Shih Yu-Lang Central Y: San Francisco, CA. UC Berkeley Arch 100B, Fall 2011
The Shih Yu-Lang Central Y is located in the Tenderloin of San Francisco, an area with one of the highest homeless and crime rates in the United States in 2011. The inhabitants are largely comprised of working-class people, seniors, youth, and families who use the Y as a place of recreation, exercise, after school study space, meeting hall, and social hub. With the 2008 economic meltdown, increasing lack of school funding, overall reduction in works and wages, and housing foreclusure crisis, the Y's function as a hybridized urban amenity becomes increasingly importent, as it will support, extend, and enrich the lives of these affordable housing residents.
My design for the Y stems from a preliminary formal analysis on the Tenderloin site and its adjacent neighborhoods. In the study, I diagrammed spatial "pockets" found in this neighborhood fabric and examined their properties and functions in relationship to their positions on the site. In the design of the Y, these "pockets" are transformed into the major programmatic spaces.
A living wall and semi transparent skin system, as inspired by Caxia Forum in Spain, serves as the central sustainable strategy and helps bringing nature and vital living into the building's interior. In relationship to the building's envelope, the green walls, which are composed of louver-like planter panels, make up the the interior "breathable" layer of the double membrane. And in relationship to the program pockets, the green walls act as semi-porous closure, allowing for open sight line, as well as filtering fresh clean air into the programmed spaces. Within the interstitial spaces in between the pockets, which largely comprise of transitional areas and lobby spaces, visitors can also experience the green wall visually. In different scenarios, the green wall may be facing lobby space, or hovering above an exercise area.