CAFE 524524 N. Homewood Avenue
Pittsburgh, Pa
OVERVIEW
Cafe 524 is a design build project that I participated in over the course ofmy fourth and fifth year at CMU. The project started out as a participatory process between the students of the Urban Design Build program, the community members of Homewood, and the various community groups including the Homewood Children’s Villiage and the Urban Redevelopment Authority. Through this process we developed a specific site in Homewood to promote positive community growth by becoming a catalyst for future development. This process also revealed that the community needed a “third space,” first being home and second being work, which provided the people with somewhere to spend time away from these first two types of spaces. This drove the decision for this site to become a for-profit cafe space that focused on the needs of the community.
The design process began as an exploration into finding architectural strategies resolve some of the recurring problems with the current state of Homewood. In the early stages of the project our focus was on developing a
core and shell plan, being that there had not been a client who offered to run the cafe and we were only working with community feedback and the wants of the local community groups. After two plus months of designing without a client, the National Black MBA Association stepped up and offered to be our client, adding a new aspect to the design.
core and shell plan, being that there had not been a client who offered to run the cafe and we were only working with community feedback and the wants of the local community groups. After two plus months of designing without a client, the National Black MBA Association stepped up and offered to be our client, adding a new aspect to the design.
This project has since been accepted for several publications including the December 2010 issue of Architectural Record as well as a spot in the next Design Like You Give A Damn. It has also gone through a number of redesignsand has since been reduced to a single story cafe with the focus on an overall cost reduction.
The new plan included a for-profit cafe to provide the community with a “third space” and a business incubator poised to offer local entrepreneurs with an opportunity to new resources and new opportunities to help get their business off the ground. This new development immediately expanded our plans to add a second floor and to take over the space in the existing basement. It also added an extra challenge of combining these two very different programs in a way that meets the needs of both. Moreover, with a new client it was our responsibility to meet the needs of the client as well as weigh in on what is best for the community as a whole.
One of the main components of this design is the double glazed reconstituted glass wall that makes up the new enclosure on the south facade. It was important for us to make sure that this wall becomes an efficient system that relates to the human body and functions in harmony with the mechanical systems in the building. Over thecourse of the summer my primary task was to analyze how this wallcould function in relationship to lighting, ventilation, views, materials, furniture/ ergonomics, and constructability. Through this exploration I developed a series of drawings that explore these factors and allowed us to begin setting guidelines for how the opaque and transparent panels are laid out along the length of the wall. Light shelves, operable windows, and tempered glass are confined to specific zones based on related criteria.
The walls are both 90 feet long and approximately 12 feet tall. Each wall has been broken down into six smaller bays that relate back to the structure of the building. Each bay is laid out in relationship to the guidelines shown before as well as its relationship to the programmatic spaces.
There are two doors located along the length of the wall. The first door on the left is a large sliding door that would allow the tenant to open up a large portion of the wall for customers to enjoy an open air cafe.There are also five operable windows spread out along the length of the wall, allowing the tenant to increase the natural ventilation of the cafe space.
As a design build program, over the course of the spring semester and through to the end of the summer, myself and several other students took part in constructing mock-ups at full scale as well as completing the actualconstruction of the reconstituted glass wall. This experience was aniterative process which informed the final design of this wall and all of the relevant construction details. By the end of the summer, we had completed a number of full scale joint detail mock-ups, three or more full scale module mock-ups, one full scale bay mock-up, and a finished reconstituted glass wall, ready for installation.
Every piece of wood was taken through a process of planing and surfacing to ensure a high quality finish. The profiles of each piece were designed and milled to function as a complete wall system that sheds water and creates depth and variation over the entirewall surface. The assembly of each module, after the milling of the pieces, starts by assembling the outer frame of the module. This then allows you to begin laying out and attaching all of the interior universal(stud) pieces. After the entire frame of the module is assembled, the windows are then framed and inserted into their respective places within the module. Plywood panels are then cut and attached on oneside. Next, the cavity in each plywood frame is filled with insulation, and another piece of ply is placed on the exterior, closing off each opening. The module is then temporarily placed within the Laminated Veneer Lumber frames and trim is applied, finishing off the module.
