Week 6

This week went by decently fast, and I am still working on getting this exhibit put together for the Designing Action competition.  The main parts of the exhibit are figured out, now it is just a matter of fine-tuning all of the small details. Next week we will build a mockup, which I am looking forward to.  Yesterday we met with the Parks Department and got the design approved, and they told us what we could and could not do to the site, such as interfere with the sprinkler system or existing lighting.  All this week I have been working on graphics for the exhibit, and I really want to create a lively and energetic space for people to enjoy.  

Another one of my tasks is to find sponsors for different events at the exhibit.  Since the theme is alternative sports and the exhibit will be up for a month, we were thinking that different groups could sponsor one night by having a demonstration, games, food, etc.  These would be people like the Nashville Roller Girls, the Sounds Baseball, Rockettown, and so on.  Also, the exhibit opens September 20^th and Parking day is September 21^st.  For those who do not know (I did not), Parking Day is a worldwide event where people can turn a public parking spot into a miniature park or whatever! It looks like a lot of fun, and people come up with some really interesting things.  Google image Parking Day if you get a chance.  Luckily there is a public parking lot next to the space where the exhibit will be so we are also trying to think up several clever ideas for utilizing this space on Parking Day.   

http://parkingday.org/......We should totally start a group for Knoxville!!

On Tuesday we showed part 2 of the documentary series NCDC is hosting at the downtown library called “The Weight of the Nation” which talks about the serious problem of obesity in our country.  This week was especially sad because we learned more about the individuals and their personal struggles with their weight.  This is an HBO documentary, and I would definitely check it out if you have any free time!  

A few of the people at NCDC have started a Young Urbanist group where occasionally they hold small, fun events around town.  Last month they did a bike tour of Nashville, and this month was a tour of the new Nabrico building downtown.  So on Friday, Hastings Architecture gave us a tour of the space, and it was really neat to learn about the process of converting an old building into a LEED certified one.   

Nashville Civic Design Center does not specify furniture, fixtures, or equipment.  Designers here work at a much larger scale (city scale), and in a way they create guidelines for architects to abide by.  NCDC does a lot of research and case studies on what this city needs, then they create literature that shows this and hold various events in the community to educate and get people excited about the direction Nashville is going.

The person of the week is Tyler McSwain.  He is another intern in the office and is currently a student at Tennessee State University.  His job this summer is helping Gary and others update some of the older literature and he has been documenting some of NCDC’s Urban Forums.    

Week 6

Yessick was closed last week for the fourth. On Monday Rachel and I were busy catching up on the last week emails and mail. We receive new books of fabric from vendors which requires us to send an update to the designers and storage away in the correct location. I also returned memos back to the vendors and I called vendors on pricing and availability of fabrics. I also went through the discontinue fabrics in Miles Tabbot. On Tuesday a designer specified a fabric was discontinued. Rachel and I looked for similar fabrics that the design could use instead. On Wednesday I went through Michael Thomas’s discontinued fabrics to update the material library. The sales rep from Miles Tabbot located the discontinues fabrics. The firm allows me to take the discontinued fabrics for our library at UTK. On Thursday Rachel and I organized the hardware cabinet. We label each containers of hardware so the designer can find the resource quicker and easier. On Friday we organized Robert Allen fabrics in the resource library.

Marsha, the owner, decides what vendors the designer purchase from. The Project Manger, who is Rachel, keeps the library up-to-date. Vendors mail list of discontinue books or patterns. It is the Project Manger job to locate the books and patterns. The firm’s library is separated by categories and by color. For example all the leathers are stored together, and rug samples are in one area. This system is easier and quicker for the designers. Rachel also emails the designers when new books of fabrics arrive.

On the left is Jonathan and the right is Rachel Streans, who is my supervisor. They both are not NCIDQ certified but working on it. Jonathan started working at Yessick in April. Rachel started in February. Jonathan is looking for a house in the Chattanooga area. He watches the Bachelorette which I do too. I have gotten close with Rachel. She is a member of the ASID.  

Week 8: We just got "Office Spaced"

This week was pretty crazy! Looking back we were so busy it was almost a blurr!

