The Beginning of "The End"

Looking to the culinary world for inspiration I have further looked into the culinary art of molecular gastronomy which was mentioned and shown to us by Professor Hui. Molecular gastronomy takes the ordinary culinary process of making food and through the deconstruction of various produce, meats or dairies, by means of physical and chemical transformations, changes all the sensorial aspects (touch/texture, taste, visual appearance, smell)  that a dish might entail throwing away any preconceived notions of what a dish might be.

For a city like Las Vegas turning the known into the unknown or the extra ordinary is all part of the cities spectacle.

So here is what I'm thinking...

My proposed culinary institute along with teaching regular culinary art will focus on teaching molecular gastronomy a feature that will be highlighted in the building's main restaurant. Although there are other restaurants on the strip that play with molecular gastronomy I don't think that having a institute or another restaurant that focused on it would "overkill" the above mentioned experience. 

Merging this along with with the previous idea I had of using a large green wall of produce as a defining feature of the building and its atrium will become a major part of the buildings spectacle.

The purpose of this produce wall would be to highlight the use of the raw product as a reference for the deconstruction of it through the cooking process and the recreation of food. Consequently the design of the interior atrium space would highlight this utilizing a wall of produce leading to the kitchen/laboratory and ultimately the restaurant table (all in a upward motion).

Building Massing / Rough Programming

After looking at the given program size and any extra program I want to put in the building (including services) the program could roughly fit within the massing. There is defiantly allot of extra space as the site is extremely large but this can be incorporated into public spaces, retail and atrium spaces.

The given program will fall somewhere in this separation of spaces

Facade Component

In answering what my envelope will become I have to first discern what I want it to do. For me the envelope must do 3 things.

1: Contribute to the building spectacle
2: Highlight the interior spectacle
3: Provide relief from extreme climatic conditions.

Playing off of previous envelop ideas I had  for this project (exploring metal/fabric meshes and diamond shape glazing units)  I have decided to stick with something close to my original ideas.

My idea is to create a component that has a horizontal frame which would be attached to the buildings glazing units. Inlaid within this frame would be a series of fabric strips that would act as screen elements for solar heat. In addition to this the fabric would act as a surface which at night would be illuminated by a system of led lights adding to the building ambiance.  

It is highly important for me that the component is visually porous so that views into and out of the building are not disrupted. Along with the material choice of fabric to achieve this, the density of the strips can also vary depending on needed visual or solar transitions between exterior and interior spaces. Working in tandem with what I image for the building's interior the exterior envelope component will allow for the deconstruction of the exterior visual impact and shift it to focuses on the interior produce wall, molecular gastronomy kitchen and restaurant dining experience.

In the end I want my building to have a balanced relationship between elegance and spectacle