Capabilities - bellcr.combellcr.com/wp-content/uploads/2005/12/Portfolio-20130406.pdf · Capabilities HAND-DRAWN AXONOMETRIC: Student project - office lobby & conference room for

Capabilities

cb e l l5 0 @ g m a i l . co m � 70 3 . 470 . 1882HAND-DRAWN AXONXX OMETRIC: Student project - office lobby & conference room for Airbus.

Char lot te R Be l l , I IDA , LEED ID&C

Contents

design by Charlotte Bell. Layout done in Adobe InDesign.Fonts: Titles - SF Grandezza; Body Text - GeosansLight; Sidebar Text - Futuri Light ; Captions - GeosansLight; Blog excerpts: Eterna

3D SKETCHES: Exercise in furniture design class.

� Summary of Design Resumé

� Projects - Photos, Renderings, & Drawings

� Details

� Hand Drafting & Sketching

� Research & Writing

� Fun Things


Summary of Design Resumé

SELECTED CLIENT LIST

BAKER & DANIELS: All phases of design for new office space; FF&E

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT: Multipleinterior renovation projects, 5,000-50,000 SF (images not shown due to security policies); LEED certification

FIDELITY INVESTMENTS: All phases of office project; LEED certification

GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT:Programming and conceptual design

OGILVY PUBLIC RELATIONS: Design development & construction drawings

REAL ESTATE DEVELOPMENT FIRMS: Tenant improvements; toilet rooms; fitness facilities; BOMA calculations

SUTHERLAND: Office expansions; library and conference roomrenovations

THE CHRISTMAN COMPANY: Officespace; secure room

Full resumé available on request.

�Work Experience

Associate Interior Designer, HGA Mid-Atlantic, Inc., Alexandria, VA. 2010 to 2013; Interior Designer,Ward Corporation, Rockville, MD, 2009 to 2010; Project Manager, Rippeteau Architects, Washington,DC, 2009; and Designer, Gensler, Washington, DC, 2007 to 2009: Programming, Schematic Design/Space Planning, Design Development, FF&E, Construction Documents, Specifications, and ConstructionAdministration for range of commercial interiors projects. Experience in both private and government sectors. Knowledge of SCIF standards and BOMA calculations. Administrator for LEED project. Security clearance.

� Education

Marymount University, Arlington, VA, Master of Arts, 2008: Interior Design, CIDA accredited programculminating in written masters thesis.

Stanford University, Stanford, CA, Bachelor of Arts, 1975: Studio Art.

� Certifications & Professional Associations

LEED ID & C

IIDA, Professional Member

� Technology

Revit; AutoCAD; SketchUp; Microsoft Office Suite; Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Acrobat, and InDesign.


Consulting Firm

BAKER & DANIELS

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: New35,000 SF office space in LEED certi-fied building.

RESPONSIBILITIES: Programming, de-sign development, FF&E, construction drawings, and construction administra-tion, with primary responsibility for the café, catering kitchen, custom mill-work, and FF&E.

RESPONSIBILITIES - FINISHES & FUR-NITURE: Research, selection, specifi-cation, and coordination of systemsfurniture, loose furniture, and finishesthroughout project, including texturedpaint, acid stained concrete, and ter-razzo.

RESPONSIBILITIES - CAFÉ: Design and detailing of pantry and café, including millwork, finishes, furniture, equip-ment, and ceiling systems.

IMAGES, clockwise from top left:Café, facing toward the pantry; café,facing toward lounge and readingarea; pantry; pantry ceiling detail; and canopy ceiling over dining area.

Top right photo courtesy of Maryland Office Interiors; other photos by Charlotte R Bell


Consulting Firm

BAKER & DANIELS

RESPONSIBILITIES - CONFERENCE& MEETING ROOMS: Selection,specification, and bidding for furniture and finishes, including custom tables and banquettes.

RESPONSIBILITIES - RECEPTION:Material research and design oflimestone accent wall and selection offurniture and finishes.

RESPONSIBLITIES - MILLWORK:Design and detailing of custommillwork for the entire project,including glass and stainless steel credenzas, a unique wood and steelmodular reception desk, pantry, catering kitchen, and work areas.

IMAGES, clockwise from top left:Conference room looking towardreception; reception accent wall and furniture; custom reception desk;meeting room furniture; detail of custom millwork; and detail of custom sycamore conference tables.

