My darling girlfriend recently got into an amazing hobby, seed bead jewelry. She loves it because it very rewarding and relaxing, in a few hours she can create some fantastic hand-crafted pieces. All her friends love it and frequently ask her to make them some items.

While I was in need of re-registering this domain name I thought it might be exciting to have her showcase her work on a website and also have the ability to sell some jewelry to anyone who might want it. Even though Etsy it the premier digital place to sell hand-crafted art, sometimes its nice to have your own site to manage and alter anything at will.

Seed Bead Sam was the name she chose. Please visit, there are some great pieces on there!

As a former multi-term President and active member of Pi Sigma Chi Fraternity, I noticed the lack of collaboration and communication between the alumni and active members. We needed a common place to store and share our fraternity related business as well as showcase ourselves and what we do to the interested public.  We went through 4 revisions over approximately 7 years, and thankfully the last one stuck! I experimented with several CMS installations and finally settled on using Joomla. Our previous website designs were lacking coordination and the uniformity of a single login to access all aspect of the members area of the site. Joomla made this easy, but I spent months porting our member’s info and old content as well as creating some new.

This was a huge undertaking to create a website that potentially hundreds of my brothers would rely on to communicate with each other. Many aspects still need refining, but I have never created anything on this scale before and I am very proud of the results.

This webdesign project is to date the only one not active. I proposed this website for my company, Bricolage Designs, after I was put in charge of expediting their current website from the designer they hired. The company is Maria Galvis Design, and I believe my office should have taken the hint that they can not design websites if they would have visited the company’s site (which is non existent).

After nearly 2 years of “expediting this project” I decided to propose my own design using Joomla! and Shape5. Even though I wasn’t hired because my boss decided he was already too “invested” in their current site, it turned out to be a fun experience to test my creativity. I developed a semi-working version with example content in only 16hrs. Thanks Joomla!

Commissioned to design a website for an Ear/ Nose/Throat and Eye Doctor in Lawrenceville, NJ. Their goal was to keep a professional looking website by providing their existing customers with access to necessary forms while providing critical information and common symptoms to potential patients about ‘ENT’ and LASIK surgery.

This was a straightforward project with none of the web 2.0 frills we see all over the internet today. Designed strictly in HTML and CSS I worked directly on coding this project and creating all the necessary graphics (something I don’t  often do on CMS websites).

In order to define habitable space in a two-dimensional membrane my proposal incorporates rigid wires that act as a “movable force” on the intervened membrane. These forces are applied in three phases indicated on the diagrams below. The membrane was subsequently put under pressure by the wires and transformed the membrane into an apparatus (in a manner unique to the data I collected), whereby the forces could then be manipulated.

The notion of force being applied to an object was translated throughout this project. Forces were realized in the creation of the diagram, seeded into the apparatus, and later interpolated from the data mining from my site visits. The final model is the product of assembling three of the apparatuses with additional forces determined from the site in order to form an continuity between the parts.

Year: 2005
Semester: Summer
Class: Design
Professor: Philip Parker
Size: unknown
Program: This design project seeks to redefine conventional methods of construction as well as the process of thinking that leads to designing. Students were encouraged create a membrane by analyzing and reconfiguring the data found in researching a type of ecology into a composite lined diagram. This drawing was to be cut, scored, perforated, or dissected in any number of ways.

My proposal seeks the redevelopment of the Brooklyn House of Detention site as a hybrid of city service facilities, which include the consolidation of many of the Brooklyn administrative offices such as courtrooms, the redefined house of detentions, ground floor retail spaces, and an outdoor garden. By moving such offices, it will free up many new vacant lots for redevelopment and it would become a more efficient means of completing tasks by eliminating the “run-around” between departments which are currently great distances from one another.

This design is reminiscent of the original building in that it keeps the same structural grid. I extruded the “cross-shaped” plan to its extents and beyond into the vacant parking lot across Boreum Place with five (5) bridging gateway connections.

In short my proposal provides Atlantic Avenue, and Brooklyn, with a new “gateway” as well as being poised to strengthen productivity and strengthen interoffice involvement.

Year: 2005
Semester: Spring
Class: Design
Professor: Fred Biehle
Size: 400,000 sf
Program: This site is located on Atlantic Avenue between Boreum and Smith Streets. We were asked to develop a hybrid program on the site of the existing Brooklyn House of Detention. Students had the option of using the original structure, modifying it, or adding to it with valid reasoning.

In this studio I was required to design a museum to “fit” within the shell of an existing structure. In order to invade a pre-existing structure I felt it necessary to connect the new and the old with pre-existing systems.

This pre-war warehouse was bare and all that was left was the brick walls and cast iron hinges for doors and windows. Hinges are joints that permit motion in one directional plane. I found that every archway has hinges, these arches acted as portals that bridged the space between either side of the main load bearing wall. This will become the origin of my intervention.

Year: 2003
Semester: Summer
Class: Design
Professor: Anita Cooney
Size: 86,000 sf
Program: Issues to be addressed include; siting, circulation, structure, enclosure, building code and accessibility. The end product will be the fully integrated design of a museum.

The proposal to extend the use of the religious community and relocate the child daycare facilities would be best implemented above the vast parking lot. Therefore, the flow and direction of cars and pedestrians became important aspects. My attention was drawn to the geometry of the parking lot and the way it gathers and filters the traffic through the existing site.

