For the last half of the semester we were split into groups to finish the interior design of the vance chavis library. I was in the stacks group and below is our final work.
So I'm trying to use my blog for more than just posting my studio projects. This semester I'm taking a Creative Non-fiction writing class and I love it! English was always my favorite subject in high school and I've always enjoyed writing. Taking this class is actually starting to churn some wheels in my head about what I'd like to do after I graduate...journalism?? maybe.
Our first assignment was to write about a memory we have and I decided to write about my car accident. I have this goal that someday I'm actually going to write a book about my car accident and incidents that came to follow...but we'll see if/when that happens. Let me know what you think!
It all started with a light, one single forbidden light. Then the spinning started, and the blood ran, and the bones popped, and the glass flew.
Open your eyes
Open your eyes
God if only I hadn’t opened my eyes. Eyes that saw blood, and death, and pain, and anger. Eyes that saw things I never knew existed.
With one light, I lost everything. I lost scholarships, security, and my ability to run and jump. With just one light, my eyes were blinded, and my bones were destroyed, and my skin was scarred, and my anger was released.
With just one light, I saw everything and felt nothing.
All my senses seemed to be intact except I couldn’t feel anything. I could taste the horrible mixture of blood and debris on my lips. I could hear him telling me to get out of the car, and I could hazily see my wrist bent in a way that was anything but natural, but yet I still felt nothing.
“Christyn Get out of the car” he said once again.
And I tried. I could hear my brain telling my legs get up and move your ass out of the car! But I could not move, I couldn’t feel anything.
“I can’t,” I told him. But by the horrible smell of burning oil I knew I had to. So I did the next best thing, I fell. What seemed like 20 feet later I found myself on a hard, uneven gravel surface. Shards of glass lay all around me and glistened off the stream of blood that was becoming a large river down the road. The next thing I knew I was on the grass in a man’s arms. He was interrogating me asking me questions like “What’s your name?” “What’s your mom’s number?” Then somewhere in the short distance I heard the most terrifying sound. A sound that would haunt me in my sleep in the months that were to follow. Somewhere a woman was screaming as if she had just lost her child or her lover. Her scream was like having an alarm clock wake you from the deepest sleep. Because all of a sudden the hazy screen that was covering my eyes was gone and I could clearly see.
If only I hadn’t opened my eyes. This is a decision that I would later come to regret in the months that followed. Ahead of me I could see that the river of blood was protruding from underneath a beautiful mess of curly hair that lay strewn across the road. The hair was attached to a head that should have been attached to a body. But instead they lay a couple inches apart.
Then I remembered him. All of a sudden a rush of panic and horror rushed to every vein in my body. I couldn’t see him anywhere and I couldn’t hear him. That’s when I started to scream. How I heard him I have no idea, but somewhere from the midst of the sirens in the distance and my own screams I heard him softly yell my name, “Christyn.” I looked to my right and saw his tall strong body so broken in a pool of his own blood. He was gripping his stomach tight and profusely vomiting blood. “Ryan, are you ok”…but there was no response. It was at that moment that I knew what it was like to loose everything you thought you knew.
The next moments passed so quickly that I wasn’t able to keep track of Ryan. All of a sudden EMT’s appeared like ants. They were poking and prodding different parts of my body like I was a fresh piece of food that someone had dropped on the floor and not bothered to pick up. I was given an IV on the spot and then they started to cut my clothes off. This seemed very strange to me as I was lying in the middle of the street. Never mind the fact that every EMT was a man.
“Why are you doing that?” I asked.
“Christyn, can you tell me what hurts?” One of them asked.
“Nothing” I responded. The man’s face turned from being slightly concerned to a nice mixture of complete surprise and horror.
“Christyn, can you wiggle your toes for me?” he asked. I told my brain to wiggle my toes, which in turn told my toes, but they weren’t having any of that. This is when I started to worry. Since I was in just my bra and underwear I could finally see why they looked so shocked when I told them I felt nothing. My left femur was penetrating out of my skin and both of my ankles were turned almost inside out. Shards of glass were sticking out of my arms and legs and I was covered in what I presumed to be my own blood.
“Holy shit” I said, “that does not look ok!” At this the EMT’s laughed which I found oddly inappropriate since I meant it in a oh no this is really, really bad kind of way.
