building updates

Third floor studios launch redesign this fall

Anonymous — Mon, 26 Aug 2024 19:27:26 +0000

Third floor studios launch redesign this fall Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 08/26/2024 - 13:27

Sierra Brown

For generations of design students at CU Boulder, the third floor of the Environmental Design building was more than just a workspace – it was a canvas for creativity and community. Alumni speak fondly of the infamous “carpet garden,” a lounge-like area that once held floor-to-wall carpets. They reminisce about working late into the night with friends, materials and designs spread across the rickety drafting tables. ENVD’s third floor always seemed to be a space that encapsulated the creativity and rigor of design students.

This summer marks another iteration of third floor updates and while there may not be a wall of carpet addition, the third floor will be, in many ways, student-oriented once again.

Assistant Teaching Professor Jared Arp and Creative Labs Center Coordinator Kiera Cudmore spent much of the summer redesigning the remaining third floor studios while constructing new study spots, maker spaces and lounge seating on the western side of the building. “Before, there was just no space to study or gather,” Arp explained. “People would crowd around the stairway, sit in the lobby or take over empty studios. It just wasn’t working.”

Once filled with crooked bar stools and crowded drafting tables, the third floor is now home to a newly furnished and carpeted student lounge area complete with plushy chairs and dangling lamps. After students finish their naps, they can head next door to the cubicle-like worktables in the newly designated student study space. Constructed from old drafting desks, the cubicles offer private, secluded pods for those late-night study sessions.

“It’ll be really nice just to open up the space a bit more,” Arp said. “It’ll help increase the movement within these rather confined spaces.”

The studios, which, according to student feedback, were notoriously loud and overcrowded, have now been entirely refurbished and rearranged. Each space is equipped with repurposed tables and seating, new shelving, TV monitors, fabric partitions for noise control and ample open space for review and pin-ups.

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Summer independent study redesigns central ENVD space

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Aug 2023 22:06:28 +0000

Summer independent study redesigns central ENVD space Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 08/28/2023 - 16:06

Sierra Brown

A central conference room in the Environmental Design building, typically referenced as ENVD 134A, has been reimagined, redesigned and repurposed. While it will still serve as a supplemental meeting space, its new main objective will be to safely and securely hold materials, not humans. “We have hundreds, maybe thousands of building samples, and they’re all spread out in offices, out in CINC, behind jammed doors,” Marcel de Lange, ENVD teaching professor explained. “We asked ourselves, what can we do with it?” For de Lange and Jared Arp, ENVD teaching assistant professor and co-lead on the project, the solution was simple: create a centralized and accessible materials library in an already centralized and accessible room.

The space will function less as a typical reference library and more as an experiential space. “It’s supposed to be exploratory,” Andrew Song, senior in product design commented. “It’s something we’ve been missing in this program. We don't often have access to physical examples of things we could use to build with.”

Such material examples include natural, metal and synthetic objects as well as building systems (such as small wall sections and joinery) so that students could visualize how these materials function in practice. The library will also contain a thorough reference section containing relevant design books and magazines, many of which were donated from local design firms. “All of our projects start with precedent research so this will be a nice area to do that,” Madison Svoboda, another senior in product design also working on the space said.

As part of an independent study course, the students working on the project have spent the summer retrofitting ENVD 134A: installing new carpet tiles to mitigate sound reflection, adding updated lighting systems and constructing floor-to-ceiling shelving units built to accommodate and showcase the variety of design materials. “We found a couple of ENVD students that wanted to take this on as an independent study because they felt like they were missing some of the hands-on design build type of experience,” de Lange explained. “Under our supervision, they conceived most of the things, got some critical feedback from us and now they’re putting it together.”

Much like the synergetic process behind the project itself, the finished library is meant to be a space for collaboration. With shelves set aside to highlight both student work and design displays, the hope is that the room will be fully accessible to faculty and students of all majors to share resources, access unique materials and find inspiration. “For the foreseeable future, it’s about going in and finding things that you didn’t even know existed,” Arp said.

Design Contributors

Faculty Leads: Marcel de Lange, Jared Arp

Independent Study Students: Colleen Lilley, Andrew Song, Madison Svoboda

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Studio redesigns take place in basement, third floor studios

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Aug 2023 19:51:14 +0000

Studio redesigns take place in basement, third floor studios Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 08/28/2023 - 13:51

Sierra Brown

The Environmental Design (ENVD) building is an eerily quiet place in the summer. With barren studios, empty hallways, and dormant 3D printers, the student and faculty spaces in the building often resemble a ghost town. Unlike a ghost town, however, the old worktables and rickety studio stools haven’t been left behind to gather dust and rust. Rather, this ghost town underwent a redesign.

Over the summer, a hard-working group of faculty, staff and students spent months updating studio spaces in both the basement and eastern wing of the third floor. After collaborating on studio update projects last summer, Marcel de Lange, teaching professor, and Jared Arp, teaching assistant professor, hoped to continue the momentum this year by tackling adjacent studio spaces in dire need of updates.

“Why in the 21st century are incoming students sitting on a barstool on some kind of drafting desk that doesn’t even hold your computer?” de Lange questioned. “Why not mimic a little bit more the way that most design agencies work?”

