wesley

james

thompson

a

portfolio

of

architecture

Successful design can be found at the intersection of a profound idea and an elegant, efficient solution. As I begin the design process, I make conjectures about what a project wants to be, and I begin to distill them. My goal is that the process eventually reaches that one perfect moment where the set of parameters allows me to make obvious, almost inevitable, decisions; the kind of decisions where I step back and say, “It simply must be resolved this way.” That is the point when the process blossoms.

Since beginning my gratifying, yet arduous, journey through my architecture education, I have begun to see the world differently. It is a more informed view, a view that allows me to see objects and places and know that there is an inherent craft embedded in each. My intent is that this body of work is representative of great care, meaning, and elegance.

earthpulse 12

sequester 8

structures 24

detailing 26

stone+steel 16

UFS 4

travel sketches 28

photography 30

design projects

studio projects

frigid facility 20

Food production has always had a place in urban planning and land use, whether it occurred in the city or had some connection to more rural growing conditions. Urban Food Stimulus proposes that cities begin to think of urban agriculture as more of a system that engages multiple entities with the task of feeding its citizens, rather than simply trying to solve the problems with gardens only. The city becomes a machine for producing food, and just like any other machine, it contains many moving parts that must work well together. The project is a building in Northwest Portland that is a node for the collection, processing, storage, and sales of food produced specifically within the Urban Growth Boundary. The building does not only engage the food system in terms of tangible production, but it also becomes a highly transparent, intellectual and cultural node. It questions previous roles of disparate programs like food production, markets, city planning, and community invovlement, and it proposes that they can all exist in a common space.

urban food stimulus UndergraduateThesis Project

green roof study

food processinglecture space

sectional model component study

1. picking 2. delivery 3. processing + storage 4. public market

south elevation

The 2015 EXPO will take place in Milan, and its theme is “feeding the planet, energy for life.” The challenge of this studio was to consider what the U.S. pavilion could be. I began by thinking about the potential of capturing and using human kinetic energy. My scheme eventually evolved into a critique of the EXPO itself: with a theme so concerned with protecting the world’s resources, why are visitors expending so much energy to attend the event in the first place? And does this perhaps signal a paradigm shift in how our society views the EXPO?

My project proposes that visitors are separated, or sequestered, into respective paths depending on the method of transportation they used to arrive at the EXPO, which is representative of their individual carbon footprints. The partí became a series of ramps within a box, and the skin is a flexible membrane that undulates in a repeating pattern.

sequesterU.S. PavilionEXPO Milano 2015

kinetic energy collectionwith shock absorbers

below

above

relationship

partí

structure

ramps

skin

structure

plane

car

train

bike

walk

cba

skin

plan

entry popout box exit corner

conditions of the habitable wall

elevation

The Lyceum Fellowship is an annual student competition, and the design problem changes each year. For 2012, the challenge was to design a visitor’s center and artist retreat in the abandoned Wells-Lamson Quarry in Vermont. I chose to look closely at the effects of mining and quarrying processes as they relate to air quality and the production of acid rain.

My proposal is called Earthpulse: it is a device that measures the vital signs of the earth. Since 1990, when the EPA established the Acid Rain Program that capped industrial emissions, the acidity of the rain has decreased. But there is a lag in the habitats that are influenced by this rain, especially in an old quarry now filled with water. I’m proposing that this Earthpulse device measure the various levels in the water that directly affect the recovery of the habitat. The architectural implications of this are a roof that chnages depending on the water level, subdivided spaces for different art studios, and a surface that acts as both a roof and a platform.

EarthPulse Lyceum Fellowship Competition2012

pavilion section

the changing roofp

H le

vels

mic

roo

rgan

ism

gro

wth

heav

y m

etal

co

nten

t

chan

ge

in a

nnua

l wat

er le

vel

seismograph room

1985 SO2 emissons 2008 SO2 emissons

[Although the acidity of rainfall has decreased] “full recovery of New England’s ecosystems will take time...