Simultaneously, certain aspects of the church aided in my design process. The patron walks up twelve feet of sidewalk to enter the main level which greets you with a wide entrance. The circulatory path of the church gradually narrows to direct you into the gathering space.

I succeeded in proposing to merge the filtrating circulation of the church with the directionality of the parking lot. Through a series of circulatory diagrams and comparisons to paths existing on the site I proposed a design that contrasts the style of the church, yet keeps the same “flow” patrons are use to experiencing.

Year: 2004
Semester: Summer
Class: Design
Professor: Zehra Kuz
Size: 42,000 sf
Program: Assess site restrictions and guidelines
of the ever expanding Unitarian religious organization that needs more facilities both for the church and the nursery school occupying its basement. It is advisable to stay clear of the wetlands, incorporate sustainability, maximize parking, all while building under a height restriction of forty feet.

BOOKS are what a library is primarily designed to house, this design seeks to emphasize this. I found that even in a book we can find structure; the binding of a book is inherently rigid, however I focused my studies in structure by deforming the page of the book. I derived models by using techniques of tearing and adhering. These studies allowed me to experiment with form and apply program to its logical sections.

HORIZONTAL VS. VERTICAL is a methodology I derived from the studies of the book and the characteristics of tearing the pages up from a horizontal plane to a vertical plane. This thesis provided me with the asymmetrical design you see as a final proposal. By having the reading room and research be defined by the horizontal plane, while the stacks would be defined by the vertical plane.

Year: 2003
Semester: Fall
Class: Design
Professor: Erika Hinrichs
Size: 122,000 sf
Program: The second year design studio is intended to introduce the primary issues of “site” and “program.” The site is to be investigated as both a condition and as a specific context. The program will be researched as a concept as well as a utilitarian concern.

French architect Jean Nouvel recently unveiled a shining new LEED Certified skyscraper on 11th avenue in New York City. The building features a stunning facade composed of 1,700 different panes of glass and is described by the Pritzker Prize-winning architect as a “vision machine”. With apartments reaching from $1.6 million to $22 million, one wonders if New York really needs another green luxury building when there’s so much need for affordable housing. But nonetheless, 100 Eleventh Avenue is a stunning portrayal of what modern design can accomplish in a city like the Big Apple.

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Ocean levels are rising around the globe, so rather than tethering our buildings to the sinking shoreline why not suit them for a life at sea? That’s the approach behind the Water-Scraper, a futuristic self-sufficient floating city. A special mention in this year’s eVolo Skyscraper Competition, the design expands the concept of a floating island into a full-fledged underwater skyscraper that harvests renewable energy and grows its own food.

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In addition to causing widespread death and destruction, last week’s devastating earthquake in Chile may have shifted the Earth’s axis permanently and created shorter days, according to scientists at NASA. Based on calculations thus far, every day from now on should be 1.26 microseconds shorter. While the change probably won’t be affecting our daily schedules too much (a microsecond is a millionth of a second), it is unsettling to think about how much impact something as concentrated as an earthquake can have on the entire planet.

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Read the rest of Stunning Green Roofed Apartment Building Rises in Amsterdam

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This seems to be the year for green iPhone apps, with already over 100 to choose from, including TreeHugger’s own which was launched last month and the Green Map app launched recently. Now here is one for the biomimicry and architecture fans amongst you. Read the full story on TreeHugger

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This past Saturday, the world awoke to yet another horrific natural disaster, an 8.8 magnitude earthquake right off the coast of Chile near Concepcion. It’s only been 2 days since the deadly quake and the death toll has already risen to over 700. However in comparison, the Haiti earthquake (which measured 7.0 on the Richter scale) was 500 times less powerful than the one last Saturday but over 250,000 people were killed. Based on magnitude alone, the death toll from Chile should be much higher and the devastation much more complete – but that’s not the case. Chile can thank foresight and smart planning for that, and its situation is a testament to what a huge life-or-death difference smart building codes and well designed architecture can make.

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The biggest surprise from Volkswagen’s preview show on the eve of the Geneva Auto show was without a doubt the new plug-in electric hybrid Porsche concept car. Called the 918 Sypder, the stunning ride can allegedly get 78 miles per gallon, can go 16 miles on electric charge alone, and can do 0-60 in 3.2 seconds. …Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Nanotechnology is generally pursued by scientists and those involved with high-tech gadgetry, weapons, and medical devices, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be applied in other fields. Recently NYC-based Decker Yeardon became the first architecture firm to synthesize a thin sheet of carbon nanotube buckypaper, and they plan on utilizing the super-strong and lightweight material in future building projects. The miraculous material is 10 times lighter and 500 times stronger than steel, it can conduct both heat and electricity, and it can filter particles.

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Sloping towards the open sea, Oppenheim’s luxurious mixed-use tower for the United Arab Emirates is both elegant and a model of efficiency. If you look closely, the pixelated residences comprising the development sprawl fluidly away from the lush garden oasis hidden at its base and onto the sandy beach. The design was conceived specifically to maximize the quantity of units available on the water while minimizing the amount of energy used.

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Created by a guy named Neil Dawson, this sculpture is called Horizons and one of the neatest optical illusions I’ve seen today. Not to mention that it’s proof of my cartoon invasion theory. [The Grip]

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Studios Architecture has designed a new green office, meeting, and exhibition space that aspires to become a hub of sustainability in the Sacramento area. Dubbed the Earth’smart building, the center would be an ideal place for individuals to converge in order to discuss, plan and work towards increased sustainability in the fields of construction, public policy, industry, investment, design, and education.

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