Current population of Thekla: 3

Sam, Katy and Amir

Come along and get involved in our project on the 16th of October and become a Theklian!

Cities and the Sky By Italo Calvino

Those who arrive at Thekla can see little of the city, beyond the plank fences, the sackcloth screens, the scaffoldings, the metal armatures, the wooden catwalks hanging from ropes or supported by sawhorses, the ladders, the trestles. If you ask "Why is Thekla's construction taking such a long time?" the inhabitants continue hoisting sacks, lowering leaded strings, moving long brushes up and down, as they answer "So that it's destruction cannot begin." And if asked whether they fear that, once the scaffoldings are removed, the city may begin to crumble and fall to pieces, they add hastily, in a whisper, "Not only the city."

If, dissatisfied with the answers, someone puts his eye to a crack in a fence, he sees cranes pulling up other cranes, scaffoldings that embrace other scaffoldings, beams that prop up other beams. "What meaning does your construction have?" he asks. "What is the aim of a city under construction unless it is a city? Where is the plan you are following, the blueprint?" "We will show it to you as soon as the working day is over; we cannot interrupt our work now," they answer.

Work stops at sunset. Darkness falls over the building site. The sky is filled with stars. "There is the blueprint," they say.

About Me

Sky-rise Cities is a competition run by the University of Auckland School of Architecture which requires groups of 2 or 3 to build a skyrise with a minimum height of 8 meters. We previously had a space of 2.5m by 2.5m to build in but this has been reduced to 2m by 2m. The structure must be self supporting and can not be propped up, hung or supported by another structure. Our brief was to find a story and convey our interpretation of that story through a structure.Our idea for the Skyrise Cities project is based on the story "Cities and the Sky" by Italo Calvino.

Sunday, October 3, 2010

End of week update

This week has been very busy! We have cut all our bamboo to size and have painted all of it black. We have recieved our glow sticks and will be picking up our material tomorrow. This material will be used to create darker amd more lighter areas in our strcuture by layering. We had to complete our safety plan this week. This had to include how we intend to transport our structure to the exhibition space and how we plan to erect it. We also had to think about the hazards of our project and how we will go about minimizing these hazards.

Hazards include:

Tripping : We have a 20cm step up onto our structure. We plan to bring this to everybody's attention if they wish to enter our structure.

High heels: High heels may be dangerous to wear in our strcuture as the floor is made of bamboo and will be slightly uneven. Flat shoes are a must.

Offset : To make the structure possible the bamboo has an offset to allow for binding. This is not unusual for bamboo structures but may catch people by surprise if the walk close to the structure.

Binding: The structure will be bound using traditional techniques.Cable ties will be used to further support the binding and keep the bamboo from splitting.

Bracing: The structure has a significant number of cross bracings to avoid warping.

We think we will use a flatbed deck trailer to transport our structure. The trailer is 4m  in length and 2.2m wide! This will be a perfect fit for our modules.
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