Temporal Tenancy

This the­sis posits that our con­ven­tional under­stand­ing of domes­tic­ity is in direct rela­tion to a cul­tural assump­tion about prop­erty own­er­ship – per­ma­nence, pros­per­ity, growth – and, in turn, claims that this rela­tion­ship is cur­rently in a state of cri­sis (we move now more than ever and fore­clo­sure rates are through the roof).  This assump­tion of per­ma­nence has served as the foun­da­tion for a vari­ety of dis­ci­plines – archi­tec­ture, urban plan­ning, real-estate, the build­ing indus­try – but our increas­ing con­di­tion of imper­ma­nence forces us to reex­am­ine how these dis­ci­plines respond.  This project pro­poses a method of mak­ing that oper­ates in direct cor­re­spon­dence with the ebb and flow of prop­erty fluctuations.

The spe­cific method of mak­ing is a cus­tomiz­able cnc hot-wirecut EPS foam block unit of con­struc­tion that is rapidly post-tensioned to a pre-cast con­crete foun­da­tion.  This foun­da­tion serves as the hub to sync the archi­tec­ture to infra­struc­ture ser­vices.  It houses all the irre­ducible ele­ments of the archi­tec­ture – water, elec­tric­ity, struc­ture.  The remain­ing foam enclo­sure is imper­ma­nent and respon­sive.  It is ever chang­ing.  In shrink­ing cities, where vacancy is plenty and moti­va­tion to move in is lit­tle, this pro­posal pro­vides an extremely inex­pen­sive and rapid method of mak­ing that can accom­mo­date events, or local rentals, or sea­sonal vis­i­tors.  By remov­ing the bur­den of per­ma­nence, which archi­tec­ture and these other dis­ci­plines have oper­ated with, tem­po­ral ten­ancy hopes to accom­mo­date alter­na­tive meth­ods of archi­tec­ture and occu­pa­tion that have pre­vi­ously been sub­sumed under this reign of permanence.

Pro­to­type — a post-tension EPS foam enclo­sure system.

Scale mod­els — This sys­tem is propos­ing a con­stantly chang­ing, mal­leable method of archi­tec­ture.  One that is not ded­i­cated to a sin­gu­lar form.

Intel­li­gent Geome­tries — Dura­bil­ity | Flex­i­bil­ity | Dou­ble Boolean Geom­e­try | Thatch Inserts | Drainage | Planter

Exploded Unit

Par­a­site - Detroit Michigan

Gath­er­ing Space — Atlanta Georgia

Stand Alone — Phoenix Arizona

Indus­trial - Philadel­phia Pennsylvania