Carol_Portfolio

ARCHITECTURE

P T R F L O O

CAROL ZHAO

SELECTED WORKS

2022- 2025 -

ARCHITECTURE

Museum Design

Academic Work

Group Project

Duration 12 weeks

Spring 2025

Mixed-Use Community Design

Academic Work

Individual Project

Duration 10 weeks

Winter 2024

Residential Design

Academic Work

Individual Project

Duration 7 weeks

Winter 2022

04

05

06

PULL & PLAY TOWER OF HARMONY FLEXI-WALL

Modular Stage Design

Academic Work

Group Project

Duration 12 weeks

Winter 2025

Installation Design

Personal Work

Individual Project

Duration 2 weeks

Winter 2023

Experiential Design

Self-oriented Competition

Group Project

Duration 3 months

Winter 2023

01 CONTINUUM MUSEUM

The Continuum Museum reframes the climate crisis through the conceptual lens of quantum mechanics, where superposition and entanglement become metaphors for environmental uncertainty and the multiplicity of possible futures. Rather than presenting climate change as a fixed trajectory, the museum positions each visitor as an active participant within a continuum of choices and consequences.

Sited in Century Gardens, the building presents itself as a singular, monolithic mass. Its material paradox is central to the concept: an unsustainable, heavy shell clad in sustainable facade systems and integrated photovoltaic panels, embodying the tension between environmental harm and responsibility that the museum interrogates.

At the heart of the scheme, a central atrium anchored by a spiral staircase serves as the primary organizational spine and organizes the entire visitor journey. Immersive exhibition galleries are fully enclosed with no openings, powered by an embedded quantum computing system that generates real-time, non-linear climate narratives, creating a spatial experience as uncertain and layered as the future itself.

8 th St SW

Exsiting Amphitheater Loading Dock

Exsiting Water Feature

Fourth Floor

Ground Floor

02 COMMON GROUND

Located at the intersection of 11th Ave and 13th Street, Common Ground addresses the absence of social infrastructure in a disconnected urban environment. The project transforms a downtown corner into a community hub for a diverse population, including newcomers, residents, and the general public, by rethinking how programs and spaces can work together to foster connection.

Rather than separating functions into isolated zones, the design organizes three primary programs, a newcomer center, recreational facilities, and residential units, into three overlapping activity patterns: social and interaction, learning and growth, and active and wellness, forming “the community”, a zone where different user groups can intersect, learn, and coexist. The interplay between public, semi-public, and private spaces is equally central. Residential units occupy a private corner while public and semi-public programs share larger, more open volumes. An atrium acts as a spatial buffer while creating moments of connection. Circulation paths are differentiated yet subtly linked. Public escalators, semi-public corridors, and private residential stairs each serve distinct user groups while allowing for unexpected encounters across boundaries.

GALLERY

RECEPTION

BETWEEN WORK & LIFE

Between Work & Life proposes a co-living community for remote workers, responding to the social isolation intensified by highrise living and the COVID-19 pandemic. The project asks how residential architecture can actively rebuild community in an era where the boundaries between work and home have collapsed. The design distributes massing to balance private units with generous communal areas, creating a community-focused environment that encourages spontaneous social interaction. Shared spaces, including a café, collaborative workspaces, and a central courtyard, are integrated throughout the building to foster connections among residents. Simultaneously, the project recognizes the need for clear separation between work and living. Private units incorporate setbacks to reinforce physical distance from shared workspaces, while the orientation and sectional organization maximize natural sunlight and create inviting outdoor spaces that support both focus and rest. The result is a building that negotiates between togetherness and solitude, offering remote workers not just a place to live and work, but a framework for a more balanced and connected everyday life.

