Preliminary
Design:
Site Location:
This project was to build a non-denominational chapel on the SUNY Farmingdale campus that integrated some of the contextual systems from the school and that it fit in. The schools campus is oriented at a 45 degree angle from north. This is seen throughout the campus and since the chapel wasnt going to be the most important building on campus, I decided to keep this system in the chapel are have it face at 45 degree too. For choosing the location of my site, I followed the system that was in place by the uses of building, which shows that educational buildings are to the north of the campus and student life buildings are to the south. Because of this, my site is located towards the south of the campus. Also, to show a symbolic representation of state and church, the chapel is located across the way from Lupton Hall, and are separated by the great lawn.
Building:
Because of the orientation of the campus on a 45 degree angle to north, I decided to make the main part of my lobby face in the same angle. The hard part about designing the building was that although the entire campus faced at a 45 degree angle, that did not optimize the light from the sun and I would have to design the chapels to capture as much sunlight as possible. The solution was to have the main sanctuary and meditation chapel face map south, and also have their methods of capturing light face south so that they would capture as much sunlight as possible. Then the building itself has a simple circulation spine that has an entrance from the main walkway into the lobby. From there, it enters the main sanctuary which has a pathway along its side that take you to the other two sanctuary. Also, it has a branch that turns into a hallway leading into all the offices and libraries and ends in the conference room. The hierarchy of the building is that the most important part of the building is the main sanctuary, standing over 25 feet tall. Then, the second most important space is the meditation chapel with a height of 15 feet. Both of these spaces are more accented by being oriented map south, while the rest of the building and its spaces being oriented at the 45 degree angle provided by the campus.
Inspiration:
My inspiration for the main sanctuary and for a way to capture sunlight was the Sydney Opera House. I was amazed by its shape and overall greatness and wanted to have that same feeling in my sanctuary.
Jose Solorzano