mcgee portfolio

ANDREW MCGEE SELECTED WORKS

YOSSARIAN 40N 73W

03 - 08

FISH FARM

09 - 14

PLAZA REPUBLICA

16 - 21

INVERTED HOUSE

22 - 26

FLOWER MUSEUM

28 - 32

PERFORMATIVE WOOD

33 - 38

SYMBIOTIC INFRASTRUCTURES

PIECEMEAL CENTRALITIES

THE DETAIL AS DRIVER

YOSSARIAN 40N 73W

FISH FARM

These projects operate with the notion that seemingly invisible or banal urban infrastructure - a highway tunnel, an island, a river - provide immense opportunity for architectural intervention that can address larger scales and functions within the city, beyond immediate site or context.

SYMBIOTIC INFRASTRUCTURES

Yossarian 40N 73W

The island typology is one that is not unfamiliar to the lifeblood of New York City. Many of the small islands that pepper the city’s shoreline have been utilized in the past for various utilities that required separation from the masses - quarantines, mental hospitals, prisons, iconic symbols of the city itself - and were artificially augmented in many cases to better perform these duties.

Willet’s Point provides an opportunity for the city to engage with a new island, one created for recreation and remediation. Positioning itself over existing highway infrastructure, the recreational facility and resulting island are intimately connected to the circulation of the region while remaining unplugged from the cacophony of the contemporary city, allowing for reflection on the urban condition and one’s place within it. Formerly a salt marsh, the site is remediated to return as such, stationing the facility within an augmented nature that prophesies the renegotiation of boundaries occurring with the onset of sea level rise and climate change.

Academic [Spring 2010 Architecture Studio]Professor Felipe CorreaRecreational Facility I 750,000 sfWillets Point, Queens, NY

Yossarian 40N 73WA Recreational Island for New York City

2010 Flood Condition

2050

2100

Island Viewed from the Air

06 I 07

The Islands of New York City and the location of Yossarian

Phase I: Transfer Development Rights to PeripheryPromote local engagement with regional project

Phase II: Bury Existing Highway Condition Reconnect fabric to waterfront site / marshland

Phase III: Excavated Soil Augments Island (160,000 m3 ; enough to fill 25% of Giants Stadium)

Axonometric of Island Components

Facade System

tensile skin

secondary structure

primary structure

Program

Field Condition

Island Access

+05 venues

exhaust stacks

subway entrance

+04 circuits

promenade

remediated salt marsh

+03 courts

mesh panels

freeway tunnel

+02 aquatic

structural glass barrier

subway

+01 parking

monumental sub-structure

00 entrance

-01 circuits

08 I 09

10 I 11

Figural Taxonomy of Programmatic Adjacencies

Entrance from Subway

View of City from Roof Deck

12 I 13

Longitudinal Section

Freeway View Underneath Recreational Facility

14 I 15

FISH FARM

The history of the Chicago Shipping and Sanitary Canal is one born on the back of Industry. Serving as a way point for water based cargo transport throughout the US, a staging space for the meat processing factories made infamous by The Jungle, or the threshold into the fishing and recreational markets of the Great Lakes Region, the Canal has deeply influenced the economy and lifeblood of the City and its constituents for over 100 years. The invasive Asian Carp now threatens this gateway.

This project attempts to utilize the unsettling characteristics of the Asian Carp as the driver for a new industry in Chicago: a biological resource with Agricultural, Fuel, and Food Implications. A Barrier Wall that stops the Carp from invading the Great Lakes is constructed in the waterway, and doubles as a recreational circuit and spectacular promenade for the surrounding neighborhoods. At its terminus, the Limnology Center acts as a destination and educational tool for the local population to engage with and embrace the new Carp Industry.

