So|Aware

Socially Aware Architecture

[so-aware]

Thank you for your continued readership over the past year. It is with great excitement that we announce the next phase in the evolution of So|Aware Architecture -- that is, the rebranding and launch as The Commonist Magazine. Please check us out and submit your personal articles or artwork at commonistmag.com

[so-aware]

The IKEA Playlist Kit for Primates

by Bill Burns

Has this week’s So|Aware Prison coverage got you feeling crazy? If so, you can spend the weekend locked in your own guard tower and prison cells built with Bill Burns IKEA-esque instructions. Also in the Kit is a list of songs played repetitively to prisoners at several extraterritorial prison camps including that at Guantanamo Bay Cuba. Songs include, the Bee Gees “Stayin’ Alive,” Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the USA,” JoeRaposo’s “Sesame Street Theme Song,” and much more.

Via Erin Riley

Thanks for reading everyone. Have a great weekend!

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Richard Ross: Architecture of Authority

by John MacArthur & Richard Ross

For the past several years--and with seemingly limitless access--photographer Richard Ross has been making unsettling and thought-provoking pictures of architectural spaces that exert power over the individuals within them. From a Montessori preschool to churches, mosques and diverse civic spaces including a Swedish courtroom, the Iraqi National Assembly hall and the United Nations, the images in Architecture of Authority build to ever harsher manifestations of power: an interrogation room at Guantanamo, segregation cells at Abu Ghraib, and finally, a capital punishment death chamber.

Though visually cool, this work deals with hot-button issues--from the surveillance that increasingly intrudes on post-9/11 life to the abuse of power and the erosion of individual liberty. The connections among the various architectures are striking, as Ross points out: "The Santa Barbara Mission confessional and the LAPD robbery homicide interrogation rooms are the same intimate proportions. Both are made to solicit a confession in exchange for some form of redemption." Essay by Harper's Magazine publisher, John R. MacArthur, also a columnist for the Toronto Globe and Mail.

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Prison Architecture

by Leslie Fairweather RIBA & Sean McConville

Current and future prison designs are examined in this book, within the government's prison building program, and the confines of current penal philosophies and legislation. America has led the way in prison design, with two main types of architecture predominating: radial layouts (outside cells with windows) and linear blocks (inside cells with grilles). Now, 'new' generation prisons (central association surrounded by small groups of cells) look set to become the fashion. But are they a better answer, and should they be copied worldwide before we know? Architects and administrators show in this book the designs of these 'new generation' prisons and assess their impact. Most countries in central Europe also have a rising crime rate and a demand for new prisons. Contributions from significant architects from the UK, Europe and America comment on these issues. Other topics within the book are: setting current prison architecture and design against an historical setting; looking at penal ideas and prison architecture and design in the post-war period; the psychological effects of the prison environment; the influence of technology and design on security management; and how prison architecture and design can be more flexible and innovative. 

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499.SUMMIT

by Andreas Tjeldflaat and Gregory Knobloch

The US prison system has failed to see advancements throughout the past century and desperately requires innovation and re-imagination. While recent literature begins to question the sociological impact of prisons, there has been little exploration of the physical environments in which inmates are housed.

499.SUMMIT is the outcome of a critical look into these static institutions. It proposed to challenges all preconceived notions of the word “prison”, and re-imagines the high-rise as an urban penitentiary. The massing consists of three towers in the shape of an arch. The inherent linear and formal qualities of the ‘arch’ allowed for the overall circulatory concept: Up, over, down. Each arch has three primary phases, Incarceration (up), Transformation (over), and Integration (down). The arches begin isolated during the incarceration phase and merge together both physically and programmatically during the integration phase. As the inmates graduate through the facility, they are being exposed to an increasing degree of social interaction, to make the transition back into society as soft as possible. To catalyst this process, public program and residential housing are introduced in the integration phase downwards.

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Halden Fengsel Prison

by Erik Møller Architects

Norway’s Ministry of Justice invited Erik Møller Architects to compete for the design of Halden Fengsel Prison. The prison is located in Halden, in Southern Norway. It was designed to house 250 prisoners which, unlike American prisons, would be a mixture of men and women.

The design is based on the hard and soft interactions in the prisoners’ rehabilitation process. Sited in a hilly wooded area, the prison is generally divided into two areas – housing development, located in the most hilly area, and administration and employment areas located in a lower area with buildings organized more specifically around the central large air courtyard and sports court. Halden prison also has a mural by Norwegian street artist Dolk, which is reportedly worth $1 million.

So is this massive investment in architecture and design worth it for Norway's most hardened criminals, including murderers and rapists?

A Time Magazine article reports that, although recidivism rates are calculated differently between countries, only 20% of Norway's prisoners end up back in jail within 2 years (compared to 50%–60% in the UK and US).

