Freecell Architecture LLC finds it essential to engage physically with materials, methods, and structures to solve design problems. We consider the studio to be an open, as in FREE, organism, as in CELL, that absorbs, processes, and grows from outside influences and resources. We strive to make site-specific, three-dimensional constructs that transform and question the use and perception of space, and it is with this formula that we have created installations, designed residences, and fabricated furniture. Our standard is to offer thorough commitment, listen to your needs, respond with solutions, understand the budget, and act with timely efficiency. Our devotion comes from the love and satisfaction of completing projects.
Installations
Point to Line, University of Akron, Ohio, 2012
The installation is a frozen moment and a scheme for what is to come. Two out of a thousand paths are drawn in space. Movements of music, dance, and geometry are expressed as lines punctuated by points. These points are constructed of complex mirrored pieces of geometry that capture and reflect the sun from the skylight above.
The constructed pathways begin as a regularized hexagonal grid fit to the dimensions of the ribbed concrete wall of the original Guzzetta Hall. This construction provides a place for connection so the work can be hung. The two pathways reach from the concrete wall in a branched modulation, bending away from and towards new connection points. The work, generated with scripted geometry, is 23 feet high, 11 feet wide, and 10 feet deep. It is constructed out of aluminum tube, waterjet cut plate, and polished stainless steel reflectors.
Our interest in the work and our search for form comes from a desire to express movement and sound. We looked to Wassily Kandinsky's seminal text Point to Line to Plane to frame the work within a critical context.
Point to Line is installed in Guzzetta Hall in the School of Dance, Theater, and Arts Administration at The University of Akron and was funded by the Ohio Arts Council. Peter Dorsey helped Freecell with its development. A text on the project, in PDF format, is available HERE.
Lighthearted, Times Square, NYC, 2011
Can you imagine a heart in Times Square lifted and held by the communal spirit of people? The Times Square Alliance commissioned us to realize their 2011 Valentine, and thousands of people helped us lift the heart from February 10th to the 20th. Lighthearted was a ten-foot diameter lightweight construction with an open weave fabric that allowed wind to pass through, but still captured and reflected light. The frame was made of lightweight aluminum tube that formed curvilinear volumes in the top half of the lobe and a triangulated frame on the lower half. These lobes rotated about a ring that allowed the heart to transform from its closed DOWN position to an open UP position.
Without volunteers, the heart lays flat on the ground, looking more like a flower. But when the group lifted the structure it became a heart! This communal activity, with participants' arms lifting above their heads, encouraged short exchanges among strangers with the telling of names and hometowns. The space below the floating heart and encircled by the participants defined a new room that was within but separate from Times Square. Peter Dorsey assisted in the design of Lighthearted.
Cumulus, PS1 / MoMA Proposal, NYC, 2010
To be in and between, below and on, puffy formations of water vapor is as impossible as it is desirable. This experience is the intention behind Cumulus, a pneumatic installation of bulging volumes which squeeze and release space, allowing the adventurous to transform their sense of elevation and gravity.
Using resources wisely, the pneumatic structures achieve their mass with air powered by solar energy. In bright sunlight the clouds would be fully inflated, creating a firm bulbous volume and much desired shade. As the temperature rises, the clouds become heavy, letting loose a light rain through a system of sprayers. With the loss of sunlight or the presence of clouds, the volumes would decrease in air pressure and lose their rigidity. The shade canopy alters in form to become thin sheets draped across the tensile structure, suspended above.
As the sun sets and the evening arrives, the volumes become flaccid with air while light emitting diodes illuminate the volumes from within. In the main courtyard, the cloud formations crowd and loom to create a variety of places. In the smaller court the volumes lay low, creating clouds to rest and recline on. The shaping of the ground, both the ground itself and the changing canopy above, transforms one's sense of altitude and horizon, accentuating the feeling of being on top of a mountain within the plane of the clouds.
Stack to Fold, SFMOMA, San Francisco, 2008
Freecell was commissioned by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art to design and produce a piece for the exhibition entitled The Art of Participation: 1950 to Now at SFMOMA which was open from November 8, 2008, to February 8, 2009. Stack to Fold responds to our interest in issues of interpretation and function. It is constructed from corrugated cardboard sheets and consists of four flat patterns that, when folded, allow people to construct their own environment. The patterns are die-cut and printed with graphic illustrations to instruct the user during assembly. Museum visitors were invited to construct multiples of these four elements.
The primary elements can be combined in prescribed ways to create specific functional furniture, such as a bench or table. However, the objects, which consist of related geometric joints, can be connected in other combinations, as per the imagination of the participant. These interpreted assemblies will create abstract spatial situations in the gallery for visitors to occupy.
moistSCAPE, Henry Urbach Gallery, NYC, 2004
As an opportunity to explore the play of the natural within the artificial, we constructed a three-dimensional steel matrix inset with panels of living mosses and enclosed within by translucent volume. The matrix emerges from the walls and hovers over a groundscape of recycled rubber, which is as springy and giving underfoot as the mosses are to the touch of a hand.
