Doesn't someone from Cranbrook have a model of the school?? you guys have probably CNC'd the campus by now.

[ps see you at the Wired event in April]

i would think that cranbrook had something, but they may or may not share with someone from your school. since it's a competition, sharing with one group could start a stampede...

hey, chili. any chance you might be interested in spreading the word about this?

I can and I will. I have some friends who live right by this place. Cranbrook gave us the site plan, and I contacted the company who built the model for Moneo when his addition was built and they said the only thing they had on CAD was the new addition, and they would have to get Rafael's permision to give that to me. I told them that I was sure Rafael was a busy man and not to bother him!

for you Chilli Davis - after getting person of the year from Time, now the Pantone color of the year. not bad.

You should have emailed Raphael and told him to ease up off the turn table graphics and show some love. Surprisingly I sure he spends most of his time on flights and departure lounges going through emails like yours.

Ah yes, 2006 was a good year indeed. I will have to add "Pantone Color of the Year" right below "Time Person of the Year" on my resume. I have to be the most over-qualified CAD monkey in the world.

Hey Chili, Did you find the drawings you needed? I called around campus a couple of months ago looking for some those drawings and in the end didn't find a damn thing. Maybe they've been lost on purpose so once a scheme is picked, they will have to bulldoze everything down and start over.

That could be one direction. Besides, who doesn't love bulldozers?

Hey Chili, I found these guys on the title block of a partial cad plan. Maybe they would be easier to deal with than Rafael?

Thanks ether, I'll give them a call.

Good lead, ether. I called the office, and they did in fact serve as architect of record on the Moneo addition. Unfortunately, Mr. Osler was out, so I sent him an email. Hopefully this will lead to something. Thanks again.

Hey Chili-
You might have luck checking with UDM's SOA. I know for a couple of years now they have been working on a project to recreate the entire Cranbrook Campus in 3d, to extreme detail, all furniture inside of the buildings and everything. I am not sure if they have done the Museum of Art and Library but it is worth a shot. When I was there last year we worked on the Cranbrook House, but I know that they had done more buidings in the past. A good contact if you need a name there is Wladek Fuchs. Good Luck.

Thanks titan. I see Wladek is still a professor at UDM, but the website doesn't have any contact information. Do you have an email address you wouldn't mind passing along? You can email, if you prefer.

search the facilty mailing addresses..... might take a minute to find through th site but i think they are listed at the top of the schools site

I contacted Wladek and I am waiting to hear from him. David W. Osler suggested I contact Jean-Claude Azar, who was the client representative for the Moneo addition, and a Cranbrook Architecture alum. I haven't been able to find any contact information yet. Does anyone from Cranbrook or otherwise have information for Mr. Azar?

i'll look into it and email you if i find anything.

Thanks ether, I appreciate the help.

I don't know how to get ahold of Jean-Claude, haven't seen him since the dedication of the Moneo building, but he is a total sweetheart and I'm sure would help you if you can track him down. Cranbrook Academy of Art admin office should have alumni info on him, especially since he did the Moneo work.

He's also brilliant, so try to talk to him for awhile if you can, you might get some cool and illuminating anecdotes out of him!

lb, I sent Jean-Claude an email. I will be calling him if I don't hear anything in a day or two. I'm still waiting to hear back from Wladek Fuchs as well. Even if Jean-Claude is unable to provide me with building information, his opinion on the renovation/expansion/demolition of the museum and library will be relevent both as an alumni and as a designer. I will also be talking with a few other instructors I have had who are Cranbrook alum, as well as my fiancee's thesis advisor, who is also an alum. If you, or ether, or any other Cranbrook students or alum would like to voice your opinion on what you think would be the proper handeling of this project, I would love to hear them as well!!! You can either post in the forum, or email me if you prefer. It is easy to formulate my ideas and opinions about what should happen, but I think it is more important to consider the opinions of those who lived and used the campus on a daily basis.

