Hyde Park Mouldings

Summer Internship #1: Hyde Park Mouldings

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I had an amazing experience at Hyde Park! I loved my mentors Eduardo, John and everyone else that I worked with! I was amazed at how much I was able to learn in such a short time period. 

Throughout my time At Hyde Park Mouldings, I worked on various projects in the custom shop. The job of the custom shop was to work on custom pieces so that we could get a section done to make a rubber mould of it. Once we completed the project and had the rubber done, the mould would be sent to the casting shop where they would produce the pieces needed to complete the project. From there the pieces would be cleaned if they needed and shipped to wherever they needed to go. 

Under my pages link, Click on "Summer Internship" to see detailed descriptions of the projects that I worked on!

California Straw Bale Building Conference

I had the opportunity to go to California for 4 days on a school trip. We flew into LAX and went and stayed with Scott Nelson who is a good friend of ACBA. Scott owns his own company, Naturalwalls. Scott deals with all natural plasters and clays. 

Just look at that view! This is in Pasadena where we stayed with Scott Nelson and his family. 

From there we went to The gamble house for a quick visit. Th house was built in 1908. this house was built by Charles and Henry Greene in Pasadena. It shows a rest deal of craftsmanship in all of the trades! 

We then stopped at Pasadena City Hall.  I loved how intricate and decorative this building is. It was very unique and beautiful! 

On our way to the conference, we stopped at the Getty Villa. This museum was absolutely amazing!  There was so much detail on the building itself and also in the artifacts what were found. It was interesting seeing how they incorporated the artifacts into the villa. 

My favorite part of the Getty Villa was  the porch ceiling. I loved the contrast of the gold and light blue. There were many different patterns of the gold flowers. The ceiling seemed to flow very well. It brought the porch together and made it complete. 

And finally! We got to the conference! I didn't get nearly enough pictures at the conference but it was mostly meeting people, eating, drinking and lectures on various topics relating to straw bale building. I learned so much about natural buildings and especially straw bale building! I met many people from so many different backgrounds. Some were builders, some were architects, some were just interested in building their own homes, some were looking for a new career and Jackie and I were the only students. Throughout the two days, I went to many lectures Professor Webb gave some great lectures on plaster and building materials. Among those i went to some relating to natural building materials, how to fix straw bale built problems , how to improve foundations, and many many more. I see straw bale building in my future. Economically, it makes so much sense. There are so many great benefits from it that I don't see why more people don't use this technique. 

       

On our way back to pasadena, We stopped here! What a beautiful sight! 

We stopped to see Steve Shriver a good friend of Patrick Webb and ACBA. Steve showed us all of his latest projects and told us about his history and how he became an artists. I loved meeting Steve and seeing all of his work! Looking at it truly makes a thought come into mind. All of his paintings have a message and just by looking at a single painting it brings out so much emotion. 

Here, Steve is showing the ideal proportions of a face. The human face is divided into 4 equal horizontal parts and 5 vertical parts.  

After meeting with Steve, we visited with another friend, Teale Hatheway.  Teals paints abstract architectural portraits. Teale worked on a very large project this spring. She designed and painted 53 Tee pees for Coachella.


Although this looks like a painting, it is a real picture. This is showing her 53 Tee Pees with the mountain range in the background. I loved meeting Teale! She has such a free spirit and her paintings reflect that! She has no limits but also she knows how to keep it in control and appealing to the eye. 

We ended the trip with a perfect Venice Beach sunset. watching the surfers and the sun go down at the same time was magical! It truly makes you feel apart of something greater than life! I had a great time in California and i learned to much! I met many people who hopefully will be in my future! I have to much to learn and so many people that are willing to teach me. 

Pointing is Perfection

Pointing is the act of filling the joint in plaster pieces. In order to connect the pieces to look like one continuous segment, the joint needs to be clean and perfectly matched up. There are many different steps to pointing. When pointing, it is best to use a material that is easily workable that doesn't dry out too fast. This is referred to a "retarded" mixture. To create it, you use a special mixture of water and rabbit skin so create a pasty texture. The rabbit skin allows the plaster to be workable for a longer amount of time. 

