh
Charlie & Chocolate Factory https://monaverse.com/spaces/charlie-and-chocolate-factory?invite=TnpNMU1EVTRNZzphc2lh
Chloe Black Panther Street https://monaverse.com/spaces/chloe-black-panther-street?invite=Tnpjek5UWTI6YXNpYQ
Anna's Spa https://monaverse.com/spaces/anna's-spa?invite=TkRrNE5qZzJNUTphc2lh
Dream Office https://monaverse.com/spaces/dream-office?invite=TWpreU9EVXo6YXNpYQ












Students work by SCI-Arc VS 2741 01 - Fall 2022 Students: Albarrak Salih, Chakhal-Salakhova Anna, Cheng Wei-Chun Jimmy, Cook Jenny, Huang Chenxi Chauncy, Leon Kimberly, Lin Sijie Chloe, Nyby Hanna Lovise, Park Hanna, Smirova Anastasia, Zhang Xinyu Dawson.
The Collaborative XR Design Lab ~ The Island - 2022
Interaction, Virtual Reality, and Spatial WebUCLA - Architecture and Urban Design - M.Arch students - Spring 2022
The Collaborative XR Design Lab investigates the future of spatial web and immersive social spaces. We have entered since 2020 a new digital era with internet technology, Web 3.0 – or the spatial web – where interfaces, computation, and data have drastically changed. The virtual universe built for this lab is a research tool designed to shift the way we think and design spaces. We design in Virtual Space collaboratively and in real-time, we build, freehand 3D draw, and inhabit the spaces we create at a one-to-one scale. Join us and design with us!

We have entered since 2020 in a new digital era with internet technology, we are now in Web 3.0 or the spatial web where interfaces, computation, and data has drastically changed. The virtual universe built for this lab is based on these cutting-edge technologies. The interfaces we use are no longer only smartphones, but we are moving into extended reality with interactive wearable XR devices. The computational logic is no longer done through apps and cloud computing but through distributed computing using artificial intelligence. Our information and data are no longer on the cloud but migrated to a distributed ledger technology using blockchain.
The Collaborative XR Design Lab investigates the future of spatial web and immersive social spaces by designing an Island for our avatar Traders, Explorers, Dwellers, and Farmers. The Lab is divided into four users, the Traders design the Marina and the Bazaar, the Explorers design the beaches and cultural spaces, the Dwellers design housing and parks for their dogs, the Farmers design land, and algae farms. We model each user’s avatars, buildings, infrastructure, asset packs, and mood boards through extensive research. This virtual universe is design for this lab and uses Oculus Quest 2 VR headsets, and WebXR through a laptop.



Episode 1 ~ Virtual Self >>> Avatar
Episode 2 ~ Virtual Place >>> Buildings
Episode 3 ~ Virtual Street >>> Stuff