I think it's also important to mention Tod Williams, the architect of the natatorium, and another Cranbrook alum, will be one of the jurors for this competition.

seems to be a popular competition as we've been getting many phone calls from people wanting to come take tours and get info. i've been working on installing an exhibition in the museum for the last 3 weeks and almost everyday there is at least one group of students touring through taking pictures and taking notes.
ironically, no one in the cranbrook architecture studio right now is participating in the competition. However, i'm sure we're all very interested to see the results. do you know if the entries be posted online anywhere?

ok just read the competition poster... pretty good summary of the buildings.
i'll add some other little details that might be of interest... i hope thats legal. i figure if i post it in a public forum it gives the info somewhat equal access to all.

the museum is not cloth-covered plywood walls anymore, its gyp. board. Also downstairs in the library is the coveted thesis room... not sure why that was ommitted. the library conference room used to be the architecture studio back in the libeskind days and the first years of hoffman. The lighting grid in the museum ceiling is totally amazing but does not work anymore apparently. there is a small version of the same system that works in the stairwell of the painting dept., which is just west of the library but is always locked. the library and museum are connected under the peristyle/propylea with a set of double doors that are locked by key-card access. if it were not for essential museum security, the two buildings would truly be like one and that would be really incredible. The new museum at Washington University in by Fumihiko Maki (a cranbrook arch alum) also contains the library and museum in one building and is connected underground to the architecture studios, which is a similar ideal to what was originally envisioned for cranbrook.
I also work in the library, and the space is literally one large room. its glorious yet very modest. sometimes the touring architecture students are kind of loud in there and walk around like they own the place, which in that room is very distracting since its one big silent space for reading. all the furniture and lighting in there (except the new flouresents on top of the shelves) are designed by saarinen specifically for that room. the view out of the windows to the trees, sky and de Suvero sculpture are wonderful.
The stairwells in the library and museum are twins and both have a little angle to them in plan, the same angle which can be found throughout the campus... apparently its 7degrees. I don't think the description in the poster explained that the two axes that intersect at the libray/museum really connect several of the programmatically-unrelated parts of cranbrook. The axes are not really apparent unless you walk the length of them and really explore their changing elevations, though saarinen and williams/tsien did their best to make the axes more clear, the topography of the grounds really defines the experience of the axes. standing at that intersection is the only place where you can see both the Cranbrook House and the natatorium. There are many many more axes around campus, but most all of the others are skewed with the previously mentioned angle.
the museum really needs its own little woodshop to build platforms, pedestals, frames, and projector boxes. they currently use the central woodshop of the art academy which is close, but it would be nice to have one in-house. just room for the basics: table saw, chopsaw, material storage, tool storage, etc. thats more of a pragmatic thing, but maybe it helps.
the front desk in the museum was designed and built by andy and eric who graduated last year... that really has nothing to do with anything, i just think its cool that they did it.

good luck with the competition!

Very nice description, Doug. I miss it so much - the immediate hush of walking into the library is palpable.

Also, the arrangement in the library of a low shelf along one wall with soaring glass up above is key to the space and for me is an ideal "library" arrangement - and was very popular in many modern libraries to follow.

And another note on the twin stairwells: the one in the library is wood, while the one in the museum is a mirror but in stone - I'm momentarily spacing on the name of the stone, starts with a T - so seeing the two rendered in different materials is really beautiful.

travertine?

oh yes, that's correct... a kind blond wood panelling in the library, travertine in the museum.

hey guys, I'm doing the same Cranbrook competition and I'm also trying to find any 2D or 3D drawings of the campus. Anyone get anything so far?...I'll let you guys know if I find somthing.

No luck yet, I'll keep you posted as well. What school are you at?

Carleton University......Ottawa

Any trips to Cranbrook planned?

I visited the campus about 2 weeks ago. I recommend it if you haven't gone yet. The images of the buildings really don't give you a good sense of the scale of these buildings; they are much smaller then you might think. Overall, its a beautiful campus....make sure you check out the Williams/Tsien Natatorium, its a beautiful building.

It's practically in my back yard. Literally a 10 minute drive. I've mad about 4 trips since the competition kicked off, and I've been there numerous times previously. The Williams/Tsein Natatoriam was nice, but more importantly, Williams will be one of the jurors for the competition. There are a few Cranbrook alum floating around this site, so if you have questions, don't hesitate to ask. They are quite helpful!

Thank you doberman - yes, travertine. I've got this totally bizarre mental block on the word "travertine" - call it a dead zone in my brain. Every time I see the material travertine my brain says "terazzo" and I know that's not right but I can't summon travertine up from the grey matter.

So thank you. Back to Cranbrook, carry on. I'm very excited to see the results of this competition!