Photos by Charlotte R Bell


Consulting Firm

BAKER & DANIELS

RESPONSIBILITIES - OPEN WORK AREAS: Research, specification, bidding, and verification of loose and systems furniture and finishes.

IMAGE: Open work area.

Photo courtesy of Maryland Office Interiors.


Consulting Firm

BAKER & DANIELS

IMAGES: Elevations, furniture plan, and reflected ceiling plan for the caféand pantry.

Drawings created in Revit.Construction drawings available on request.


Financial Services Firm

FIDELITY

GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: 5,600 SF space for the Fidelity GovernmentAffairs office in DC. The projectearned LEED Gold certification.

RESPONSIBILITIES: Schematic design,design development (including meeting formal client standards); codecompliance, construction drawings, construction administration, and the architectural portions of the LEEDprocess.

IMAGES, clockwise from top left: Entry, looking toward the small conferenceroom; reception area; office; reception servery; main corridor; pantry; andlarge conference room.

PRODUCTION: Presentations in SketchUp and Illustrator, finish boards, and construction drawings in AutoCAD.

Photos by Charlotte Bell



FIDELITY

GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS

IMAGE: Furniture plan.

Drawing created in AutoCAD.Construction drawings available on request.



FIDELITY

GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS

RESPONSIBILITIES - CUSTOMMILLWORK & COMPLEX DETAILING: The client required a pass-through between the conference room andpantry, with sliding doors on the conference side and a tambour door on the pantry side. Achieving this pass-through involved complexdetailing and careful planning to achieve neat material transitions and to accommodate the requestedfeatures within the limits of the building structure.

IMAGES, clockwise from top left:Pass-through from conference room with sliding doors closed; detail of conference-side panels; detail of tambour door installation; partially-open tambour door from pantry; and pass-through with tambour door closed and sliding doors open.

Construction drawings available on request.



FInancial Services Firm

FIDELITY

GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS

IMAGES: Details of pass-through shown on previous page.

Drawings created in AutoCAD.Construction drawings available on request.


Higher Education

GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY

SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: The GMUSchool of Management hoped torenovate and rebrand its existing 13,500 SF office space to better serve its graduate and undergraduatepopulations and present a savvy imagefor potential investors. The programincluded an updated lobby, expandedreception area, conference room,trading room, pantry, office space,and IT suite.

RESPONSIBILITIES: Programming questionnaires, interviews, and Program and Concept Report; site analysis; conceptual space plan, ceiling plan, and design; andpreliminary finish selections.

IMAGES: Top - Lobby. Bottom -Reception, view from Lobby.

The final Program and Concept Report, showing programming,concept development options, and additional images, is available on request.

Renderings by Thomas Seuss


Higher Education



IMAGES:Top - Conference Room,view from Lobby. Bottom - TradingRoom, view from Lobby.

Additional higher education projects for this client included franchise food service installations, a gait analysis lab, and office renovations.

Additional higher education projects included a theater renovation, elevator renovations, a faculty lounge, and student lounges for NVCC.

Renderings by Thomas Seuss


Higher Education



IMAGES: Conceptual space andreflected ceiling plans


General Contractor

THE CHRISTMAN COMPANY

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: 4,100 SF Mid-Atlantic headquarters for a general contractor. Project includedglass office and conference roomfronts, custom millwork, and a secure room complying with SCIF requirements.

RESPONSIBILITIES: Programming,space planning, FF&E, andconstruction drawings.

IMAGE: View from reception through open pantry/collaboration area toglass-enclosed conference room with back-painted glass writing surface. Custom movable plans storage unit is on the right.

Photo by Ron Blunt Photography


General Contractor


IMAGES: Top - Glazed offices with custom millwork worksurfaces.Bottom - Conference room with movable wood panels to reveal back-painted glass writing surface.

Photos by Ron Blunt Photography


General Contractor





Medical Device Manufacturer

K2M

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: Expansion of an existing office for an artificial spine manufacturer. The expansion incorporated new office space, acadaver lab suite, locker rooms, an exercise facility, a materials lab, and an electron microscope room.

RESPONSIBILITIES: Programming, space planning, and initial construction drawings.

IMAGE: Final space plan.

