Architecture has always played a critical role in shaping the collective and individual spaces of our cities. Housing as an urban architecture acts as a robust frame for public life. The dwelling is a frame for our everyday lives. Is it time for housing to do more? Can housing linked with other programmes reshape our cities in vital and unexpected ways?
This studio will investigate and explore hybrid prototypes that intertwine housing, sustainability, landscape and links them with museum / cultural programs resulting in innovative models for city building. This project expands the role of design beyond the formal ensuring meaningful engagement with social, cultural, political and technical issues ensuring that the design propositions emerging from this studio can shape the cities of the future.
Our studio will work with the Honolulu Art Museum and we will design propositions for a vacant site in downtown Honolulu owned by the museum. Each student will develop a new prototype for the Honolulu Art Museum’s urban city block interrogating the ways that housing, museum and social condenser can be combined providing a catalyst for rethinking the future of downtown Honolulu.
Each student will be asked to work at several scales of investigation understanding the interrelationship between the scale of the city, the building and the room. Drawings and models at three distinct scales of investigation will be developed, presented and represented throughout the term. The studio will also investigate light, materiality and space through large sectional models and drawings.
Our studio will travel to Honolulu on the island of Oahu to visit the site and to better understand its physical, cultural and social context. Design seminars with the Honolulu Art Museum Director and staff, the SHADE Institute Director and civic leaders will provide students with insight into the complex layers of meaning each design proposal must address.