Scaffold Pavilion

The creation of the scaffold pavilion originated from a series of three consecutive actions—ducking, hopping and kicking---performed on a ubiquitous strip of scaffolding on a New York City sidewalk. Similar to Etienne Jules Marey’s work in chronophotography, a single image capturing the three human actions and the temporal transitions between them was created. A linear vector map was generated to quantify the body (head, feet and limbs) and the environment (scaffold and time) from start to finish of the action set. These lines were then used to generate the form, structure and envelope of a small pavilion.

Schematically, the scaffold pavilion can be broken into four main parts: a primary structure, a secondary structure, a skin condition, and a circulation system. The primary structure consists of a rectangular box-shaped frame to which the secondary structure of a tension rod scaffolding system is attached to. The scaffolding system supports the skin which consists of panels while the circulation pathways “punch” through these panels creating void passageways that weave up, down and across the pavilion. Moments of stasis are injected within the circulation program to provide places to sit and stand still---encouraging the user to stop and pause while traversing though the pavilion.


Master in Architecture at the Spitzer School of Architecture // Fall 2015