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January 16, 2026 - Surjan Super School Weekly Newsletter




SURJAN SUPER SCHOOL NEWSLETTER

WEEK OF JANUARY 16, 2026


Theme: The Concrete Bouquet & The Knitted City

INTRODUCTION: THE INFRASTRUCTURE OF OPTIMISM

We are mid-January. The city is gray, the trees are bare, and the studio has collectively decided to rebel against the winter.

Our prompt this week was simple: What if infrastructure bloomed?

We are moving past the idea of "green architecture" (which usually just means gluing a bush to a balcony) and entering the era of Floral Tectonics. The images we generated this week propose bridges, towers, and floating platforms where the flower is not decoration—it is the structure itself.

We are knitting steel. We are carving timber into petals. We are building the city as a permanent spring.

01. THE CORN-COB BOUQUET

(Ref: The Marina City Interventions)

The most ambitious study this week reimagines the base of the iconic "Corn Cob" towers (reminiscent of Marina City in Chicago).

Instead of a parking garage, we proposed a "Floral Patterned Bowl Base".

  • The Logic: The technical drawings reveal that this isn't just a mural. It is a "Layered Assembly" of "Wood Construction Structural Components". The facade is thick, dimensional, and tactile.

  • The Aesthetic: The "Pink Floral Facade" and "Yellow Floral Facade" wrap the brutalist concrete cores in a soft, organic embrace. It turns the base of the tower into a massive planter, creating a "Concrete Bouquet" that reflects beautifully in the river below.

02. THE KNITTED CANOPY

(Ref: The Fabric Structures)

We also explored the concept of "soft spans."

The "Knitted Floral Canopy" project challenges the rigidity of traditional roofing.

  • The Material: We are looking at a "Temporary Print" on a textile membrane that mimics the texture of a knitted sweater.

  • The Structure: This soft skin is draped over a rigid "Upper Timber Arch Structure". It creates a covered public plaza that feels like living inside a quilt. The "Pink and Yellow" floral pattern scales up the domestic comfort of a blanket to the urban scale of a city block.

03. THE PETAL PLATFORM

(Ref: The Floating Infrastructure)

Finally, we took the garden to the water.

The "Pink Petal Roof Structure" is a proposal for a floating pavilion.

  • The Geometry: The roof is defined by massive, cantilevered petals that channel rainwater into the center (a reverse-umbrella typology).

  • The Base: It sits on a "Yellow Floating Hull" with circular perforations—a "Yellow Perforated Cladding"—that acts as a playful counterpoint to the delicate roof. This is infrastructure designed for joy, turning a ferry terminal or a viewing platform into a giant lily pad.

FINAL THOUGHT: SCALE IS THE MEDIUM

The lesson this week is that Cute becomes Monumental when you change the scale.

A flower on a desk is pretty. A flower that is 30 stories tall and holding up a skyscraper is sublime. A knitted pattern on a sweater is cozy. A knitted pattern on a stadium roof is architectural innovation.

Don't be afraid to take the small, soft things of the world and blow them up until they become the world itself.

Stay blooming,

Surjan

Professor of Practice, ASU

Founder, Surjan Super School

 
 
 
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