Hasheem Tahir: Thesis report...INTERURBAN: WALL CLADDING DESIGNS.

National College of Arts

Department of Ceramics Design

Interurban: Wall Cladding Designs

Presented By

Hasheem Tahir

Roll No: 2018-nca-cera-254

Thesis Incharge: Naveed Niazi

Acknowledgement

I want to communicate my earnest gratefulness to my God, who made it possible for me to complete my task. The task could never have been conceivable without the direction and backing of my instructors, who were consistently there to direct me and help me with how to lead an extensive experiment.

First, I sincerely thank my advisor and department head, Shazia Mirza, for her patience, inspiration, vast knowledge, and for always guiding, counseling, supporting, and standing by me.

I want to thank the entire Ceramic Design Department faculty for their assistance. With their encouragement, I was able to take the initiative to work on my thesis.

I have no words to adequately convey the tremendous efforts of my honorable teacher, Naveed Niazi, who helped me anytime I required assistance. I want to express my gratitude to my friends who supported me during the process.

Introduction

Since I have an experience of working on architectural designs guided by my father,I always wanted to take up some kind of architectural project for my thesis.

During my 7th semester,I started working on geometrically shaped motifs on tiles inspired by cubism, but could not justify my design's basis in juries.

That's when I realised that the true reason why I love geometric 3D volume is because I like urban maps, especially of inner city, where my family lives.But also realised that what was actually happening in my head was that I appreciated the geometrically more organised urban maps of the newer parts of Lahore that were being developed, and I unconsciously had been comparing it with my own older parts of Lahore.

That's when I started looking at older and newer parts on google maps, and then I used drone footage to look more deeply into areas that intrested me.I took roughly 100 drone photos.

I my mid term jury,i stared working on tiles based on shapes and maps I copied from these aerial maps.I traced shapes from aerial photos into drawings and made these in 3D clay tiles.

My jurors pointed out that the combination and comparison of new and old Lahore is very interesting and they suggested that may be I have some psychological relationship with new Lahore while emotionally I am attached to old Lahore. I did not relate to it in the beginning,but later on I found out that they were right.

This is when I finally decided that I must work with these two different Lahores as design motifs for my wall tiles as my thesis topic.tHis is my story, and I think other viewers and architects will always relate to it because we all lived in congested parts of Lahore at some point, and now that many of us live in modern parts of Lahore with wide roads, geometrically easier to understand maps, and planned interior spaces, we still want to go back to inner city on some mela,basant or just to shop.Whenever our senior relatives visit us from abroad,we always take them back to inner city where they become tearful remembering how they lived and played with dozens of other people in these narrow streets.

So,I hope my designs will show both Lahores as having different beauties ( one of hustle and bustle of inner city, and other of peace and calm of organised suburbs), and if used in new constructions, they will fulfil our desire and longing to keep our old city in our hearts and as constructed permanent part of our living spaces.

While researching the image, the views show me two sides of one city. Each side show an exciting thought and form. There is always something that classifies things; in the images, I found roads and the idea to differentiate the organized and unorganized construction. One side is overcrowded, undisciplined, and forcefully developed, and the other shows disciplined, well-planned areas. It shows the beauty of the city.

Design Concept

As I explained before that we usually see the city we have been living in since we are born from just one perspective. Either inner city, or suburbs, remaining aloof to the other part and their lifestyle.

But if we look at some simple apps like google earth or google maps, or look at some drone footage in some drama or national song, the bird's eye view changes the whole perspective of the city, converting it from planned to unplanned. Vanishing all the details and converting them into cubic-like shapes. Streets and roads look like lines, and building take shape of 4,5 or even 6 sided shapes.

So as a start,I took these simplified maps as 2D drawings, and I gave those shapes some height and different up and down levels.

In the beginning I was too excited by creating many layers and making more complex and rich looking tiles in effort to show my entire concept.My tiles were very big as well (12" by 16")

But soon I resized that I could not take this experiment too far because practically these complex and richly levelled designs could not go into mass production.

