Machine / Hands: Discovery Through Technical Drawings

REILLY WALKER

Previously a chemical engineer, I have been exploring the role of architecture in an industrial setting. This year, I travelled to Arizona through the Howarth-Wright Fellowship to conduct research on desert systems and design a low flow shower prototype.


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Figure 1. Untitled, September 2023. Reilly Walker.
Figure 2. Sketches made in the design of small architectural components: low-flow shower head and drinking water fountain, September 2023. Reilly Walker.


Before entering the field of architecture, I worked in industrial facilities in Canada, the USA, and France. I became a licensed engineer, but decided I wanted to learn to be a better designer. I hoped to eventually help shape the architecture of the factories and chemical plants that I had worked in. I have tried to integrate processes of engineering into every major design studio since arriving at Daniels. This usually results in friction that has me questioning the limitations of technical precision, formal expression, and the importance of experiential considerations.

For my final year’s thesis research, I have been examining upcoming infrastructure expansions in Arizona that are aimed at alleviating the megadrought currently occurring in the region. Presently, the population of Phoenix is rapidly increasing while experiencing severe water stress conditions. My proposal, at one point, was to provide architectural support for massive infrastructure projects that would provide an increased water supply through water recycling. New municipal facility upgrades could purify the outflow of wastewater (sewage) plants to a level suitable to be sent to the potable (drinking water) system. I see this as an opportunity to produce civic infrastructure that can draw attention to itself and reveal the short-circuiting of the water cycle to the community it serves. As these projects were already in the works, and calling for proposals (although, from engineering firms - not architects), I decided to put my hat in the ring as a designer for the new facilities.

I am interested in this project as a way of discussing the advantages and shortcomings of working through spatial problems by hand - especially when it comes to the friction of the technical drawing stage, and choosing degrees of precision for drafting. I am also interested in ways of moving in and out of the computer, when printed material goes back under the hand for tweaks and changes outside of the drawing’s digital homeland.

“Originally trained in the technical conventions of engineering drafting, I am interested in how to flex and twist these conventions in pursuit of designing buildings that go beyond being functional and become purposeful.”

I have learned that rigidly technical design approaches, although efficient, can be dangerous if the end goal is flawed from the start. These considerations have shaped my design process, evolving towards a ‘soft’ technical drawing approach, which is executed with rulers and pencils. Through this method of drawing, I represent my working ideas as I navigate the space between the worlds of architecture and engineering. Originally trained in the technical conventions of engineering drafting, I am interested in how to flex and twist these conventions in pursuit of designing buildings that go beyond being functional and become purposeful.



Figure 3. Site Plan Diagrams, Various Municipal Water Treatment Plants in AZ. October, 2023. Reilly Walker.


I am inspired by masters of hand drawing—such as Peter Cook, Cedric Price, and Lina Bo Bardi—who can seduce their audience with convincingly expressive hand drawings. I have learned that there is a careful balance to be struck between precision and intention that I have been continuously testing and experimenting. Often this begins with freehand sketching, with either:

1. Thin, ghostly lines that act as scaffolding for later commitment. Continuously choosing discrete strokes on top of which I can darken experimental lines.

2. Thick, chunky lines that provide low precision and the ability to reinterpret compositions as iteratively better formal compositions.

Next, I explore the kernel of the drawing by integrating rulers and compasses which give more authority to the lines produced, but always allow for loose additions by hand at any second. After wrestling the idea into rough shape, I produce a final draft with precision mechanical pencils or sell my soul and convert the drawing into vectors using drafting software.

“Architects and engineers should contemplate human considerations and workmanship in design, and learn when to resist the ease of relying on technological alternatives.”

In the end, I have come to appreciate the limitations of technical drawings by hand. Often, this process creates ambiguities that can be both productive and alluring. Architects and engineers should contemplate human considerations and workmanship in design, and learn when to resist the ease of relying on technological alternatives.