Honorable MentionJohn Cadenhead
Powers Brown Architecture
1314 Texas Ave
2nd Floor
Houston, TX 77002
Phone: (713) 224-0456
Email: cadenhead@powersbrown.comTexas Steel Processing
A small office building for the executive and support personnel of a steel processing plant provided the opportunity to explore the potential of digital technology and production. The eccentrically perforated Corten steel screens that wrap the exterior define the character of this building. The panels will be manufactured by the client, who typically does not perform services for architectural applications, but whose industrial technology is easily converted to make this unique skin. Combining the logic of machining and digital input, each panel will have a unique pattern that is non-repeating and thus truly compositional.
The manufacture of the panels explores the intersection of pattern and composition working toward the compounded argument of formal validity and economic viability- there is no difference to the machine whether or not each panel is repeated. This is a simple example of the potential for moving beyond the limitations of repetitive industrial production. Ultimately the building has an iconographic presence that supports its purpose without recourse to un-transformed literal devices.
Milwaukee, WI 53214 IPERF.org