These could be produced as limited production large wall murals, but for mass produced tiles, the designs were too complex too be handled, cast, finished, fired and transported.

And if I somehow did produce some multiples, that wastage margin would be too high and cost unaffordable. So with help of my advisors,I started dividing my huge tiles into smaller tiles which were much easier to handled.

I used some street maps of complex areas like following in parts of my designs.

Design Development/Design Process

As I explained before,I started with more complex designs, but later simplified it to smaller tiles and visually appealing lines and volumes that remained as close to Lahore's maps as possible.

The process followed following steps.

1.CAD Drawings

After finalizing the design and completing the drawing process, the next step is to make the tiles into the actual state. In the beginning, I tried to make them with my hands. However, it wasn't working correctly. Then I tried to use technology to transfer the design perfectly due to accuracy.

2.CNC Machine / AutoCAD Files

I decided to get my molds through the CNC Machine.Following are some files I made.For CNC cutting 3d files of a design is necessary. I made the designs via using Sketchup.

3.Mould Making Process

Usually we make the object we want in solid plaster and then make a mould from it which is used for slip casting.It is a long process and takes lot of time.Our teacher Madam Shazia taught us a method where we make the model in 3D program or CAD and then carve it directly as a mould on blank plaster sheets.This saves two processes.One of model making and second of mould making by hand.The carved mould is made by a CNC machine which is accurate and this method was very suitable for my topic.

Plaster is set

Plaster slab is dried completely

CNC machine starts carving

4.Fabrication Process in Clay

In dry plaster moulds,i pour a layer of slip to form a thin coating and to pick all finer details of design

Then I pour slip out and empty the mould.

Then I fit and press plastic clay in the mould with hands.This is because tiles must use clay with least form of moisture, otherwise they will warp and crack.

Then I smooth out the surface and leave it inside mould to get leather hard,after which I take the tile out and leave it to slow dry in studio for 5-6 days.

Firing Process

One of the most fundamental aspects of the firing process is to be vigilant about the temperature and time. Initially, it troubled me a lot due to warpage and crackage. I tried to fire the stoneware at 1100 degrees Celsius. However, the tile was wrapped at a 1100-degree temperature to maintain the tile in the appropriate form, so I reduced the temperature. After many experiments, I fired the stoneware at 1050 degrees Celsius. And for terracotta, I fired them on 1000, so the engobe will set with the clay, and the tile doesn't warp.

Color Palette

Engobe recipe for both terracotta and stoneware

· Stain 10%, 15%

· Clay body 70%

· Transparent Glaze 30% terracotta

In the beginning,I didn't know how to choose colours.So I did some experiment with colours and glazes with available colours in market.

I wanted glazed tiles but after doing a few samples I found out that glazed and shiny surface makes my designs look different and bad.So I chose to go for matt glazes or matte engobes.

My final color palette was formed when I realised that in Lahore's tiles,i must use Lahores's colours which were the terra cotta colours of brick buildings.

So I tried to develop shades in two following categories.

1.Different shades of terra cotta.Sincs I was also inspired by khingar eent and also from burnt bricks,I did not try too hard to keep the terra cotta color too uniform, because accidental smoked and dark parts add character to my designs.

2. I tried to make some tiles in the shades of grey and buff grey so that they may be used with un-painted polished cement walls.I also used slightly greenish and bluish cement colours because these are popular wall colours.

overall I have used 10 to 15% stains in my engobes.

Final Designs

Following are the main compositions of my designs, but all of these tiles can also be used individually in repeats or in combination with plain tiles to add space in between.

A Special Kind of Tile

As I mentioned before,I have been working with some architects, so I know what the trends are.One of the good trend is that eco-friendly materials are liked by senior architects because these materials cause less or no harm to environment and incests and birds.One such this is use of teverton pours stone for wall cladding.This stone has holes in it, which let ants make home.I tried my best to develop wall tiles with such holes by adding grog, rice husk and saw dust so that environmentally friendly tiles can be produced. It will take me a few months to come up with more successful designs but I was able to make one such tile.