The spatial configurations of these verdant planes vary in size, height and proximity to the visitor, thus creating a range of possible encounters. There is no designated path to follow, but instead present a space to explore where the underside is as telling as the topside. MoistSCAPE allows visitors to experience the play in scale from the miniature of the floating mossy landscape to the actual one of the installation as a whole. Exhibited at the Henry Urbach Gallery in New YorkNY, from June 1 to July 30, 2004.
Beneath, Artists Space, NYC, 2002
Volumes are set into a surface. This surface and its supporting structural system create various spaces and levels for participants to explore. A relationship of open space to its structure is exemplified; the simple sustained by the complex.
Use of the spaces, both within and beneath the constructed surface, is implied rather than explicit to encourage participants to imagine possible activities. Private and collective experiences are created through the proportion and location of the spaces. Beneath was commissioned by the Artists Space in New York NY and also exhibited at the BEB Gallery at the Rhode Island School of Design, Providence RI in 2002.
Interiors
Diesel Black Gold, 68 Greene St, NYC, 2011
We were asked by the stylist, Ryan Korban, to help realize his vision for the new Diesel Black Gold flagship store on Greene Street in Soho. We collaborated with him sourcing materials, making prototypes, and finding fabricators. The result was stunning retail interior that was featured in the Robb Report and WWD, among others. The interior was clad with gray suede panels, punctuated with polished aluminum monoliths, and accented with Macassar Ebony tables and brushed brass fixtures.
Worth Street Loft, NYC, 2010
This loft apartment is sited within a landmarked building that has its original windows and floor. Our design strategy was to open up the previously divided space and return it’s openness. When the large sliding pocket door is open, one can see through all five rear windows. This idea was pursued so that the breadth of the space is experienced from all the spaces of the apartment. The front section of the apartment is one space with many activities: cooking, eating, working, and relaxing. The challenge was to scale the details and zones, so that they functioned well together, as well as, read together as a whole. This project was realized in collaboration with the stylist, Ryan Korban, and architect, Lawrence Sassi.
Exhibitions / Events
Spontaneous Interventions, US Pavilion, Venice IT, 2012
This year, the US Pavilion at the 2012 Venice Architecture Biennale features an installation rather than a conventional exhibition of projects. It consists of a lively system of banners to present a collection of 124 actionable strategies aimed at bringing immediate improvements to the urban public realm. Freecell collaborated closely with communication design studio M-A-D, led by Erik Adigard and Patricia McShane, to design an enveloping environment that puts Spontaneous Interventions in a broader historical and cultural context. Freecell designed a kinetic system, employing banners, counterweights, and pulleys, in which the viewer needs to reach to pull information from the sky. M-A-D conceived of a timeline supergraphic that serves as a bold counterpoint to the banners.
We would like to thank Spedstudio of Venice IT, for its help in realizing this project.
Open House, Levittown NY, 2011
Why waste time and fuel driving to a chain grocery store to purchase globally shipped vegetables when you can walk a couple of blocks and get local fresh, organic vegetables instead? We reconsidered the primacy of the lawn and replaced grass with agriculture, creating a suburban farm that can grow hundreds of pounds of produce which can then be sold to the local community. In the backyard a greenhouse grows kale in the winter and sprouts seeds in the spring. Most of the yard becomes a farm on which large tracts of irrigated soil grow hundreds of plants.
This piece was exhibited as part of Open House, an excerpt of the project brief is below: Open House by Droog led by Diller Scofidio + Renfro is a movement in which suburban homeowners supplement their income and develop a new vocation by offering homemade services and facilities to the public. This new residential marketplace not only brings more capital and density to the neighborhood, but also increases social cohesion through service exchange.
DOT DOT DOT, Beaux Arts Ball, NYC, 2006
In 2006 the League asked Freecell to design the environment for the ball with the theme of DOT DOT DOT. Since the transformation would span only one evening, our desire was to find a system which provided stunning visual impact with minimal resources. The space, a 10,000 square foot warehouse on 126th Street, was vast and daunting, so the intervention had to have a potent effect. The raw space needed to satisfy the spatial requirements of the formal ball, including a dance floor, multiple bars, casual lounges, table sitting area, coat check, and pathways to connect them all.
For the 3000 square feet of programmed space, the floor was resurfaced to be smooth and gray with a neon orange stripe defining the edge. Inspired by the city's gridiron and building's columnar structure which give measure and scale to space, we chose to use a grid. For the remaining 7000 square feet, a 12 inch by 12 inch grid was established out of heavy cord, which ran just under the plane of the ceiling. A 14 foot string ran from the ceiling to the floor, and a single neon orange bead was tied at eye level. Tethered to the 40 columns of the space were vertical fluorescent lights with UV emitting black-light bulbs, causing all the beads to glow. The strings bounced and swayed as people moved through them; black light caused the beads and the myriad congregation of dot-themed outfits to glow.
