In freshman year, I took an intensive introduction to architecture class with an emphasis on creative exploration and making. I learned how to draw plans and sections—schematics which depict structures through horizontal or vertical plane cuts—as well as assemble models out of mediums like laser-cut wood.

For the final project, I created this unique K-House design, which segments kitchen, dining, living, and bedroom into separate programmatic spaces united by a central tower. I utilized a kerf-cutting technique to accomplish the curved walls of the model, which I learned for a "pavilion" design project earlier in the course.

I'm thankful for how this course taught me to think and design spatially. Ethen Wood, the instructor, encouraged me to consider how structures can emulate or influence movement, how light travels at different times and in different places, and how function follows or occasionally violates form. This mode has helped me become more imaginative in my own creative processes, and perhaps more appreciative of the built world we live in.