Academic [Spring 2011 GSD Architecture Studio]Professor Jeanne GangRiver Barrier + Limnology Center I 400,000 sfBubbly Creek, Chicago, IL

FISH FARMRemediating Chicago’s Waterway

Carp Infestations of the Mississippi since 1980

The Pest: Asian Carp

Possible uses to mitigate overpopulation of Carp in local waters

18 I 19

Phase I: Construction of Barrier and Limnology Center as Spine for future development

Phase II: Development of parcel infrastructure supporting re-routed shipping and new Carp Lagoon industry

Phase III: Remediated Waterfront brings industries that take further advantage of the edge, allowing extension of public access

Future Urban Vision, with Barrier and Limnology Center as Anchor Points of New Waterfront Industry and Programs

20 I 21

Barrier Connection to Limnology Center

Axonometric Detail of Section of Barrier

22 I 23

Viewing Spur for Carp Lagoon Collection

Roofscape of Floating Programmatic Volumes

Limnology Center Straddling Barrier

24 I 25

Exploded Laboratory Components

Section AA’

26 I 27

PLAZA REPUBLICA

34 - 45

INVERTED HOUSE

46 - 55

These projects find themselves confronted with reassessing notions of public space, both in the city and in conventional architectural typologies. Adopting a fine grain, complimentary approach to existing conditions, access to and activation of these public spaces as new centralities becomes possible.

PIECEMEAL CENTRALITIES

PLAZA REPUBLICA

PLAZA REPUBLICAA New Fine Grain Open Space

This proposal transforms a derelict urban surface into a new, cultural landscape that provides the city with a high quality fine grain open space.

The project restructures the old plaza into three new interconnected spaces - an open lawn that faces the existing park, a new courtyard and gallery space that redefine the entry to the existing underground theater, and an elevated platform that holds a small botanical garden made up of endemic Andean species and offers expansive views towards the park and the historic core.

These three elements act as anchors for a multiplicity of social and cultural activities to unfold within the spaces of the project.

Competition Finalist (August 2011)Collaboration with Somatic Collaborative, Mariusz KlemensPublic Plaza Renovation I 50,000 sfPlaza Republica, Quito, Ecuador

Site Plan

View from Adjacent Building

32 I 33

Create a new type of public space complimentary to the park, where A+B can generate a new centrality in the city.

The space can then serve as an anchor for other institutions and cultural activities in the area.

Ultimately, the space can be a point of entry to the district when a new metro line is completed in the next few years.

How to generate a quality public space adjacent to important city park ?

Phase I: Remove existing platform over street

Phase III: A low lying T-shaped building inserted at corner holds gallery, cafe, and service spaces

Phase IV: Raised platform and new bridges are constructed

Phase II: Recast Plaza surface to new contours

Axonometric of New Plaza34 I 35

Time scale diagram showing a multitude of uses during different portions of the day and week.

36 I 37

Uses, Circulation, and Water Management

Roof Plan

Ground Plan

38 I 39

View approaching from HIstoric Core

Elevation from park across the street

40 I 41

INVERTED HOUSE

INVERTED HOUSEA New Dormitory for Harvard

Conventional notions of the student dormitory often conjure visions of narrow halls flanked by cell-like rooms and book ended with over-sized and under-utilized common space. To complicate matters, the nature of the Harvard House system is rooted in notions of secrecy and a manufactured tradition that undermines the utility of its spaces.

Inverted House projects the events of its interior outward and dissolves traditional unit aggregation strategies in favor of a clustering approach that maximizes interaction between its inhabitants, while offering a new perspective on notions of common space. Broken into smaller typological bits, these shared programs are appended to each unit type, allowing sophomores, juniors, and seniors to play host to one another in a more dynamic academic and social setting. On a large scale, the sacred courtyard typology is unhinged to allow for larger scale urban events and interaction to occur while still maintainig a staging space for formal student activities.

Fall 2009 Core III Architecture StudioProfessor Jonathan Levi200 Bed Student Housing I 150,000 sfRiver House Quad, Cambridge, MA

9 River Houses + Inverted House

Hotspots of Pedestrian Circulation

Public and Private Open Space

Site Map near the banks of the Charles

CHARLES RIVER

44 I 45

Conventional Harvard Brick promotes isolation

Inversion creates transparency to interior

Disintigration designates public and private

Distortion accomodates large scale programs

Cross Section

Typical Unit Floor Plan

Various Class Units form Micro Aggregated “Neighborhoods”

Circulation within Neighborhoods promotes constant interaction with students from other years and units

Sophomores, Juniors, and Seniors play host to one another in an environment that fosters new forms of collaboration.

