UBC Graduate Research

Project Admix Titchkosky, Avery

Description

What is a bowling alley without its gleaming wooden floors, its leathery-smelling shoe cubbies, and its black-lit Friday nights? While its bowling surfaces and mechanics are highly specific, its other spaces of sociability and support are less so and offer the architect opportunities to intertwine these conditions. This project explored the rebuilding of the the Varsity Ridge Bowl on Vancouver’s west side, transposing an originally subterranean and horizontal site to a vertical one. The parameters of the project are rich with possibilities for spatial explorations of two different/similar programs: a 15 lane bowling alley and a nightclub on a narrow site (25’) in the heart of the entertainment district on Granville Street. The project is an exploration of shared experiences between two programs, via visual and auditory (dis)connection. The strict dimensions of the bowling alley provide a repeating horizontal element on every other floor, while the club takes a faceted amorphous form in the spaces between. With limited site area the entire volume needed to be utilized by using an efficient circulation strategy. Two sets of scissor stairs address this need while keeping the programs physically separate. Twisting together the separate vertical circulation allowed for shared experiences between bowlers and clubbers in this normally peripheral experience. This spatial element defines the facade and expresses the larger architectural concept.

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Rights

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International