107. Notes for a George Herbert Walker Bush Gallery-Retreat House
atelier ying, nyc.
This design is not meant to give any political views at all It is notes for a design exploration of a Presidential Memorial Library. It's design concepts could be applied to any of the US presidents in history who have flown on Air Force one.
It was a fairly dramatic moment in 1991 when the senior President Bush boarded Air Force One for a weekend retreat to Camp David and then not long after the plane ascended announced a surprise air strike, in effect using the ruse of a vacation trip to disguise the beginning of a military campaign from onboard an airborne war room. At that moment it appeared that he had firmly cemented his position as Commander-in-Chief of the American Armed forces.
Whatever the politics, which is not my focus, this airplane was probably most suited to this particular president than any other in past history, looking at things now from an aesthetic distance. Bush used it as a war room and a retreat from the local politics of the White House. He did not alter it for lobbying purposes (Johnson) or underuse it (Nixon) or overuse it (Clinton) or had it cleaned of children's scrawlings (Carter). Again, the plane was most suited to Bush as he was a former Air Force officer. A personal fact is that he has celebrated almost every birthday after his military years with a parachute jump.
This set of notes for a design drawing also shows my process very well, beginning with remnants of a dream I had of a building with a parachute motif which sold research books on air currents and cloud formations. This dream immediately inspired ideas going simultaneously in three directions: for a humidor, for an enclosure for a camera and a gallery-retreat.
With possible features in my mind but no strong direction, what emerges is a homage that has multiple facets. Only the notes remain, not a final coherent design that falls within any specific category; and this is the way I like to keep it, full of potentiality. My drawing lifts off the page finally with a design for a gallery-retreat which has a small footprint but is very tall, almost like a monument.
A secondary design of a camera enclosure with a humidor (but not for cigars or any tobacco product) is also precipitated. It too is not a final design, but more like a dream of one. I believe the two designs together, one a homage the other a memento, have the best effect.
I will start with the smaller design, that of the enclosure for an Olympus Pen EE at the Piano Nobile level is amusingly reachable not by external staircase but by parachute.
A Rolleiflex was also in my thinking, although the piano nobile holds the only lens. The top area as well as the rest of the enclosure is a modified typical Air Force personnel rations kit which Bush may have been issued in his early days. The humidor stores an amuse-bouche, a pez-like stack of boxes of assorted gourmet licorice (which was issued with military rations back then) from Holland, Finland and Italy. A relic of a parachute is also contained in this memento box.
The gallery-retreat is constructed by segmenting apart three specific sections of the hull of Bush's original Air Force One plane (the Disney cruise ships Magic and Wonder were constructed in this eccentric manner). Actually it's easier to demolish and patch up a hull section than it is to build one, especially as much of its systems are not to be used (it won't fly). Only around 10 to 15 feet of each hull section is usable, the rest are converted to visitor's areas. As the entire building is very roughly 130 feet in height there are plenty of open areas. The footprint is roughly 40 x 55 feet. It is an interesting design for a fantasy version of a presidential library.
Visitors ascend stairs and escalators along a glazed curtain wall to three sectional cabins of AF1. The piano nobile is the AF1 Presidential Office, the next level is a tv screening room which is the gallery proper and finally the nose head sleeping quarters with shower room is on the quiet top penthouse level. Bush has a central private staircase and mechanized stair lifts to ascend right into the plane cabin in the style of today's private jets.
Two parachute-motif terraces serve as ranch-styled front porches with high aerial views. The building's corners have simple frictional elements (from my dream) that border the window openings of each end of the hull sections and simulate a very very mild air turbulence sound effect to link early airplane experiences of yesteryear with that of modern day air travel.
Any other accoutrements of the retreat are kept to a minimum and decorated with reserve. Tradition and the decorum are upheld, as is in keeping with a military facility which seems to have been the way in which Bush employed his presidential aircraft.
Design, text and drawing are copyright 2013 by David Lo.
