„Lighthouses are endlessly suggestive signifiers of both human isolation and our ultimate connectedness to each other.“
(Virginia Wolf)
The light that shows the way home, the lighthouse, serves as an inspiration from a personal experience that influenced the overall design of the cardboard architecture. After being succumbed by the vastness of the seas for hours, the sun was about to fall, and all was left was time. A flicker of light grabbed my weak eyes’ attention and took me to the safety of the shores. Meanwhile, when crafting this masterpiece, all I have thought was the time I got lost at sea; earlier, the design was not attaining my vision, revisiting my past resurrected the lighthouse occurrence. Additionally, the spiral figure of the architecture anthropomorphizes waves, which add a sense of complexity and smoothness to the structure. Although missing creativity, I strived to embody the lighthouse as the warmth of the sun and the care of a mother taking her children in before dusk while crafting the cardboard architecture. The cardboard architecture resembles a meaningful part of me, which I will never take for granted, again, home.
As rapid prototyping and research is coming to an end and the final product is approaching its fruition, I imagine my final architecture to look nothing short but professional, especially now that I am equipped and well adept. Currently, the cone-like structure in comparison to other prototypes will sustain metal wires to grip the entire structure, and as previously calculated, 2 kilograms is a lot for 3mm wire to withstand! Nonetheless, the metal wires will be bent carefully to accommodate the spiral design of the lighthouse. This will ensure that the wavy base of the entire architecture is sturdier and vertical, with no signs of leaning. The waves will be cut unevenly, and unproportionate to one another as waves in its nature are all unique, no wave appears as another wave. The house of the lighthouse will be a series of cardboard, which will be spiraled side by side to create a small vertical structure out of the wavy cardboard. This design will allow the lighthouse to appear as if the house has stemmed from the body itself rather than gluing a house atop the structure.
With extensive research at hand, I utilized the medium of science as a tool to help perfect the overall design of the cardboard architecture. I have searched for various forms of lighthouses around the world that have different designs that hold either an aesthetic meaning or functional usage behind the overall structure. I believe that my architecture has an aesthetic significance and foundation of the architecture, the spiral, holds that significance. As previously mentioned the importance of the spiral represents waves, and the irregularities of the spiral also match the uniqueness of waves in nature. I believe that future designers can indeed adapt my design and the overall structure to be robust enough to hold the entire structure together. For instance, in the future, sizeable 3D printing could exist, which could allow the whole structure to maintain extreme spirals and still hold the structure well. Also, it is worth considering that spiral and not just the top could serve of touristic or homing use. Instead of building a separate home, the lighthouse keeper could live within the structure as well.
