PURPOSE

Question the relationship between industrial standardized building material and organic material in the present time when concrete jungles are sprawling on the land.

Our goal is to allow nature to appear and break the traditional boundary that we humans created, separating ourselves from nature.  

EXPLORATION

The physical exploration of many ways created the possibility of a stair, mainly in an abstract way.

We used found materials like paper clips, straws, styrofoam, pine cones, leaves, etc., to test the different effects and search for new opportunities creating a stair.

INSPIRATION

The styrofoam model gave us inspiration on how to transfer water from a higher point to a lower point through gravity, and it allows two paths for non-human and human.

The pine cone model has the potential of capturing water and becoming a filtered element.

Both models are in modular forms and their function relies heavily on gravity.

IDEATION

With the two chosen models as the initial inspiration, we started doing rapid-modeling as the ideation by deconstructing and reconstructing the styrofoam and pine cones.

The left focuses on the movement and space of water flowing.

The right tackles the way to filter and purify water with several different modular forms.

At this phase, the two models still look similar to their origins. We also discussed back and forth to find a way of consistently merging them.

DEVELOPMENT

Parts of the two models were printed out for conducting the exploration and testing to find the best way of combining each other,

such as attaching the cones on the wall or the handle? Should we move the troughs for water from the side of the handrail to the side of the wall? etc.

SIMPLIFICATION

Two forms were simplified in the end, especially the cones, to have the same design language.

The shape of the cones became geometric, stacking with each other like waves.

The troughs were moved to the other side of the staircase, becoming the connecting bridge of treads for humans and the filtering system water.

FINAL CONCEPT

Merged the treads with the wall system, to integrate everything together in a whole form that presents the flow of the system.

The water capturing module was resized larger to contain bags of crushed oyster shells for water filtration.

The surface of the water trough is slanted at an angle, the detail indicates its difference with the walkable surface.

It creates a contrary flow to blur the boundary between humans and water, forming harmony with the movement of humans walking up and down.

MODELING & RENDERING

The project is named Karst, from Karst terrain, which is famous for solutional caves, with its cave form and the process that acid rain can act with the crushed oyster shell.

The shells composed of calcium carbonate can react with acid rain saturated with carbon dioxide to form the soluble calcium bicarbonate.

This reaction can reduce ocean acidification by absorbing carbon dioxide.

The water containing dissolved bicarbonates can contribute an alkaline (High pH) source as an antacid to help neutralize acidified ocean.

The left side of the stair is designed for humans, each tread extends to gradually become the trough and cliff for water.

The rainwater drips from the cone pockets with bags of crushed oyster shells.

After the filtration, it trickles down on the cliff and flows through the troughs.

SCHEME

Each water filter module is filled with bags of crushed oyster shells.

Potentially, this system can be inserted into every sliced unit along the island.

It is a filter system that can blur the boundary between humans and nature on Governors Island.

In the end, the filtered water can return to the harbor and benefit the island.

EXHIBITION