VCT in the staff hall in the Cancer Institute!Monday was actually pretty slow. Heather was on vacation this week and Rebecca and I got off to a slow start. We did walkthroughs of UFP, 12 East, MOB A,B, and C which were getting new carpeting, and we did a walkthrough of the Cancer Institute. We also went by and saw the rennovations being done in the Pathology department that I worked on at the beginning of the summer. We brightened up the department with a lighter paint and carpet color. It made it seem as if the lighting had been improved! Because it had been so hot and so rainy we hadn't seen the Cancer Institute in a while. It was crazy to see the progress that had happened! There is paint on most of the walls and the 4th floor has VCT! We also did a walkthrough of the Patient Registration project with Danielle from Lewis Group. She is helping us with this project (kind of like an unofficial joint venture) because we have so much on our plates with other projects. Needless to say we did a lot of walking on Monday! (I am glad I had on comfortable shoes!)

Tuesday Rebecca and I were given a huge list of work to do to prepare for a presentation for the end of the week. We needed to add some temporary signage to the new roundabout, which is a part of the new main road they built this summer! Its already open! We also had to prepare graphics and a layout for departmental progress posters. Each needed a space for individual progress as well as the goals for the hospital. We needed to have 14 printed and mounted onto foam core by the end of the week! We also had to prepare renderings of the Dirtt Wall we are working on for the new Patient Regustration project. This will be a wall which will have 8 8'x8' lightboxes with illuminated images of different scenes. This is a project I have been working on this summer, and it was almost ready for a presentation. We had no elevations of the walls, and in order to explain the project we knew we would need rendered elevations and perspectives. 

Preparing for this presentation was our goal for the remainder of the week. We had until 3PM ThursdayWorking on renderings! to do all of the progress posters, renderings, and drawings. It completely consumed the remainder of the week, but we got it done with a few hours to spare! We even had to stay late Wednesday when some last minute changes were made to the progress posters at 4:59PM! Though it didn't take too long to fix we joked about getting "Office Spaced" by our boss!

The rest of the day Thursday we organized some of the papers and work we did for the day and we opened and played with the new blown glass samples for an art installation in the Cancer Institute.

Houseboat we stayed on this weekend!Friday I started teaching Mary Beth a few things in AutoCAD before I headed to Lucas, KY for the weekend with some friends! We spent the weekend on my friend's uncle's 83' houseboat on Barren River Lake! It was the biggest boat I have been on in a lake! 16 people could sleep in it! Though it rained most of the weekend we still had fun taking out a smaller boat to cruise and go tubing! It was a great way to beat the heat that has been going on this summer!

This week was a good week to talk about presentations considering I spent most of the week preparing for one! Usually we use AutoCAD, Photoshop, SketchUp, and Corel Draw to prepare for presentations. Depending on the phase of the project we could present with drawings, sketches, color schemes, loose materials, or final finish boards. It also depends on who we present to and how formal the presentation is. Sometimes when we are just getting approvals for fabrics we will have our selections pinned up, with backups within reach. If things have already been approved and need to be presented we will have final drawings and finish boards for the clients to see.

This week I got to know Danielle from Lewis Group. I do not have a picture of her because I was so captivated in getting all the work done this week. However I did learn that she has a daughter named Hannah, which I think is a great name! She is very helpful and nice and made me feel included in meetings and walkthroughs we did with her this week.

Week 6 with some left over week 5

This week I worked at my internship on Tuesday and Wednesday only because I helped work Design Matters! camp with Amy Burns, Matt Hall and four other TAs.  The Camp was awesome!  We had kids come from all over the country. There was a guy and a girl all the way from California, we also had some Texas kids, and tons of Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama kids.  I My main Design Matters! job was the set up crew as well as the behind the scences/ keeping everyone's files together person.  It was a fun job and we had a ton of free food from some great places.  I also felt like a freshman again eating in the cafeteria, but the food is so much better in the summer when there is less quantity to cook for.  

At my internship this week, I of course did order some samples, but I did get to do some designwork as well.  One of our projects is Synergy and it is going to be located in the Southeastern Glass Company building.  They are wanting to use the original facade letters again.  I helped design two differnt options for the facade and sent it to our clients.  I also worked on updating the website and spent a lot of time finding faucets for three different sinks in the new residence hall. 

