New Idea

For the last two years I have been obsessed with urban theory; naturally when it came time to consider a thesis I was quick to turn to praising the city and cursing the suburbs. But after this week I am less certain about this topic. This last week I have learned a lot about my project. Or at least a lot more about how I need to approach my project. Through the process of designing and making my thesis installation I had to really focus on my project and why it was important. I have been caught up in trying to layer ideas one after another without fully connecting them together

Through the past week as I designed my installation it became alarmingly obvious that I needed to simplify, desperately. The ideas I had thus far were not fitting together, there is not time to make them work; I need to edit them. I don’t think there is need for yet another attack on suburbia. There are endless evils in the cookie cutter neighborhoods but they have been strewn out over books and articles, what could my project say or explore that hasn’t already been scrutinized? I want to use my project to uphold the benefits of the city, but also to explore communities. When I had to think about why my project was important I thought about why architecture was important to me. An enormous part of why I have become so passionate about architecture is because of studio.

There are few fields where you work so closely with other students for so long. Spending hours creating and designing around other people doing the same develops unique relationships. There is something about the process of making that deeply affects people. Communities built in this way are the foundation of many great neighborhoods and cities. Cities offer the greatest built environments and strong and vibrant communities that are hard to come by elsewhere.

How can space better suit the needs of an emerging neighborhood? How have neighborhoods formed in the past and how do they grow currently? I want to evaluate the importance of making in a community and of a community in a city. The importance of connections and what can the built environment do to spark them. At least that is currently the idea I am working off of. I am not sure if I got to the root of my why but I do think I got much closer. I can’t do project that I know the answer to, I need to do something that helps me see something new.