107. Notes for a George Herbert Walker Bush Gallery-Retreat House
atelier ying, nyc.
This design is not meant to give any political views at all It is notes for a design exploration of a Presidential Memorial Library. It's design concepts could be applied to any of the US presidents in history who have flown on Air Force one.
It was a fairly dramatic moment in 1991 when the senior President Bush boarded Air Force One for a weekend retreat to Camp David and then not long after the plane ascended announced a surprise air strike, in effect using the ruse of a vacation trip to disguise the beginning of a military campaign from onboard an airborne war room. At that moment it appeared that he had firmly cemented his position as Commander-in-Chief of the American Armed forces.
Whatever the politics, which is not my focus, this airplane was probably most suited to this particular president than any other in past history, looking at things now from an aesthetic distance. Bush used it as a war room and a retreat from the local politics of the White House. He did not alter it for lobbying purposes (Johnson) or underuse it (Nixon) or overuse it (Clinton) or had it cleaned of children's scrawlings (Carter). Again, the plane was most suited to Bush as he was a former Air Force officer. A personal fact is that he has celebrated almost every birthday after his military years with a parachute jump.
This set of notes for a design drawing also shows my process very well, beginning with remnants of a dream I had of a building with a parachute motif which sold research books on air currents and cloud formations. This dream immediately inspired ideas going simultaneously in three directions: for a humidor, for an enclosure for a camera and a gallery-retreat.
With possible features in my mind but no strong direction, what emerges is a homage that has multiple facets. Only the notes remain, not a final coherent design that falls within any specific category; and this is the way I like to keep it, full of potentiality. My drawing lifts off the page finally with a design for a gallery-retreat which has a small footprint but is very tall, almost like a monument.
A secondary design of a camera enclosure with a humidor (but not for cigars or any tobacco product) is also precipitated. It too is not a final design, but more like a dream of one. I believe the two designs together, one a homage the other a memento, have the best effect.
I will start with the smaller design, that of the enclosure for an Olympus Pen EE at the Piano Nobile level is amusingly reachable not by external staircase but by parachute.
A Rolleiflex was also in my thinking, although the piano nobile holds the only lens. The top area as well as the rest of the enclosure is a modified typical Air Force personnel rations kit which Bush may have been issued in his early days. The humidor stores an amuse-bouche, a pez-like stack of boxes of assorted gourmet licorice (which was issued with military rations back then) from Holland, Finland and Italy. A relic of a parachute is also contained in this memento box.
The gallery-retreat is constructed by segmenting apart three specific sections of the hull of Bush's original Air Force One plane (the Disney cruise ships Magic and Wonder were constructed in this eccentric manner). Actually it's easier to demolish and patch up a hull section than it is to build one, especially as much of its systems are not to be used (it won't fly). Only around 10 to 15 feet of each hull section is usable, the rest are converted to visitor's areas. As the entire building is very roughly 130 feet in height there are plenty of open areas. The footprint is roughly 40 x 55 feet. It is an interesting design for a fantasy version of a presidential library.
Visitors ascend stairs and escalators along a glazed curtain wall to three sectional cabins of AF1. The piano nobile is the AF1 Presidential Office, the next level is a tv screening room which is the gallery proper and finally the nose head sleeping quarters with shower room is on the quiet top penthouse level. Bush has a central private staircase and mechanized stair lifts to ascend right into the plane cabin in the style of today's private jets.
Two parachute-motif terraces serve as ranch-styled front porches with high aerial views. The building's corners have simple frictional elements (from my dream) that border the window openings of each end of the hull sections and simulate a very very mild air turbulence sound effect to link early airplane experiences of yesteryear with that of modern day air travel.
Any other accoutrements of the retreat are kept to a minimum and decorated with reserve. Tradition and the decorum are upheld, as is in keeping with a military facility which seems to have been the way in which Bush employed his presidential aircraft.
Design, text and drawing are copyright 2013 by David Lo.