Now to finish up all the info from week 5:

The purchasing in the Lauderdale Design group mostly specifies for bidding.  For example, we have specified all the furniture and finishes in the Residence Hall and we had to choose from furniture that was "on contract" and then show it to the Architecture firm with whom we are working. Project fees are negotiated between our principles and the client.  The client may be an architecture firm, or a company. Joy is the principle that handles most of the money through the firm.  She keeps up with e the money with project. She works with an accountant, the bank, and the credit card company we use.  

Week 6 information:

So far at Lauderdale, Dani Collins has been the designer doing the FF&E's for most of our design work this summer.  To keep our materials library up to date, we have lunches and or meetings with our design Representitives from different companies.  We keep our reps up to date within our contact information that is shared in our Lauderdale's outlook email account.  Whenever we make a new contact via ordering samples or other means, we make sure to add the contact to the contact list. 

I did not meet anyone new this week in person, but I did have plenty of phone conversations and emails with Becky Hollingsworth from Forbo.  Messaging and bulliten boards are a huge part of the residence hall design, and Becky is helping out a lot with our questions and needs.  She is quite helpful and is always willing to help! 

Week 8: Unexpected Road Trips

Finally some relief...rain and cooler weather started off the week! Monday felt kind of chaotic. I seemed to be doing several little projects at once for different designers. I made a contractor’s board and delivered it to the client, as well as continued to collect finishes for another sample board. I also continued the finish organization for the National Accounts group; checking a lot of fabrics to make sure they are still available. I also continued to pull finishes for the three different finish schemes for the bathroom upgrade project.

Tuesday started off like any other day. I did some organizing of the materials library and made a “placemat” for a designer to take to a presentation. I also had to deliver a set of drawings to the building that reviews the drawings for correct codes, as well as distributes the building permits. After lunch I am told that there is a group going to the Paoli furniture factory and if I would like to go there is room. I rush home to pack before the bus arrives…only the bus did not arrive anywhere close to the expected arrival time (it was 4 hours late and I was starting to question my decision to go on the trip!!) So after some long waiting and confusion about the bus we make it to Paoli, Indiana at 1:30 in the morning!

If anyone is curious what is in Paoli, Indiana…not much. Originally the factory was located in the town, but has expanded and has moved a few miles down the road. On Wednesday we toured the factory, got a small training session, and walked through the showroom. It was very interesting to see how everything starts and then all the different steps from beginning to end. Surprisingly, the factory was clean and fairly dust free considering all the wood that is being cut, sanded, and stained. Even though the bus ride was pretty rough and I times questioned my last minute decision, the tour was definitely worth it!

Thursday was a busy day. I started off the morning by working on a finish board that will be displayed in the client’s office. I also finished up the organization of all of the binders and fabrics for the National Accounts group. In the afternoon I did an electronic finish board for Ashley in the Vanderbilt group. An electronic finish board is a publisher file that includes images of the seating, tables, etc. along with their corresponding finishes.

Finish board that I worked on for a display board for the client.

Friday was another busy day. I started off the day by going onto the Steelcase and Coalesse website to verify which fabrics passed testing on different seating. I also did another electronic finish board for a different building for Vanderbilt University. I did another finish board that would be used for display purposes in an apartment complex clubhouse. At the end of the day I set up the finishes in a conference room for a client meeting Monday morning. The rain also stopped in the afternoon and we got some needed sunshine!!

Presentation Techniques & Computer Applications

There are several different techniques that the designers use to communicate their ideas to the client; these include finish boards, contract documents, and images and renderings. The format does change based on the phase that the project is in. the beginning phases start out with a simple concept board and then move into a finalized finish board. Sometimes the finish board will also include images of the furniture and lighting. Renderings are always a big part as well. The next part would be the contract documents to show the contractors and subcontractors. IDS typically uses AutoCAD, Google Sketchup, and Photoshop as their main computer programs. Microsoft Word, Powerpoint, Excel, and Publisher are also used frequently for text type documents.

Name: Shandi Harmon

Shandi is part of the design team along with Sarina (who you might recognize from an earlier post). Sarina and Shandi were practing their picture poses! Shandi is very knowledgeable abou design and her projects typically lean towards the modern, contempory side. A fun fact about her is that she recently got engaged!