Additional projects completed for this client included prior office expansionsand an upgraded executive toiletroom. Construction drawings available on request.


Public Relations Firm

OGILVY PUBLIC RELATIONS

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: 8,000 SFoffice for a public relations firm in Sacramento, California.

RESPONSIBILITIES: Assisted designteam in design development,finish selection, millwork design, furniture selection and specification,construction document production,and design of a special entryway.


Drawing created in Revit. Construction drawings available on request.


Civil Engineering Company

SCHNABEL ENGINEERING

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: 11,000 SF branch office for a civil engineering company. The project was below grade with glazing above the openoffice area. The project also includeda materials laboratory (not shown here).

RESPONSIBILITIES: Programming, space planning, FF&E, construction drawings, and construction administration.

IMAGE: Final test fit.



Details

EXTENSIVE EXPERIENCE: I was the “go-to” person for custom details in the Interiors department at HGA.

CAD DETAIL LIBRARY: I developed astandard CAD detail library for Rip-peteau Architects, including partition types and details; door types andhead, jamb, and sill details; ceiling details; finish transition details; andmillwork details.

IMAGES, clockwise from top left: Ceil-ing detail for gait analysis lab; acous-tic partition with viewing window for public radio station; pocket door plan;typical base cabinet with drawers; and door sill with automatic seal.


Hand Drafting

ARCHITECTURAL DRAFTING

AXONOMETRIC: Pencil drawing of classroom produced for first archtec-tural drafting class.

Additional design school work can befound at http://bellcr.com.


Hand Sketching

PENCIL SKETCHES

MODERN BUILDINGS: Pencil sketches done from photographs taken of modern buildings in Washington, DCfor a modern architectural history class.

Original drawings can be shown on request. Additional design school work can be found at http://bellcr.com.


Research

GRADUATE THESIS: ABSTRACT

The competitiveness of a business pro-viding services rather than goods rests on whether its customers perceive theservices to be of good quality. Amongthe factors that strongly influence the perception of service quality is the inte-rior environment of the place in which services are received. This thesis reviews several lines of business-based researchthat examine how the interior environ-ment affects customers’ perceptions of service quality, proposes a modelsynthesizing this research into seven primary influences on the perception of service quality – functional, tempo-ral, physical, ambient, psychological,indicative, and social – and discusses the role that design of the interior environment plays in each of these influences. The concepts discussed areof significance to business becausethey demonstrate the value of design in a business setting and to the interior design profession because they expandthe interior design body of knowledgebeyond the confines of design-basedresearch.

(The full thesis can be found at http://bellcr.com.)

Blog Post: “Bullpen vs pod”

I did a quick study for a class, comparing the ease of collaboration in a bullpenwork environment to a pod work environment and found some unexpectedresults.

A “bullpen” is an open area with a group of workstations that are not visuallyseparated:

A “pod”is a small group of workstations that are enclosed within walls that arehigh enough that occupants cannot see into the next pod:

The study asked pod and bullpen occupants how easy it was to collaborate intheir current environments and asked bullpen occupants whether it was easier orharder to collaborate in the bullpen than in the pods. Just over half of the peopleasked to complete the survey were housed in pods; the rest had moved within thelast few months from pods to the bullpen.

I expected that it would be easier to collaborate in the open bullpen environment since other research has shown that open workplaces encourage collaboration,particularly if workers have visual and aural connection. The bullpen seemed tofit this description exactly - it was open, workers could see and hear each otherreadily over the low partitions that divided them from others, and were in closerproximity than in the pods.

However, my survey revealed that pod dwellers are much more likely tocollaborate than people in bullpen environments. Here are some of the results.

76% of pod occupants on one floor of the study office and 86% of podoccupants on the other floor said they found it “very easy” to collaborate withpeople in their pods. On the bullpen floor, only 11% said collaboration with thosein their immediate vicinity was “very easy.” None of the pod occupants said that collaboration was “very hard,” whereas 20% of the bullpen occupants did select “very hard.”

When asked how easy or hard it was to collaborate with team members not in the pod or immediate vicinity, 19% of pod dwellers found it “very easy,” but none said it was “very hard.” Only 6% of bullpen dwellers, however, said that such

collaboration was “very easy” and 14% said it was “very hard.” Everyone else ratedtheir collaboration experience as “somewhat easy” or “somewhat hard.”

