LIVE + WORK = DWELL
Design Studio IV - Fall 2022 | Design a space where two different “makers” can live and work in one combined “dwell” space.
MAKERS
The two makers we chose to design a residency for were silk aerialists/acrobats and high divers. While these two crafts are vastly different from one another, we found a common ground between the two in the extreme verticality that both activities require.
The final design for our live/work space needed to be big enough to house five of each maker so we decided the most effective strategy was to build up as much as possible rather than over.
HISTORY
After choosing our two makers, our project quickly became about rethinking housing specifically. The immediate problem we realized we had to address at the start of our design process was figuring out how to create a space that encouraged creativity rather than just productivity. Acrobatics and high diving both originated in the Middle East and have since been white-washed throughout the U.S. and Europe. Unlike today, both of these athletic arts were initially learned as means of survival rather than for enjoyment. Diving and acrobatics actually resulted from an oppressive system that exploited those in great financial need. So after extensive research on various traditional design elements commonly used in the Middle East (i.e courtyards/riads, screens, and arches), we were able to reconnect the historical roots and significance of these crafts back to both our building and those meant to inhabit it.
MOOD BOARDS
EARLY SKETCHES & ITERATIONS
CONCEPT MODEL
CONCEPT
The effects of colonialism and white-washing are long-term and lead into what is known today as “grind culture,” which we defined as this concept of people having to work tirelessly with little-to-no reward in a society overrun by capitalism and greed. In order to challenge this notion, our residency is intended to have an inward focus that leads towards inner-healing and personal growth. It relies heavily on nature as both a grounding and reprieving element so that our makers may find themselves lost in true creative freedom and restore the passion that led them to their art in the first place.
With all these goals in mind, we wound up with a building that opposes the horizontal manner in which most of us normally live our lives through the use of extreme verticality.
**This project was not completed alone. Several drawings/renders displayed above were either done by or with the help of my friends Khalid Hambishi and Amber Slusser.