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Prison in an Urban Context: Chicago’s Metropolitan Correctional Center

by Harry Weese

Roman Mars, of 99% Invisible, along with reporter,  Dan Weissmann, produced a fantastic broadcast about the Metropolitan Correctional Center and how design serves prisoners.

Roman Writes:

The Metropolitan Correctional Center, or MCC, is a federal jail right in the middle of downtown Chicago. It’s a triangle-shaped skyscraper, 27 stories, with tall, super-narrow, irregularly-spaced windows up and down each wall. The outside walls look like old computer punchcards. As odd as it looks, each of these striking details serve a purpose. The architect, Harry Weese, made bold innovations that were solutions to practical problems. The triangular shape creates easy sight-lines for the guards inside.  The windows are narrow (5 inches) to prevent escapes (without requiring bars), but beveled out, to funnel natural light inside. The interior design was very thoughtfully considered as well. As stunning as it is, the building can also be a little hard to see from up close. 

Producer/reporter Dan Weissmann worked nearby for years and rarely looked up at it. This is apparently by design, as well. The triangular shape keeps the building pushed back from the street, there’s a tall hedge between the sidewalk and the plaza in front of the jail, and the El train blocks much of the view of the floors above.  But recently Dan kind of became obsessed with the MCC and discovered that Harry Weese’s groundbreaking design may still gain admirers from the throngs of people that pass it on the street, but for the 681 temporary residents inside, it may not be living up to Weese’s grand vision.

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Prison Alternatives Initiative

by Architects/Designers/Planners for Social Responsibility (ADPSR)

Originally launched in 2004 as the Prison Design Boycott, ADPSR's Prison Alternatives Initiative calls on architects and other design professionals, along with the public to support community-based alternatives to incarceration. Their website communicates the painfully stunning facts and figures associated with U.S. prisons.

ADPSR States:

Our prison system is both a devastating moral blight on our society and an overwhelming economic burden on our tax dollars, taking away much needed resources from schools, health care and affordable housing. The prison system is corrupting our society and making us more threatened, rather than protecting us as its proponents claim. It is a system built on fear, racism, and the exploitation of poverty. Our current prison system has no place in a society that aspires to liberty, justice, and equality for all.

As architects, we are responsible for one of the most expensive parts of the prison system, the construction of new prison buildings. Almost all of us would rather be using our professional skills to design positive social institutions such as universities or playgrounds, but these institutions lack funding because of spending on prisons. If we would rather design schools and community centers, we must stop building prisons. 

Please join members of ADPSR in pledging to not participate in the design, construction, or renovation of prisons. We also invite you to learn more about the prison system, to join us in envisioning more just and productive alternatives to incarceration, and to work towards a society that treats all its members with dignity, equality, and justice.

Related Newscast: A plan to convert a State Prison for Women into one for men, is upsetting people in the neighboring community, who believe they've already been left behind...

(So|Aware is not responsible for any advertisements in the video)

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Lincoln Heights Jail Reconcepualized as "urban agricultural space"

by Perkins + Will

The decommissioned Lincoln Heights Jail, once home to notorious gangster, Al Capone, may soon be revitalized thanks to the Los Angeles River Revitalization Corporation, City Council District 1, and pro bono work by renowned architecture firm, Perkins + Will.

The jail, built in 1949, is currently  listed as an LA historic-cultural monument and is owned by the city. The conceptual design envisions the property as a green zone and LA River access point. The first phase of implementation calls for a 24,000 square foot "urban agricultural space" on the roof of the six-story building.  The River Revitalization Corporation is already working with potential operators and reports state that a demonstration project could be up and running in 18 months' time.

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Cook County Jail Master Gardener Program

by Cook County Sheriff's Department of Community Supervision & Intervention and University of Illinois Extension

Since 1993, the Pre-Release center, a division of the Cook County Jail, has operated an extensive vegetable garden, using inmate labor, during the summer months. Over those same 17 years, they have shipped more than 50 tons of fresh produce to homeless shelters and other deserving non-profit organizations; involving more than 400 inmates in hands on learning in horticulture, from planting to harvesting; and , since the year 2000, officially certified more than 200 of those inmates as Master Gardeners following classroom instruction and on site testing.  With the assistance of the University of Illinois Cooperative Extension Service, inmates are taught a wide range of organic farming and gardening skills in a supportive, constructive, and positive environment; skills which are meant to enhance their prospects for gainful employment upon release. A plot of land within the Cook County Jail complex measuring approximately 30,000 square feet serves as the "classroom" for this unique rehabilitative horticultural program. 

[so-aware]

So|Aware is Going to Prison!

With less than 5 percent of the world's population the United States has almost a quarter of the world's prisoners. Many U.S. prisons face the issue of overcrowding. California’s 33 prisons have a capacity of 100,000 prisoners but house nearly double that, with 170,000. To deal with overcrowding, prison classrooms and gymnasiums are filled with bunk beds, diminishing their purpose and lessening the potential for prisoner rehabilitation.