Updating student spaces to mimic professional offices, however, isn’t exactly the most affordable endeavor. According to de Lange, a new worktable alone would cost the program $2,000 each. And with fall 2023 marking the largest incoming class for ENVD, there is a demand to expand the number of students per studio, which means more tables. “There’s a budget available but it’s not enough to do that. We decided we could do it in-house,” de Lange said.

Staff and student workers at the Center for Innovation & Creativity (CINC) began the in-house project by collectively constructing 40 custom-made tables matched with repurposed and ergonomic office chairs. With a laser-cut steel frame, wooden tops and legs cut by a CNC machine and built-in power outlets (one for each student), the tables are designed to be sturdy, long-lasting, portable and ADA accessible. They’ll also encourage collaboration.

“The old space didn't really foster creativity or teamwork,” Arp noted. “You had your own desk, your own island. This way students will be working at tables with others.”

True to ENVD’s values, the team carried out the project with environmental sustainability in mind. Recycling and reusing pieces of the old furniture was key to the project. Old table legs were converted into light fixtures, wooden pieces from the old drafting desks were added to the new tables, shelving systems with added cubbies were constructed from outdated shelving materials and CINC scraps. “Those sorts of things have been worked into the project,” Jared noted. “One for budget purposes and two because it’s the right thing to do so we don’t waste this material. The types of materials that were chosen are low environmental impact, high longevity and strength.”

By updating the studio spaces to mimic design agencies while using a sustainable approach, incoming and current students will be better prepared to work in a professional setting after graduation. Apparently, even ghost towns need their building updates.

Over the summer, a hard-working group of faculty, staff and students spent months updating studio spaces in both the basement and eastern wing of the third floor.

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Digital Media Center, Creative Labs Center move to service model

Anonymous — Tue, 08 Sep 2020 17:42:31 +0000

Digital Media Center, Creative Labs Center move to service model Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 09/08/2020 - 11:42

The Digital Media Center and Creative Labs Center will operate and assist students through a web-based and in-person service model, during the fall 2020 semester. Students will not have direct access to the fabrication labs, photography studio, select scanners and smaller checkout items. Students will have access to the makerspace area in CINC 152. Both labs will adhere to university social distancing and safety guidelines and expect students that use the space do the same.

Students can reserve a makerspace tables on the online reservation system, which is similar to the one used for reserving time for the laser cutter. Faculty can also reserve studio and conferencing space located in the ENVD building and CLC in the ENVD program Outlook calendar.

Students can access links for assistance with file setup and file submissions on the Facilities & Resources ENVD webpage. The quality of submission files will be key to the success of the new service model.

Both centers have several student assistants ready to help students with software questions. Help can be requested through the public channels on the ENVD-CLC-DMC Microsoft Team. Students can connect with DMC and CLC between 9:00 a.m. - 9:00 p.m., seven days a week. Learn more about Microsoft Teams.

Video tutorials are being developed to assist students in preparing files for submission to each lab. They will be available on the ENVD YouTube channel.

File Submission Process

Required filename convention: Class_FirstName_LastName_Assignment#
File reviewed by TA and/or CLC/DMC staff member.
File submitted by the student to PaperCut.
Comments concerning additional corrections to file will be placed on PaperCut job ticket and an email is sent to the student.
*Incorrect file formats, will be discarded and the job will require re-submission.
The file confirmed to be correct.

File placed in the queue of the appropriate lab.
*Staff will not correct the file at the time of fabrication. The CLC will produce what they receive, if the submitted drawings are not accurate cuts will reflect those inaccuracies.
Students will receive an email confirmation with an estimated time of completion.
Once in the lab queue, it may take 2-7 days for execution dependent upon current overall workload and the demand on individual labs. Typically, the laser lab will have the quickest turnaround and the CNC lab will have the longest.
Students will receive an email confirming that parts are ready for pickup.

Acrylic, MDF and plywood will continue to be available for purchase through the labs. *Payment, via credit/debit card, must be made prior to taking possession of items.

The Digital Media Center and Creative Labs Center will operate and assist students through a web-based and in-person service model.

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Environmental Design Building Updates

Anonymous — Thu, 16 Aug 2018 21:44:24 +0000

Environmental Design Building Updates Anonymous (not verified) Thu, 08/16/2018 - 15:44

Amanda Pyers

If you are returning to ENVD from a summer away, you may notice a few changes in the building. The following updates were made possible by the coordination efforts of Betsy, Peggy, Emily Lawrence and Amanda.

New monitors are on order and will be installed on each floor of the building in an effort to better promote ENVD happenings and feature student and faculty accomplishments.

The basement will house four first-year studios; ENVD 1B49 has been converted into studio space to accommodate this change.

The east half of 134 will be fully dedicated to classroom space.

Several faculty and staff on the first floor have changed locations. The Xerox copier, HP printer, fax machine and office supplies are currently housed in ENVD 171; additional supplies are located in the front office.

Dedicated lecturer office space has been moved to the second floor, in ENVD 205.

The third floor has new studio and pod spaces; Jeff is constructing temporary dividers with pin-up surfaces for this floor and the basement. The layout of the print lab and DMC have been updated, and a virtual reality nook has been created in the DMC.

Renovations are expected to continue through the fall. Many thanks to those who have worked tirelessly to make these changes happen.

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