Finally, bullpen dwellers were asked to compare the ease of collaborationin the bullpen environment to the ease of collaboration in their previouspod environments. 11% said it was “much easier” to collaborate withproximate workers in the bullpens, but 43% said it was “much harder.”9% said it was “much easier” to collaborate with non-proximate team members in the bullpens, but 40% reported this as “much harder.”

This study suggests that the bullpen layout does not necessarily promotetcollaboration.

Other factors such as privacy needs, resistance to change, noise, and circulationpatterns may have been in play. Only the furniture configuration was studied.

My opinion, based on personal observations of the subject office and not on the study results, is that the negative reactions to the open bullpen layout hadthree causes. First, workers had no privacy. The space was too open and peoplewere distracted by nearby activity. Even the most collaborative workers needsome quiet time and some privacy. Decreasing efforts to collaborate might be an attempt to increase privacy and personal space.

Second, the bullpen’s circulation paths were indirect and invaded the work space of individual workers. To talk to people who were not in the immediate vicinity, bullpen workers had to travel behind everyone else in their row to themain path at the end, cross to the row of the person they wished to visit, then move back up another narrow path behind the backs of the workers in that row. This path may have seemed long and involved the invasion of other workers’private space. In the pods, in contrast, the circulation path was direct and public- workers took 3 or 4 steps to exit the pod onto the public path and never had to walk directly behind someone’s back.

Third, the bullpen layout in the office studied wasn’t set up to facilitate the impromptu interaction opportunities that characterize collaboration. The pods were interspersed with tall workcounters spaced along the common circulationpath and workers regularly convened there, both spontaneously and by appointment, to collaborate on projects. In contrast, the bullpen area had only low files and a few tables placed near senior staff workstations, neither of which could be used for spontaneous collaborative purposes. Workers had no place togather other than in separate meeting rooms.

Further research is needed to determine the extent to which these additional factors influence collaboration in these working environments.

Original blog post: June 23, 2007. http://bellcr.com/?p=201


Blog Post: “The World is Flat”The World is Flat, Thomas L. Friedman’s book about globalization in the 21st

century, keeps popping up on my radar and triggering ideas. Today I read aninterview entitled “Wake Up and Face the Flat Earth” that Nayan Chanda, editorof YaleGlobal Online magazine, did with Friedman in 2005. In the interview,Friedman says:

“Money, jobs, and opportunity in the flat world will go to the countries with thebest infrastructure, the best education system that produces the most educatedwork force, the most investor-friendly laws, and the best environment. You put those four things together: quality of environment that attracts knowledgeablepeople, investment laws that encourage entrepreneurship, education, andinfrastructure.”

Friedman is talking about what countries must do to be competitive in theflattened world of the 21st century. But suppose we translate Friedman’s fourpoints from the country level to a single firm. How can any one companyincorporate Friedman’s ideas to ensure its own competitive position in the flat world? Here are my thoughts:

1. Quality of Environment: Firms need to make their companies great placesto work. Several things contribute: comfortable and usable workspaces, goodemployee benefits, and positive organizational cultures. For example, employeesare more productive when they have control over their working conditions -lighting levels, air temperature, noise level, furniture fit, etc. Including benefitssuch as health insurance in employees compensation packages attracts higher-quality employees and increases existing employees’ feeling of security. A culturethat values intelligence, ideas, and collaboration generally achieves greater successthan one that is based on power plays and inflexible ways of doing things.

2. Entrepreneurship: Firms need to encourage internal entrepreneurship byencouraging innovation, creativity, and risk taking and tolerating the mistakes that go along with exploration of new ideas.

3. Education: Firms must provide their employees with opportunities to learnnew things by having in-house seminars, supporting continuing education efforts,or simply working learning time into weekly schedules.

4. Infrastructure: Firms will need to explore new types of partnerships with othercompanies, both local and global, to ensure that they can provide the best product or service to their customers. In-house, employees must be given the proper toolsto do their jobs, be it computers that contain the right software, communicationtools, or physical tools.

In most cases, transitioning into the new flat world will require an initialexpenditure of time and money and perhaps some radical and difficult revamping of organizational thinking. But, just as countries that fail to adjust will loose theircompetitive position in the world political and economic arena, firms that neglect or refuse to change will find themselves left behind in their marketplaces. Designfirms are not exempt.

