William Pyle
Texas Tech University
Huckabee College of Architecture
“GLULAM PLATFORM.” Car travel and traditional architectural materials such as concrete and steel contribute to a great deal of carbon emissions. Utilizing long spanning GLULAM mega-trusses and designing an urban mobility hub centered around ride sharing through carpooling and public transit allows the entire building to act as a carbon sink. The GLULAM PLATFORM is an urban mobility hub located in downtown El Paso. The building is meant to transport many of the towns transit users to various locations citywide in an effective manner while also reducing the amount of car-induced carbon emissions. © William Pyle.
Jury
Debbie Ahmari
Joseph Kunkel
Ann Lui
Dawveed Scully
Robert L. Wesley (Chair)
Being selected as one of the winners of the Robert L Wesley Award is a momentous push towards achieving my dream of becoming an architect. Having the opportunity to study architecture at the level that I do and having the chance to not only apply for but win such an award means I am achieving my dream of breaking a bad cycle for men in my lineage.
“MASS TIMBER ENVELOPE.” Using architecture as a study on environmental factors effecting the city of El Paso’s urban fabric, the Dust Institute utilizes form and skin design to capture dust particulates for studying in lab and experimentation spaces. Type IV construction in the form of GLULAM and CLT allow for the buildings magnetic skin to perform without any interferences. © William Pyle.
William is a tireless worker who is self-motivated, inventive, creative, and he takes time to properly research his topics in order to substantiate his solutions in design studio. William is current with the contemporary condition of world architecture and theory, making him inquisitive about what the future of the profession might be.
Guillermo Barajas, Instructor, Huckabee College of Architecture, Texas Tech University
“RECLAIMED STEEL TOWER,” Medellin, Colombia. Using government investments in youth as a catalyst for societal growth and improvements, the RECLAIMED STEEL TOWER utilizes a ground floor podium program as a public forum and a public soccer pitch for organized and unorganized games or “retas.” Alongside the athletic investments, the tower itself will serve as a place for structured curriculums to take place in the public and private classroom settings on each of the “work + study” levels. The patchwork takes shape with an idea of shifting bay sizes to house different programs and in rings to house different concepts of mandatory thresholds. © William Pyle.
Upon reviewing William’s work, it is clear that he is gifted with natural talent and inherent intelligence.
Debra Ahmari, Juror
“RECLAIMED STEEL TOWER.” Shared kitchens optimized communal cooking and energy/gas expenditures. A kitchen on either side of the units serves their respective sides. By separating the sleeping quarters and work + study programs, Pyle hopes to push an idea of necessary vertical threshold experience that promotes physical activity as well as discontinuing concepts of merged living and sleeping to improve mental health and focus. © William Pyle.
William Pyle
Texas Tech University
Huckabee College of Architecture
William Pyle
is a fourth-year student at the Texas Tech University Huckabee College of Architecture in El Paso, Texas. Growing up on the borderland metroplex in the liminal space between El Paso, Texas, and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Pyle dealt with the harsh reality of violent border hostile architecture and record-breaking crime rates in Juarez. Since then, he has pursued a design philosophy that revolves around equity for the environment and for the minoritized communities experiencing rapid urbanization such as El Paso and other borderland cities in Texas. Pyle was the winner of two citywide architecture competitions in two consecutive years as a high schooler and would begin his education at the local El Paso Community College. Upon transferring to the El Paso branch of the TTU HCOA, he was hired as an undergraduate research assistant for POST (Project for Operative Spatial Technologies) where he works under professors and architects Stephen Mueller and Ersela Kripa. In POST he learnt and worked within the realms of borderland and ultraviolet light exposures where he absorbed systems-based designing strategies for his own projects.