Finally my mother arrived and I felt a sudden relief that someone I knew was there to yell at the men who were constantly staring at me. I know that’s their job and everything but when you’re 18 years old with size D boobs lying in the middle of the street, you start to feel a little uncomfortable. They decided that my injuries to were too major for the dinky little hospital we had in the town and instead life lioned me to Hershey Hospital. The entire time I lay there in a neck brace, almost completely naked, and the EMT was constantly yelling at me to keep awake. He didn’t understand that the reason I kept mumbling and trying to make conversation was to in fact keep myself awake.
I must have either fallen asleep or the adrenaline has prevented me from remembering the 15 minuets that passed from the time I got into the helicopter to the arrival at the hospital but, the next thing I remember was staring at a very bright light. Nurses appeared out of thin air and cut my bra and underwear off so that I was indeed completely naked. Apparently putting a sheet over me was too much to ask. The next thing that happened was horribly uncomfortable and extremely gross.
“Mam, I’m going to check your spinal cord, just try to relax” the nurse said. All of a sudden I felt everything. It started from the inner parts of my butthole, where the nurse had just shoved her fingers, and traveled to the broken bone in my right wrist, down to my femur that was penetrating my skin, around every big and tiny shard of glass that was cutting my skin, and finally to both my ankles that were shattered and turned in a million different pieces and ways.
In order to broaden our minds towards different types of libraries out there we did a precedent study on one local library in Greensboro, and one distant library. I chose to do the Central Library here in Greensboro and the Salt Lake City Public Library. Below is my research and diagrams that I created based on the info I could find for the libraries.
Salt Lake City Utah Public Library: Moshe Safdie, FAIA Lead Designer
Isaac Franco, AIA, Project Manager
Steve Crane, FAIA, Partner-in-charge
Jeanne Jackson, AIA, Project Architect
This semester my studio class is redesigning a local Library here in Greensboro, the Vance Chavis Library. In order to fully be able to design the building to fit the client and user's needs we first needed to understand the history of the building as well as what the current issues for with the building are. So we did a site analysis.
Haiti has the highest rates of infants under-five and maternal mortality in the Western hemisphere.
Approximately 1,000 children are working as messengers, spies and even soldiers for armed gangs in Port Au Prince.
As many as 2,000 children a year are trafficked to the Dominican Republic, often with their parents’ support.
19,000 children are living with HIV/Aids
15% of all children in Haiti are orphaned or abandoned
200,000 orphaned Haitian children live in institutions; the rest are fostered, live with relatives, or are street children
Most Orphanages act as a home and a school
Some Orphanages include:
Freedom House
H.O.P.E
A child’s hope foundation
Love and Grace-Petionville
Good Samaritan
Education
Haiti’s literacy rate of about 53 percent (55percent for males and 51 percent for females)
falls well below the 90 percent average literacy rate for Latin American and Caribbean countries
15,200 primary schools, of which 90% are non-public and managed by the communities, religious organizations or NGOs
The enrollment rate for primary school is 67%, of which less than 30% reach 6th grade.
Secondary Schools enroll 20% of eligible-age children
Only 11 Universities in Haiti
Cob
A building material consisting of clay, sand, straw,
water, and earth, similar to adobe. Cob is fireproof,
resistant to seismic activity, and inexpensive. It can be
used to create artistic, sculptural forms and has been
revived in recent years by the natural building and
sustainability movements.
Earth Berm
Earth is piled up against exterior walls and packed,
sloping down away from the house. The roof may,
or may not be, fully earth covered, and
windows/openings may occur on one or more
sides of the shelter
SOL Inc.’s solar lights are shining brightly all night long, expanding relief and recovery
efforts at several Port-au-Prince sites following the devastating earthquake on January 12,
2010. Solar lights donated by SOL Inc have already been installed at University Hospital,
International Airport, UN Logistics Base and Hotel Montana within days of the disaster for
quick, immediate and reliable illumination for victims and volunteers.
The first phase of SOL Inc.’s pledge to provide $300,000 in solar lights has been reached as
the company has manufactured and packaged over 130 solar light systems ready for
shipment. Although approximately 1/3 of the lights are already delivered or in transit to
the earthquake-ravaged nation, SOL Inc. is still seeking air cargo or ocean freight transportation
assistance for the remaining lights from FL to Haiti.
Site Plan
Exterior View
Floor Plan
Community/school area
Children Sleeping Area
lower level floor plan: Guest house
Perspective of Guest house
proposed solution for Water drainage