Original blog post: September 1, 2006. http://bellcr.com/?p=148

PUBLICATIONS

“The Role of the Interior Environment in the Perception of Service Quality, a Business Perspective.” Master’s thesis, Marymount University, 2008. The the-sis can be found at http://bellcr.com.

Personal blog: Essays and graduateschool writing, http://bellcr.com.

“Historic Preservation: A New Section106 process,” 17 Envir. L. Rptr. 1002 (1987).

“Questions and Answers About the Transition from the Council’s Former Regulations to its Revised Regulations,” Advisory Council on Historic Preserva-tion (1986).

Federal Historic Preservation Case Law,Advisory Council on Historic Preserva-tion (1985), reprinted in part in 15Envir. L. Rptr. 10348 (1985).

Advisory Council on Historic Preserva-tion – “Recent Developments under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act,” with John M. Fowler, 1 Pres. L. Rptr. 2030 (1981).

Writing

Blog Post: “Collective Thinking”What does it mean to “think”? The immediate answer is that thinking is the

exercise of intelligence, reason, logic, and so forth, but it’s equally clear that thinking goes beyond “book learning” to involve life experience, social skills,basic curiosity and, perhaps most important, a willingness to step outside safeboundaries.

One of these boundaries is certainty. In his book The Long Tail, Wired Magazineeditor Chris Anderson talks about Google, blogs, Wikipedia, and other sites that operate on the “alien logic of probabilistic statistics.” By this he means that thecontent of these sites is not certain, but is based on probability. For example,Wikipedia is created, monitored, and updated by users, with an incredible numberof in-depth articles on nearly any topic one can imagine. Because, however, thearticles are not backed up by experts, as is the case with traditional encyclopediassuch as Britannica, it is not certain that the facts in the articles are accurate, thoughthe probability is quite high. Britannica’s online version has some 118,000 articles;the English version of Wikipedia has 1,336,000. Certainty may be lost, but a worldof information is gained.

This mode of amassing information works with minimal or no structure.Anderson states, “The true miracle of Wikipedia is that this open system of amateuruser contributions and edits doesn’t simply collapse into anarchy. Instead, it hassomehow self-organized the most comprehensive encyclopedia in history.”

This reminds me of the collective “thinking” of social insect colonies, which,though composed of many individuals, operate as a single entity - a phenomenonsometimes referred to as “collective intelligence” or “swarm intelligence.” DavidGordon, in his essay “Collective Intelligence in Social Insects,” discusses theorganizational processes of insect colonies and applies them to science, math,and ultimately modern life. He concludes: “It’s possible that this type of thinking will characterise the 21st century, where mighty corporations and institutionsevaporate into networks of nodes and sub-nodes. Where individuals, dwarfed bythe social, political, economic and informational networks they comprise onceagain surface as the collective masters of those networks.”

My question is: can this way of looking at things be translated into the design of an interior space, a building, or a community? The design process is one of drilling down from general requirements to specific and accurate details. This attention todetail is vital - after all, designers must ensure the health and safety of the peoplewho will be using a space. But does this process restrain innovation and creativityby limiting design thinking to forms, materials, and processes that are certain? Is it possible for designers to tap into the collective intelligence of not only client decisionmakers, but also of the client’s employees, customers, business partners,and communities? Can designers create solutions by drawing from the collectiveintelligence of the entire design community or even from that of the human worldat large? One might say that the collective experience of architects and designersover the centuries has resulted in a alien logic for design, but the profession is stillchurning out dysfunctional, non-sustainable structures. Perhaps it’s time for a newtype of thinking in the design world.

Original blog post: August 28, 2006. http://bellcr.com/?p=144


Fun Things - Cakes & Quilts

CAKES & QUILTS

CAKES: Cakes made for clients of my small gourmet dessert business, Charlotte’s. Products included cakes,wedding cakes, coffee cakes, anddessert sauces (fudge, mocha caramel,and raspberry). Yum.

QUILTS: Top photo is a sampler quilt;bottom photo is a kaleidoscope quilt. Machine pieced and hand quilted.

Additional photographs of cakes & quilts can be found at http://bellcr.com.