The first step is making a surface to apply your plaster to. We made a temporary board just for practice. We screwed a piece of sheet rock to some plywood for support. 

We choose our piece that we wanted to practice on and using a saw we cut it so we had 3 pieces. One piece with 2 straight edges and the other two pieces had 45° angles. The pieces had to be lined up so that we could mark the board for guidance once we took off our pieces to apply the plaster. 

Its important to scratch up any of the edges that will have plaster on them. This helps the plaster have something to stick to and make the pieces hold together better. Once all the edges are "roughed up", they need to be submerged into water so that the dry plaster doesn't pull all of the moisture out of the wet plaster too quickly to be worked. 

The next step is to apply a thin layer of plaster onto the plaster  piece. This layer should be evenly spread about 1/8 of an inch. After that, it can be applied to the board and the excess plaster can be cleaned from the edge. For applying the next piece, not only the bottom needs buttered, but also the edge where the joints are going to match up. The joint between the pieces should be around 1/4 inch which is marked when the pieces are laid out in place. It is important to make sure all of the surfaces of the pieces line up and are level before the plaster dries. 

Once everything is lined up and even, you can start the actual pointing process.  The plaster mix dries quickly so before applying more you have to spray the joints so it doesn't pull all of the moisture out too quickly. Once the water is completely soaked up, you can apply the plaster mix on the joint using precision tools and smoothly peeling it off using a "scraper" as shown above. 

This is me using my tool to scrape off the excess plaster.  This scraper has an extremely fine straight edge and is easy for scraping off unwanted material. You repeat this step normally 3 times or until the joint is completely smooth and invisible. 

Fort Dorchester Plan

For our Fort Dorchester project, we created a detailed proposal layout to present to the park officers were working with. 

This is the plan view of the lot that we are proposing. These are the foundations that the archaeologists found below the ground. We are going to elevate them to show what would have been there. 

This is our interpretation of the entryway. We had to  change the plans from what was found in the ground to adjust to what we think the doorway would have been. The bottom drawings are the views of the fireplace. 

The Real Deal

For the past few weeks, we have been practicing bricklaying and learning the techniques to it. We would build a section of a wall then break it down so we could reuse the bricks for practice. This time we are building a permanent structure. On the walls that we previously capped of with slate, we are continuing to build them up to make it an amphitheater shape with each level rising.

We started by building up the corners so we could run our string line for the center portion. 

This is my section of the wall. After setting up the corners, I was able to build the center up and then I laid my brick according to those corners. 

This is the corner that I built based on the brick below. 

Here, I am working on the infill structure. The bricks are dirty because they are the ones we practiced with and they will be covered so no one will see them. We will be building along the other side for our mid-term exam for the class. 

The Corinthian Order

The Corinthian is stated to be the most ornate of the orders, characterized by slender fluted columns and elaborate capitals decorated with acanthus leaves and scrolls. The Corinthian order is the last chronologically of the three principal classical orders of ancient Greek and Roman architecture. The other two are the Doric Order which was the earliest, followed by the Ionic Order.

For Drawing and drafting, we drew this column on frosted mylar paper with micron ink pens. 

This is the final Product. It has over 20 hours of work in it and the real challenge was waiting for the ink to dry before moving to another section of the column to keep from smearing.

This is a close up showing the detail of the ink. The idea was to focus on shade and shadow using ink lines.  

The Wentworth Mansion

Completed in 1886, The Wentworth Mansion was built for a wealthy cotton merchant and his family. Built in second empire style, this elegant mansion is nearly 24,000 sq. ft. and has 4 stories. For Architecture in Society 102, we had a private tour through the mansion. I loved seeing all the different trades fit perfectly in one structure.

The elegant plaster ceilings were different in each room and designed specifically for the purpose of the room. 

A close-up of the ceiling in the master bedroom. 

Trim going up the stairwell. 

A view out of the third floor guest bedroom. 

The winding staircase leading to the roof section. This staircase is original and it made of hand forged iron.  

ACBA class of 2017.