OPEN, Van Alen Institute, NYC, 2003
For the exhibition OPEN: New Designs for Public Space, the space is enveloped with color, immersing gallery viewers into one clear spatial volume. We created a public lounge providing a new experience of known space by selectively reducing the existing visual information. The strategic elimination of the wood floor and emphasis of the building systems (sprinkler pipe and air duct patterns) references the infrastructure systems of the city: wrapping, weaving, and organizing. Displaying information and imagery, a billboard wraps the space, cantilevering from the wall and projecting around corners. The front window signage attracts people from the street, but on the inside its reverse text acknowledges the relationship of being a part of a larger collective. The exhibition was curated by Zoë Ryan and the studio, Flat, executed the graphic design.
June to October 2003, Van Alen Institute, New York NY
January to May 2005, National Building Museum, Washington DC
January to May 2006, C.A.F., Chicago IL
Ideas
Ground and City Adaptations, Publication, 2011
This book was prepared for a talk given by Freecell at Harvard's Graduate School of Design. It contains eleven urban and landscape projects to inspire the making of new ideas, not to exhibit solutions. It identifies strategies of invention. Ground and City Adaptations asks everyone to observe and change their surroundings, empowering individuals to design and fabricate. The projects presented are design reactions to perceived problems or untapped opportunities. Some are DIY solutions that can be realized in an afternoon, others would take years of negotiating and convincing civic agencies to adopt change. But both present latent solutions to everyday problems. The ideas presented are to form questions and to stimulate the development of solutions.
Our entry, EXPAND THE NARROWs, for the Institute for Urban Design's By The City / For the City competition was one of ten winners. A collection of all the entries is published in An Atlas of Possibility for the Future of New York.
Project Text: EXPAND THE NARROWs is a necessary connection between Staten Island and Brooklyn, hugging the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, and allowing symbiotic transportation of pedestrians, bicyclists, and automobiles between the two boroughs. More than just a route for movement, EXPAND THE NARROWs also connects The Greenway, New York City's vision to create new green spaces linked with pedestrian and bicycle pathways through all five boroughs. It is a park with ample space for stopping to relax, play, or enjoy the breathtaking views of New York City. EXPAND THE NARROWs does not compete with the bridge's current role as a roadway but realizes the original configuration that included pedestrian access across the waterway. This new structural strip is a bicycle path, running route, walkway, and park - a way to get across, but also a place to get away.
New Littles, Open Call Submission, WNYC, 2011
The Brian Lehrer Show and Andrew Beveridge of Social Explorer asked designers to create maps of New York’s diverse communities - areas of ethnic concentration you may not know about or are changing quickly. Our map attempts to represent the ethnic diversity throughout the five boroughs through architectural icons. We mapped the locations of twenty four ethnic groups in the city from the database provided by WNYC. The drawing uses the extrusion of each ethnic boundary to form a collection of building prototypes and monuments associated with each group. We depicted each ethnic neighborhood with its respective vernacular or contemporary architecture found in the home country. The buildings are color-coded and labeled with flags that can be read and identified in the key at the top of the map. In the process of drawing the map, the densities of groups begin to inform clusters of small ethnic structures. Entwining conditions pop up in and around the city as the Great Wall runs through the Greek Islands and around a bit of German modernism. With the explosion of groups at disparate parts of the city, paths connect structure to structure to identify a common ethnicity within the complex network that is New York. Below is the last segment of the multi-part show with an interview with John Hartmann:
A 24x18in copy of the map can be purchased for $20 at ZAZZLE, a Print-On-Demand service.
Objects
Custom Furniture, ongoing
We design and fabricate custom furniture for dedicated needs in specific industries. All the pieces above were produced for the fashion designer, Alexander Wang. Clean lines, monochromatic palette, and durable materials were the driving principles when creating this series. The collection includes worktables, desks, chairs, mirrors, lights, and display shelves.
Bookcave, Shortwave Bookstore, NYC, 2002
The Bookcave's form lifts off the floor and bends overhead out of sight. The structure is an armature of bent steel conduit, a trade material used to build exterior awning supports. The two foot wide modules can join to form bookcaves of varying lengths. The armature's shape creates the space by arching away from its supporting wall. The final bend near the floor, a place to sit and read, forms a bench padded with foam. These piece were installed in both the Manhattan and Brooklyn bookstores of Shortwave Books, a branch of the publisher Softskull Press.
Seat Storage
The needs of tight living spaces are met with a simple dual purpose form. In an attempt to satisfy both the temporary need for seating and the constant need for storage, nine stools act as covers for compartmentalized wall shelves. Personal objects can be stored in the voids within the glossy chamfered boxes, giving additional function to the hanging infrastructure. Measuring approximately 16 inches square, the stools have lacquered steel feet that lift them off the floor. The body of the stool sits flush against the wall-hung shelving when the feet are inserted into the corresponding grid of holes.