Larger common spaces are broken into bits and appended to each unit type, allowing different students to play host to various functions within the Neighborhood cluster

-1 0 +1

View of Sophomore Common Space and Neighborhood Stairwell

48 I 49

Approaching Dormitory from Riverfront Side

Approaching Dormitory from Harvard Campus Side

Activities within project outward into unhinged public coourtyard

50 I 51

FLOWER MUSEUM

PERFORMATIVE WOOD

These projects attempt to utilize the scale of the detail as a generator for large scale implications on site and production practices.

THE DETAIL AS DRIVER

FLOWER MUSEUM

This proposal sites a flower museum and a demo production center in the equatorial Andes Mountains. Scalar diagrams of this global trade are juxtaposed with a new, more sustainable greenhouse typology and a post harvest demonstration gallery exposing visitors to all stages of the production process.

A recreational circuit and a small hostel is attached to the top of the museum, allowing visitors to explore the surrounding terrain and enjoy grand views of the Andean Mountain range in the distance, giving a new context to the scale of operations occurring on site.

Research and Speculative Proposal (July 2010)Collaboration with Professor Felipe CorreaFlower Museum / Prototype Staging I 35,000 sf Tumbaco, Ecuador

FLOWER MUSEUMGreenhouse Production and Exposition

Exploded Axonometric of Program and Circulation

Greenhouse Space

Recreational Circuit

Post Harvest Viewing Space

Post Harvest Gallery

Lobby / Gallery

Gallery Space

Hostel Space / Roof Deck

Site Plan

56 I 57

Building approach from the West

Section through Greenhouse space

58 I 59

Detail Test of Plywood Facade Condition

60 I 61

Overall View from the East

62 I 63

PERFORMATIVE WOOD

This project seeks to engage the novelty of kerfing and wood bending in a broader discussion regarding Architecture’s current agendas in form-making and fabrication technologies. While the desire for formal novelty has pushed technological advances within the field of design to a blinding pace, the intelligence regarding methodologies of production remains in its infancy.

The solution to this disconnect first requires asking the right questions, not about geometry, but about material. The disconnect between designer and fabricator are proliferated, perhaps even magnified, when digital fabrication meets biological composite in the form of wood. This project promotes the notion that the calibrated discontinuity of wood fiber can be the code and form enabler of a complex wood system.

Fall 2010 Options Architecture StudioProfessor Achim MengesCollaboration with Brad Crane, Marshall Prado, Yang ZhaoWood Research / Prototype Installation Gund Hall, Cambridge, MA

PERFORMATIVE WOODDynamic Kerfs as Form Finding Device

01 06 11

02 07 12

03 08 13

04 09 14

05 10 15

Steam Bent Kerfed Test Member

Kerfing Tests

66 I 67

Unkerfed Test Piece only slightly flexes

Kerfed Test Piece flexes greatly without failing

Network of kerfed pairs creates potential for larger formal system

1/8” Basswood Test Pieces

Single Piece of 1/8” Basswood, Laser Cut with Dynamic Kerf Pattern

Kerfed Basswood has extreme flexibility, unlocking potential of Wood not as a dimensionally defined unit, but as a robust and dynamic material

68 I 69

Robot Saw allows for fast and accurate production of highly varied kerf patterns

Robot Saw Cut Kerf Pairs

Steamed Full Scale Test Pair, in Jig to reinforce distortion

Steamed Full Scale Test Pairs, in Jig to activate distortion

70 I 71

Dynamic Kerfing allows for double curvature distortion

Final Installed Prototype

72 I 73

Final Installed Prototype

74 I 75

ANDREW MCGEE

Contact: 917.456.7116 andrew.s.mcgee@gmail.com

18 W. 95th Street, Apt. 1B New York, NY 10025

Academic: Harvard University GSD (2009 - 2012) Master of Architecture with Distinction University of Michigan (2003 - 2008) B.S. Architecture with Distinction B.A. English Literature with Honors

References available upon request