Fall 2015
Southern California Institute of Architecture
Michael Rotondi
Individual Work
“Quality architecture is when a building manages to move me.”
~Peter Zumthor
The Peak was designed with the intention of becoming a relaxation destination. Turning it’s back to the stressful and harsh life of the city, the Peak aims to break the repetitive and exhausting lifestyle of the typical citizen who wakes up, sits in traffic, works all day, endures more traffic, goes to sleep and repeats.
The Peak attracts strained citizens from all around to come and relax in the cavernous womb. The project is seen as a mountainous cavern that has been smashed into the site, reverberating its presence and formal break from the typical city typology. It entices visitors with its sensuous atmospheres created from unique articulations that are similar to that of a geode. Some spaces are intimate, while
others are vast. The variety of sensuous spaces are accompanied with inviting pools that vary in temperature.
The pools and geode-esque rooms are paired in their layout such that the typical progression through the cavern allows for an increasing level of relaxation and revitalization. The first, most intimate space, has the coolest temperature of water. The second, larger space, has a warmer temperature of water. The final room, which is the largest, has the hottest temperature of water. This leveling of formal breadth and water condition
coincide with the idea that a typical advancement through the cavern would correspond with the increase in relaxation. Users will come to the Peak haggard, tired, and strained and will leave with a sense of tranquility, serenity and of course, relaxation