I have a travertine coffee table top. I think it came out of one of Marcel's houses. Steel tube base. My dogs love to stand on top of it,
so I have to bring the dolly into the house every now and then and hall it outside where I take a scrub brush, some soft scrub and a hose to clean it off.....so every time I see travertine.....I think of my table.....Hope this helps lb keep it straight.

hey, i'm doing the Cranbrook comp. too. I'm at Texas Tech, so visiting would be a little cost prohibitive for me. Is there anyone who can help me just get a good idea of the lay of the land? The people responsible for the topography of the class site model have the Moneo addition floating four feet above grade. Craziest cantileaver I've ever seen!

Also, if anyone has pictures of the buildings, and surrounding area, I would be eternally thankful!

I'm willing to share, just not too much. See my blog entry here for some pictures of the buildings and grounds. Also, Cranbrook has been more than helpful with providing us with CAD drawings. Good luck.

Chili- I am a CAA alumni '92 arch. and a friend/ fellow grad of Jean Claude. Unfortunatley we have lost touch over the years. Did you say you have his emaill address??

FYI Tod Williams is not a CAA alumni.

thanks.

I had a phone number, no email.

My studio is working on this competition as well... I assume that since it is well past when you posted this you probably already found some information, but I found some decent contour drawings in publications. I forget which magazines had it because it was some time ago, but if you search for Moneo you should be able to find them. Also I found old contours from Saarinen's Drawings but once again... don't know what magazine it was from. As long as your school has a decent magazine archive you should be able to find them.

Does anyone have an idea of how many people are working on this competition?

I am driving up there in a week from New Jersey, should be fun.

Note: My studio tried to contact Moneo and the Architect of Record as well... in English and Spanish, to no avail. Also tried calling the competition coordinator and no reply.

Is anyone interested in exchanging photographs of the school and school grounds. I visited Cranbrook sometime in Jan and took pictures of the academy.....but now that my concept/design is underway, I feel like I need some more shots of the school. Especially some perspective shots of the library & museum from all sides. The type of photographs you can actually place 'your' building into. Anyways, let me know if anyone is interested, this would save me a 18 hour drive to Cranbrook and back.

Thanks.

Hi guys. I'm from Auckland, New Zealand and my studio group is working on the Cranbrook competition. So far we're still unable to find contour maps of the site. The closest I have got to is a photo of Moneo's model in plan view. Chili you mentioned that Cranbrook has provided you with CAD drawings. Which department did you contact? Any help from you guys will be great! We are desprate for a contour plan :(

I will be returning to the campus this weekend to take more photos of the library and museum specifically.

Unfortunately, I was informed by a security officer that the use of tripods is not allowed, or else I would have some high quality HDR panoramics to share!

I don't remember off the top of my head who provided us with the contour map, but I will find that information out for you.

You can contact the Archive Office for a topography dwg.

Thanks Chili (Your photos are amazing!) and Laurem. I have emailed Cathy at the Cranbrook archives so hopefully I will hear from her soon.

stunning pix, chili. good work.

how's the project going, by the way?

quite right steven ward,
excellent pictures

Project is going well. Had a midterm crit a week and a half ago. Working on design development now. I think my design takes more of a risk than others in the class. I'm developing a more sacred area of the campus. For those of you familiar with the academy, one wing of my addition extends from the southern most point of the existing museum and bisects the Upper and Lower Grotto Lakes, terminating at the Greek Theatre. The other wing flanks the Triton Pools and is turing out to be a hybrid of the U of M Law Library Addition and Zaha's wave field. I'll try to post my midterm boards to my school blog this weekend.

Those pics were with the 2mp point and shoot. I'm taking the 8.0 mp DSLR this weekend so I'll have some better pictures to share next week. Also, I have contact information for someone who can grant permission to use a tripod. We'll see how that goes.

Just to let you guys know that I have got the contour map and received the CD in mail yesterday. Thanks for all the help~ Good luck with your projects :)

Is anyone having a problem with the size of the boards being too small?

Hello,

Knowlton School of Architecture (Ohio State University) has officially joined the competition quite late in the game but we're trying to catch up on work (quarter system doesn't work so well with competitions).

We're also trying to pull some resources and find either 2D or 3D drawings of the campus. I've followed most of the links above (photos, architects, archives). Does anyone have any resources that turned out any drawings of the campus? Theresa where did you get the contour map from?

We're driving up to Cranbrook on Monday (April 9). Once I get photos uploaded I'll post them on here as well.

thanks!

Hristina

The 1/32" = 1'-0" scale for the site plan is proving quite difficult for a 20" X 20" board. I have yet to resolve this issue. I was at Cranbrook the past couple of weekends and it's amazing how different the campus can look now that the snow is gone.