Blog*

Graduation* 

To wrap up the DISC* 2024 program, we celebrated with food and drinks and family and friends in the Wurster Courtyard. We had a graduation ceremony to recognize each person who made up the wonderful cohort of 2024!

Final Proposals* 

Here are the final designs from five weeks of work. Practicing design skills of iteration and refinement, students edited their previous work considering how it would read as part of a set of drawings. In the end, each group had a cohesive set of drawings and a model that explained their process, overall design, and key elements of their design for Sea Level Rise Adaptation and Mitigation. 

Final Review* 

Students installed their final work in the Wurster Gallery and presented to invited guest critics. In addition to the exhibition and presentation of their final work, Studio Project Documentation was important for the DISC blog and student portfoslio.

Studio Work* 

During the last week of the program, students focused on completing their work for the final presentation and documentation. The  public presentation feedback at the Exploratorium and other presentation reviews throughout the program were the key to develop the final designs. By week five, the bulk of the work was done. Teams tasked with refinement of graphic content and practicing for the oral presentation.

Exploratorium Public Presentation* 

Utilizing Adobe Aero software, teams worked to create an Augmented Reality Installation. They presented these AR installations along with posters of their Urban Design proposals at a Public Exhibition on the San Francisco Embarcadero waterfront at the Exploratorium. The AR installation included updated Postcards from the Future, maps, and written content that show the viewer how the San Francisco waterfront might transform in the year 2124. Students shared their ideas and visions for a new waterfront with visitors and Exploratorium staff. 

Alumni Speaker Panel* 

On Tuesday we had a great Speaker Panel lead by three DISC Alumni students: Sebastian Xu, Mollye Liu and Yujin Cao. Here they shared their profesional career and post-DISC work. 

Studio Work* 

Week four focused on finalizing the Urban Design, creating compelling Architectural Drawings, and developing an Augmented Reality installation. Students worked as a team to finalize their Urban Design proposal, while finding opportunities to explore specific interests. 

Studio Review* 

Students presented their initial design concepts, discussed their process for landing on their chosen iteration, and established the logic of their design choices through their Resilience Strategy Toolkit.

Studio Work* 

Each team created an Urban Simulation Model to test various development strategies to determine scenarios and their outcomes, which affect stakeholders. They met with instructors to discuss the benefits and drawbacks of their iterations, and then using their knowledge from this week's Rhino and Illustrator tutorials, they digitized their initial design in an axonometric drawing.

Field Work*two

We began with a talk at Pier 1 from Adam Varat, Deputy Program Manager for the Planning and Waterfront Resilience Program. Pier 1 is the main government office of the Port of San Francisco. He lead students on a tour of the Embarcadero Waterfront, explaining the sea-level rise risk and adaptation measures being considered by the Port. 

After lunch, we continued at the Exploratorium’s Fisher Bay Observatory with host Emma Greenbaum, Project Director of Climate and Landscapes and Susan Schwartzenberg, Senior Artist and Curator. We learned about the historical San Francisco shoreline and ecologies, sifted through archival maps of the city and the Bay, and touched the textured tiles of the Living Seawall Pilot.

After playing with the Exploratorium exhibits on the way out, we concluded the fieldwork with a walk along the historic shoreline of San Francisco. Students referenced maps and photos that illustrate the changing shoreline, buried ships, and potential sea-level rise.

Studio Review* 

This week focused on generating ideas for their sites. Students studied a selected case study, analyzed its key moves and results,  and began to develop strategies and ideas for how to approach their own sites. They presented their Postcards from the Future and came up with imaginary stakeholders who could help guide their design decisions.

We discussed general trends and themes from the work so far, and the merits and drawbacks of the case studies they presented. 

Studio Work* 

After a digital lab session in Photoshop, each student crafted a Postcard from the Future, as a way to develop their Photoshop skills and to begin to think about their site speculatively. These postcards imagined how their studio site could look 100 years into the future and how the Embarcadero waterfront could change to adapt to sea-level rise. 

Field Work*one 

Students began with a visit to the Transbay Terminal Park (Salesforce Park), which is 70 feet above street level, runs the entire length of the four-block long Transit Center and is home to 600 trees and 16,000 plants. 

After lunch at the Ferry Building, students ventured into the San Francisco Bay on a ferry ride to Sausalito where we visited the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Bay Model, a working hydraulic scale model of the San Francisco Bay and Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta System.

Upon returning to San Francisco, Lidia D’Amico, a Wildlife Biologist and National Park Ranger at Alcatraz Island, spoke about the historical ecology of the bay, and the importance of birds in our ecosystems in the context of sea level rise. Then, in teams, students conducted a site analysis of San Francisco’s urban waterfront along the Embarcadero, documenting specific characteristics of the area through photography, sketching, and written notes.