Students work by UCLA - Architecture and Urban Design - M.Arch I and II - Spring 2022 Technical developer: Folly Feast Lab
Islanders: Marina Archangeli, Krishna Barot, Xiting Chen, Yueh-Hui Chen, Muyan Duan, Jingjing Fang, Miranda Hirujo-Rincon, Ziwei Hou, Yuhao Jia, Haowen Jiang, Ziyao Jiang, Kamila Khusnetdinova, Chih-Ping Liu, Qiuying Lu, Angelica Luna, Siyu Mao, Motomi Matsubara, Eduardo Morian, Insia Motiwala, Indulekha Nair, Rui Qiu, Yitong Qu, Yatian Ren, Abtin Shahverdi, Kaibo Wang, Yuzhou Wang, Hongye Wu, Muxi Yang, Yang Yang, Yuning Yang, Yiran Ye, Yuqian Zhang.
Virtual Herbaria -
MidJourney,
Augmented Reality and Game Engine.
Workshop 07 -
Bpro - UCL Bartlett - 2022 - London
Virtual Herbaria questions the way we visualize and utilize large data sets, archives, and libraries. With today’s technologies we have access to an infinite amount of online data, and years of archives and knowledge at our fingertips. Algorithms that can sort, search through, and identify hierarchy in that data are becoming extremely valuable because they are able to tell apart correct information from construct. In the last few years, we have seen the backlash of manipulated content, and the potency of fictitious representation. We are calling representation, reality, and artifice into question. With the catastrophic repercussions of the Crypto-Market on our environment, we will address climate change in the Anthropocene through the lens of Andrea Wulf in her book ‘The invention of Nature: Alexander Von Humboldt’s New World’ and the work of Heide Hatry in her series “Not a Rose.” We are putting our preconceived understanding of nature and technology under scrutiny.
We will be studying the Online Herbarium of the Southern Californian Desert, more specifically in the Mojave Desert near Joshua Tree National Park. Virtual Herbaria aims at reviving the California Desert Herbarium archive into an immersive experience through spatializing that data. After the Instagram statement that they are a video-based app, and no longer an image-based app, the interactions between user and product have become ever more important. We will use Unity Game Engine to design Virtual Herbaria as an interactive spatial archive where actual and created content will flourish.
We will dive into the exciting world of augmented reality, and games with Unity. We will start by discovering text to AI GANs with MidJourney. We will then learn basic polygon modeling in Maya, and augmented reality workflow with Unity 3D. We will then discover how to model terrain in Unity and get introduced to first person interactive game design by building a first-person game together.




























Students work by Bpro - UCL Bartlett - 2022 - London Work by: Yue Wang, Aofan Song, Biaji Jiaqi Peng, Kun Chen, Jeremy Zhikun Wu, Esther Yunxuan Xiao, Fangyin Wu, Xanxus Liuyang Miao, Yiyuan Ma, Jane Paixuan Li, Mocandi Zihan Xiang, Martin Ziding Cai, Jiacheng Wang, Xuan Zhang, Joyce Qianyuan Jin, Olivia Wang, Sherry Yuhan Xu, Dingsheng Xu, Bonnie Qiyue Huang, Valerie Limin Wang
Virtual Herbaria - MidJourney, Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality and Game Engine.
Summer Studio - M.Arch.II at UCLA A.UD IDEAS in 2022Virtual Herbaria questions the way we visualize and utilize large data sets, archives, and libraries. Virtual Herbaria revives the California Desert online Herbarium archive into an immersive experience through spatializing that data using augmented and virtual reality. Students designed these cacti and spaces as spatial libraries to walk through, interact, and be immersed in this fictitious California desert.
Virtual Herbaria questions the way we visualize and utilize large data sets, archives, and libraries. With today’s technologies we have access to an infinite amount of online data, and years of archives and knowledge at our fingertips. Algorithms that can sort, search through, and identify hierarchy in that data are becoming extremely valuable because they are able to tell apart correct information from construct. In the last few years, we have seen the backlash of manipulated content, and the potency of fictitious representation. We are calling representation, reality, and artifice into question. With the catastrophic repercussions of the Crypto-Market on our environment, we will address climate change in the Anthropocene through the lens of Andrea Wulf in her book ‘The invention of Nature: Alexander Von Humboldt’s New World’ and the work of Heide Hatry in her series “Not a Rose.” We are putting our preconceived understanding of nature and technology under scrutiny.
We will be studying the Online Herbarium of the Southern Californian Desert, more specifically in the Mojave Desert near Joshua Tree National Park. Virtual Herbaria aims at reviving the California Desert Herbarium archive into an immersive experience through spatializing that data. After the Instagram statement that they are a video-based app, and no longer an image-based app, the interactions between user and product have become ever more important. We will use Unity Game Engine to design Virtual Herbaria as an interactive spatial archive where actual and created content will flourish.
























Students work by MSAUD - UCLA A.UD IDEAS - 2022 - Los Angeles