For as digitally interconnected as our modern lives have become, hardly any of us pause to consider data storage and the accompanying physical data centers which allow us to fuel our interconnected digital realities. With the quantity of data storage being ever-increasing as we persistently move toward a more digital future, we must look to more inventive and efficient solutions of the centers' operational basis. For "Spectral Discord" Library and Data Center combo, that operational basis is data stored on synthetic DNA, rather than traditional computer hard drives, as DNA's storage abilities are 1,000,000 times that of traditional hard drives in the same physical weight. The Data Center is hosted in two underground levels to utilize the naturally cooler temperatures and potential geocooling, as, while DNA data storage requires cooler temperatures than hard drives, it does not produce nearly as much heat. In the more public region of level -1, the DNA strands are stored in racks, which have an interactive module through which the public can retrieve or store their DNA, and cabinets, those strands which are read-only but not writable nor retrievable, while some cabinets and mostly cages are reserved for the private level -2 where all is look-only. In either level, though, the atmosphere and experience are consistent: you are surrounded by an entourage of DNA strands strung in tall, fluid-filled containers, chilled by blue light, emitting the sound of grim wails and tinny mechanical whirring, and a reflective materiality that completely dissipates save for when the breathing blue lights illuminate its reflective nature; overall, a very much alien, cave landscape that boast high resolution detail through its grotesque textures and reflective lighting conditions.

Above the surface, DNA tendrils grow onto and attempt to strangulate the library, as the analog books and digital DNA combat for title of sole survivor. The library is much warmer and more relatable to the human touch and emotions – a genuine safe haven that attempts to evade and eradicate the experience of the DNA future and its tendrils. The exteriors of the library exists as two masses torn in two, reunified through the intimate, traversable gap between the two, connecting viewports, and a series of indoor-outdoor inter-weaving circulation. Do not be fooled though, the library is of magnificent magnitude in its monumental, monolithic figures whose arcs concerge at powerful centers, and whose warping bricks giving way to a higher order or strength. Within these sturdy walls lies a varied combination of soft and aerated spaces that envelope those who pay faith to the paper: gardens and reading lounges meld together for a unified experience of serene reading, a central, 3-story column of open stack shelves seperated only by glass floors that establish a massive, open chamber, slim corridors of more open stack integrate furniture directly into the shelves, acting as viewports to the closed stack which rests in solutide between those shelves, and the compact stack at high level, securely away from the DNA tendrils and accessible only across a bridge and behind a protective ring door. Custom furniture and floating paper lighting give way to the mosaic trademark so deeply rooted within the atmosphere, further contributing to the lightweight, airy experience.

The process of "Spectral Discord" began with an analysis of the DTLA site's street utilities and their rhythymic spatial arrangements to one another, as well as the creation of B&W, low-res stamps and hi-res 3D stamps from notable design features of the Beinecke Rare Book Library, Tama Art Library, and Charles Library at Temple University. These low- and hi-res stamps were then used to create three unique 15' cube inhabitable moments of a similar low-res vs hi-res nature, where the black material highlights the hi-res and the white the low-res: (1) a ribbon-rapped, rock-like volume that focussed on internal volume; (2) a top-heavy, rock cliffside volume torn in two by strangulating tendrils; (3) an arcing mass of elegant curves sharp edges which converge at a focal point. Particular experiences from each of these moments were picked as starting points for the development of the full library and data center, namely moment 3's curvaceous monolithic mass as a calm low-res for the library, moment 2's tendrils and split mass and bridging being applied to the library and a central theme to the data center, and moment 1's direction of internal volumes for the to-be underground data center; it was also at this point that the initiative of DNA data storage was taken on.

The film is a portrayal of all the aforementioned – an attempt to best replicate the emotions and experience one would truly endure as they ventured through Spectral Discord. The experience, in particular, expresses the dynamic existence of the site over time as it flickers between three different realities: the current reality, the library reality where the analog knowledge has eradicated the DNA and inhabited the underground levels, and the data reality where future of data storage has consumed the paper books and taken over.