It will be decades before we see ecosystems restored to their pre-industrial conditions.”

-Environmental Protection Agency

longitudinal section

stone+SteelA Comprehensive Addition toa Palladian Building

This was a project completed during a study abroad trip to Vicenza, Italy. The task was to re-design an addition to the town’s main basilica, which has a façade designed by Andrea Palladio. The program consisted of gallery spaces, an auditorium, and direct access into the basilica itself. The main focus of the project was the creation of a new piazza space, as well as detailed wall studies, asking questions about how the proposed façade would speak to that of Palladio.

My proposal was a steel structure that included a large atrium where the galleries would exist, as well as a façade made of small, stone louvers. The louvers would be adjusted between 0, 45, and 90 degrees, which would determine the wall’s composition.

auditoriumnew piazza piazza dei signori

cardo + decumanus

green space

water system

main basilica level

gallery level

longitudinal section site plan

panel size distribution

panel opacity based on program

main façade sectional study

piazza dei signori elevation

window wall

panel of stone louvers

frigid facilityCold Storage Facilityand Wetland Remediation

This design problem encompassed the design of a 300,000 SF cold storage facility near a protected wetland in West Eugene, Oregon. The current facility on the site (which the studio proposed to replace) handles large quantities of refrigerated and frozen food that is later distributed throughout the country. The professor intentionally kept this studio very diagrammatic so many ideas and systems could exist simultaneously.

My process focused on issues of truck traffic on site, solar orientation to maximize efficiency of freezers, and rainwater runoff issues to protect the wetland site. The buildings themselves consist of large trusses that span the freezer spaces, and each bay has access to trucks and train cars that are filled before distribution. In the latter part of the design phase, I looked into the embodied energy of food production and proposed a system of on-site food sales to lower this embodied energy.

sun

soil

plant farm

processing

shipping

cold storage

distribution

consumer

animal

concept models looking at form, variation, and site constraints

high embodied energy of current food system

concrete slab

drain below

truck dock

cold storage

train access

footing to bioswale

site amongwest eugene wetlands

bioswales on site

building response

w. 5th avenue

a-3 channel

terracing biosw

ales

paved truck exits

site section

site plan

Hanging By A ThreadA Steel Frame Market at an Urban Train Station

0 50 Feet

This project asked us to design a steel structure with an arc plan, exploring fundamental principles of support, span, and brace; and how each is manifested spatially. The result was a scheme that used cantilevered overhangs of different sizes that were all supported by steel cables connected to large masts.

Market Hall

structural design Both projects completed with fellow student, Christopher Smith

central space model top view

This project involved the design of a wood roof structure (on existing concrete walls) without using a horizontal tension chord spanning across the space. We implemented a stepped system where each cantilever relies on the one above and below for stability. Multiframe structrual analysis software was utilized to understand shear and moment forces.

Roof Truss

physical model of truss

initial load sketch

This course in building enclosures focused on two design detailing projects, and they consisted of both hand and computer drafted drawings. The first project (this page) was a heavy wood-frame entry with a window wall infill. It explored fundamental details such as window-wall-to-floor connection, roof eaves, and window jambs. The second project (facing page) was a steel structure with two main building wings: one finished with a terra cotta rainscreen, the other a window wall. I chose to design a double façade and explored it in an axonometric drawing. The end of the project focused on the performance of the sunshades on the east façade during a late summer morning when it received a lot of direct solar exposure.

details Enclosure Design and Performance Analysis

timber roof eave window wall section

window wall to opaque wall plan

shading performance

terra cotta rainscreendouble glass façade

terra cotta rainscreen parapetdouble glass

façade

travel sketchesItalySwitzerland

These sketches were completed during a study abroad trip to Vicenza, Italy. From our studio in Vicenza, we had short

excursions to Cinque Terre, Como, and several small towns in Southern Switzerland.

photographyItalyFrance U.S.

contact

thompson.wesleyj@gmail.com+01.775.846.2205