2 Reviews of First Draft

Donatella Versace's Office

OK i am having a lot of problems with this and need to add more to the design, but this is the rough idea...

The excessive lighting (kind of failed due to the materiality of glass...the surrounding elevator path is supposed to be lit blue, green, red and orange), abundant use of glass and design of the elevator like a stage, reveal how Versace's power is derived from values such as appearance and fashion. As the influential trend setter, she is always on display.

The elevator path which doesn't go directly from the office to meeting space, instead providing a stop in between for comfort (will be made more glamorous later...), is inefficient. The unnecessary extravagence of her pathway mirrors the nature of fashion as excessive.

Finally the 'cushioned' appearance of her studio captures her feminety, and lifestyle of comfort and indulgence.

I also plan to add rings around the elevator path, as embellishment captures the excessive nature of fashion and Versace's over-emphasis on appearance. It will also assist in creating different lighting effects.

Below is a close-up of her office. For some reason the geometry keeps stuffing up and strange triangular forms form in the supposedly, empty space :( GRR!!! It blocks the view of the elevator and ruins the lighting!

I am using the same elevator from my previous EXP3 trial. I have yet to upload textures on it... this is a pretty bad screenshot, but the elevator's too close to the mesh platform and my dining table to take a nicer shot :(

Screenshots from the elevator experience

Dining Table

This dining table celebrates both women's empowerment in a man's world; Zhang Yin dominates the paper industry, while Donatella Versace had to prove her ideas as equivalent or greater than her brother. The contrast of feminiety with masculinity is represented through the curvilinear table top that rises above the angular male foundation below. Women's potential are not restricted, and instead reach new levels of success.

Furthermore the two sides of the table are different, as according to the nature of both women's influence. Zhang's side is the lower, spiralling form, as its' cyclic nature symbolises how her power is derived from recycling paper ie. growing success from waste. It is unfinished, but i plan to have the spirals move downwards rather than being drawn in one flat plane.

Zhang Office & Elevator

Ok this is the rough idea and i will build on it later when i have time - i want the thick branches at the top to wrap entirely around the length of the bridge.

By incorporating oriental design and revealing a transition in the twisting structure from thin and weak, to thick and dominating, i desire to portray Zhang's growth from nothingness to power. The base represents her past of poverty and cultural inferiority, as a Chinese living in America. However at the top where the twisting structure is strong enough to support her office , it symbolises her current state of power due to wealth and Chinese dominance of industry.

The elevator is supposed to travel AROUND the twisted structure but for some reason i keep bumping into something and falling off...so it currently just travels in a linear fashion.

Again orientalism has been incorporated into the elevator base, where the cylindrical poles are supposed to resemble bamboo, another traditional chinese material.

Front View from afar

Back View, close-up

PS. To those looking and commenting on my blog, THANKS!!!!!! But it'll be nice if you told me your name so i can look at your work too....plus since so many of you are called anonymonous, i don't know if you're different or the same person haha

36 Movement Textures

I don't know what's with my blog settings, but you often can't see these images in an enlarged form....argh!!

SketchUp Tip

This is REALLy simple (and useful!) but i only learnt it recently from a Jeremy Harkins tutorial. If you draw a rectangular prism and hold down SHIFT, you can reference specific axis. Without this tool i frequently drew in between 3 planes rather than one, and so now i feel less frustrated and am more efficient, with SketchUp :)

...but many of you probably know this by now, since Russell has also repeated the tip in today's lecture

Elevator Experimentation

Even though i imported a custom texture, UT2004 still ended up designating one of its own...
Next time i develop this elevator, it will be of a much larger scale so as to actually connect the 2 spaces.

Elevator for Zhang Yin:

Her journey from poverty to wealth and power, is reflected through the growing tree that flourishes from dead roots. This tree metaphor also addresses her recycling of paper, so that the material is reborn. It is based on my original perspective drawing, except turned upside down.

Elevator for Donatella Versace

As her power originates from fashion - which i believe to be an unnecessary extravagence - this elevator system is flamboyant and visually impressive, rather than practical and efficient. It requires the user to travel in a loop, rather than immediately reach their destination. Furthermore i plan to develop the rooms between the elevators, as it enhances the idea of unnecessary indulgence as Versace will stop along the way for refreshments or rest or...

The elevator itself is like a giant stage, enforcing the idea of fashion trend-setters as always in the spotlight and needing to uphold perfect appearances. If i can attach lights to the 'mover', i can better convey this idea...

18 2-point Perspective Drawings

ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My entire design class misunderstood last week's task! We thought we were supposed to draw 6 1-point perspectives (correct!) and then another two perspectives of our model as 2-POINT-PERSPECTIVES!!

No wonder last week was such hard and confusing work...

I have also learnt to avoid drawing diagonals this time.

Screenshots of 1st Model

Original Perspective drawings:

Screenshots (i subtracted the space inside to make it work as an office):

Mash-Up

Ideas of power: consumerism, leader/trend-setter, wealth, regality, domination, persuasive, feminism

“I don’t wear the same thing a lot of times,” she said. “But so much time and work goes into making clothes. I want the clothes to be cared for like a forest, generation after generation.'"
Her companies take heaps of intense, solid swaths of color from the United States and Europe, ship it to China and recycle it into salacious looks, which must have prompted at least one fellow traveler to think that Barbie was on board.

After the clothes are thrown away, the cycle of daring lipstick feminism starts all over again. A great saleswoman and savvy deal maker, profit last year rose 349 percent to $175 million.

"My desire has always been to sell an experience in the clothes industry, concocting a new sex-symbol vocabulary with a bracing, modern edge. It's not about the fantastic colour, but what the fantastic colour can do for you.” She unveils Versace’s latest recycled clothes as if she were a particularly hip and plugged-in friend showing off inventions in your living room. Truth is, the sense of informality comes only after grueling hours of practice.”

“And One More Thing...Some day, I'd like to be known as the queen of purple baroque prints. It gives a kind of mystery, a coziness and sensuality in the evening.”

References: (Harvard Style)
Colman, D 2008, ‘Just a Few Favorite Indulgences ‘, New York Times, 23 March, accessed 5 May 2008, <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/23/fashion/23POSS.html>

Barboza, D 2007, ‘China's 'Queen of Trash' finds riches in waste paper’, International Herald Tribune, 15 January, accessed 5 May 2008, <http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/01/15/business/trash.php?page=2>

Gallo, C 2006, How to Wow 'Em Like Steve Jobs , BusinessWeek, accessed 5 May 2008, <http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/content/apr2006/sb20060406_865110.htm>

EXP 3: 18 Perspective drawings

Diagonals are HARD/impossible to draw!!!!!!!
Anyways the order of drawings are 1 point perspective, two 2 point perspectives repeated for 6 different models