Social

The Corner Cafe provides gathering space and social opportunities

Environmental

Designated Community Garden helps improve environment

Recreational

Courtyard in the middle creates a recreational space

Relax

Private balcony provides a personal and relaxing area

Triple Glazed Windows

Lintel

Joists

Exterior Finishing

Plywood

Interior Finish

Insulation

Beams

Section Perspective

PULL & PLAY

Modular Stage Design | Graduate Work-Integrated Studio

Team of 2 - Concept development, 3D modelling, Orthographic drawings, Diagrams

Rhino3D, Grasshopper, Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, D5Render

Pull & Play is a modular stage system designed to activate Calgary’s public spaces through performance, play, and social engagement. Developed in collaboration with ARUP, the project responds to the city’s goals for downtown vibrancy by offering an adaptable pavilion for both performers and the general public. The design is guided by four principles: interactability, modularity, permeability, and durability, which shape both its form and social purpose. Starting from a 3.6 × 2.4 × 3m rectangular prism subdivided into a 150mm grid, modules are subtracted and rearranged to reveal an elevated performance stage with canopy, and surrounding furniture pieces. When reconfigured, the same system transforms from a static object into an activated venue. Built entirely from EPS geofoam, the pavilion’s soft, tactile quality invites interaction across all ages, blurring the boundaries between spectator and participant, playground and performance space. Designed as a simple kit of parts, the entire system fits onto a single flatbed truck. Assembly is guided by a system using colour gradients, white orientation faces, and wave-pattern joinery, allowing city workers and public users to deploy and reconfigure the pavilion without specialized tools or expertise.

Seating at Human Scale Varied Wave Pattern

Orienting Face Assembly Instruction Manual

The assembly logic is built around a set of intuitive systems. A colour gradient, from red through purple to blue, established a clear order of assembly and disassembly for workers on site. Each piece also features a white face indicating correct Z and Y orientation, ensuring consistent alignment regardless of configuration. Built-in handles are integrated directly into the form of each module, allowing pieces to be carried, positioned, and locked into place without additional tools or hardware. Wave-pattern joinery further reinforces piece recognition during reassembly, while the varying surface frequencies increase friction between stacked modules, preventing shifting and movement during transport.

FLE-XI WALL

Flexi Wall reimagines the wall as more than a divider, transforming it into a dynamic, interactive and multifunctional structure for public space. Movable elements, including tables, benches, and drawers, are embedded directly into the wall, inviting users to pause, rest, and intuitively interact with the built environment.

The design’s vibrant colour strips form a semi-transparent surface that maintains visual connection with the surrounding space while drawing attention and encouraging engagement. The interplay of colour and texture makes the wall a focal point, both aesthetically and socially.

At its core, Flexi Wall is a catalyst for spontaneous human connection. The shared act of moving and reconfiguring its elements creates opportunities for cultural and intellectual exchange among strangers, turning a familiar architectural element into a hub of communal interaction.

Unlike the traditional solid wall that creates isolation, Flexi Wall achieves a balance between openness and privacy through its semi-transparent strips — neither fully closed nor fully open. The movable elements embedded within enable people to interact, share, and pass items across, transforming the wall from a boundary into a medium of exchange. In doing so, it redefines a familiar architectural element: from separation to connection.

TOWER OF HARMONY

Experiential Design | Competition Project

Team of 4 - Concept Development, 3 Room & Top Floor Design, Isometric Drawing

Tower of Harmony confronts the exclusion of people with disabilities, using architecture to visualize and communicate the lived experience of disability. The project reframes disability not as a deficit, but as a lens through which to critically examine the assumptions embedded in how we design the built environment.

Inspired by the Tower of Babel as a metaphor for power imbalance and the turbulent, unresolved discourse around disability, the design reinterprets this narrative through architecture. The tower houses 12 rooms, each offering an immersive spatial experience of a specific disability — engaging visitors through perception, movement, and sensation. Rather than explaining disability from the outside, the tower immerses visitors directly within it to foster empathy and understanding. A continuous water feature threads through the entire building, connecting ground to rooftop as a symbol of healing and unity. Through its vertical progression, Tower of Harmony transforms architecture into an instrument of social awareness and advocacy, rewriting the story of separation into one of harmony and shared understanding.

The ground floor initiates an understanding of disability and justice through a central theatre and small library. A cycle of water, symbolizing healing, begins here and threads continuously through the building.

The tower houses 12 rooms across four floors, each immersing visitors directly within the experience of a specific disability. In numerology, 12 symbolizes growth, harmony, and higher wisdom.

EXPERIENCE

The rooftop fountain completes the water cycle from below, creating a unified gathering space that welcomes people of all abilities — a culmination of the tower’s journey from awareness to harmony.

Learning Disability

Attention Deficit

Mobility Impairment

Physical Diability

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