Because this is such an important social issue, beginning next week, So|Aware will be sharing posts that examine the role of architecture in the prison system.

Feel free to submit any suggestions. Thanks!

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Total Housing: Alternatives to Urban Sprawl

by Albert Ferre

This book is conceived as evidence supporting the qualities of dense, urban living, and as a hopeful antidote against sprawl. Necessity and investigation are prerequisites for the design of housing: Total Housing refers to the need to understand that social, environmental, and economic factors affect form and that living space is a base for our increasingly complex and varied societies.

This new survey into multi - family housing focuses on the responses proposed by architects who are dealing with the dynamic and diverse demands of contemporary society.

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Designing for Adaptable Futures Student Competition Winners Announced

by Adaptable Futures

Designing for Adaptable Futures, the first competition hosted by Adaptable Futures (AF), recently announced their award recipients. The competition was open to students globally. AF requested that submissions illustrate the lifespan of the proposal (whether product, building or urban intervention) and how it would evolve over time –  an hour, day, year, decade, or perhaps a century.  

After receiving submissions from 26 countries, thirty projects were shortlisted the international team of judges then selected three winning submissions (a joint first place and a third place) along with five submissions deserving honorable mention. 

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Become an Enterprise Rose Architectural Fellow

Enterprise is now accepting applications to become an Enterprise Rose Architectural Fellow beginning in 2013. Take advantage of the recently extended application deadline, which is now August 8, 2012. Click here to see how you can apply. 

About the Fellowship:

The Enterprise Rose Architectural Fellowship offers a select few of the nation’s finest, early career architects the opportunity for first-hand training and experience in sustainable community design work. The Fellowship partners these emerging talents with local community development organizations for three years. Under the program’s innovative structure, fellows work in the community, forging local ties and expanding the capacity of their host organizations to create sustainable, affordable housing for people of low-income in underserved communities.

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Imagination Playground

by David Rockwell

Imagination Playground is a breakthrough playspace concept designed pro-bono by David Rockwell to encourage child-directed, unstructured free play. With a focus on loose parts, Imagination Playground offers a changing array of elements that allows children to constantly reconfigure their environment and to design their own course of play.

After five years of research, development, focus groups and testing, the flagship Imagination Playground Park at Burling Slip opened in July 2010, realized by Rockwell Group in collaboration with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation.Giant foam blocks, mats, wagons, fabric and crates overflow with creative potential for children to play, dream, build and explore endless possibilities.

Further reading via The Guardian: Sense of adventure: what happened to playgrounds that give children space?

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SEED: Shipping Container Emergency Housing

by Clemson University Department of Architecture with Tri-County Technical

Utilizing an existing surplus of shipping containers, students from Clemson University’s Department of Architecture partnered with Tri-County Technical College, to research and develop an affordable housing solution for the Caribbean Region. 

Caribbean nations inherently import more goods than they export generating a steady surplus of shipping containers.  Shipping containers are designed to carry massive amounts of cargo and withstand extreme weather conditions making them a logical housing component.  Constructed entirely of steel and reinforced with eight corner post moment connections and corrugated steel walls, a 40′ shipping container can carry 67,200 pounds and resist overturn when exposed to winds up to 140 mph.  Without modification a 40′ shipping container has 304 square feet of floor space and eliminates problems associated with insects, fire, and hurricanes.  With modification a 40′ shipping container can be a safe, comfortable, and environmentally friendly home for numerous local inhabitants.

The beginning design emerged as a system of event based solutions capable of providing immediate housing after hurricanes or natural disasters.  Local interventions and materials eventually develop into permanent additions creating an investment with a local identity.  Utilizing local skills, labor, and materials the final design is dynamic taking on a symbiotic relationship with the local cultures.  Eventually the ubiquitous container is embedded and made permanent providing an investment that can appreciate with time.

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The War on Urban Agriculture and the Locavore Movement

by Emily Badger

Earlier in July Emily Badger reported in The Atlantic Cities about Pierre Desrochers, an economic geographer at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Mr. Desrochers has written a book which attempts to eviscerate the Urban Agriculture movement’s main arguments, from its economic rationale to its environmental one.

Mr. Desrochers  claims that, "Over the last few years, the local food movement has become ... a rebellion against globalization, against big agri-business, against the way food is produced. His followers believe locavores aren’t mere silly liberals. They’re a menace. In fact, the people in this room, led by Desrochers, view locavores with about the same conspiratorial alarm with which some food activists view Monsanto.

Make sure to read this fascinating article via The Atlantic Cities and comment here what you, So|Aware readers, think of Mr. Desrochers' arguments.