Architecture Commons^™

Limpieza De Asbestos En La Ciudad De Nueva York, Ariana G. Perez-Castells

Capstones

This is the story of how asbestos is removed in New York City, and who carries out the work. It's unclear how much more asbestos abatement is left in the county, and the U.S. has not completely banned the dangerous material, unlike over 50 other countries across the world. Both of these things could change soon. A new study that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will carry out by December 2024 would give us a better picture of how much asbestos there is still in buildings and how much more removal work is to be done. At the same time, …

Human Composting Is Changing The Landscape Of Death Care (Literally) — And It Could Be Legal In New York State As Soon As Next Year, Rachael Robertson

Capstones

Soon New Yorkers might have a new option for end of life care: Natural Organic Reduction, or human composting. Rather than being buried or cremated, New Yorkres might have the option of having their body composted and turned into soil as an environmentally friendly burial alternative. A bill legalizing Natural Organic Reduction in NYS and setting regulations similar to cremation is sitting on Governor Hochul's desk. Death, remembrance, and disposition are especially difficult in New York City, where there is not enough cemetery space for the number of people who die annually. Through audio, data, and print, I explore how …

Preservando La Playa Del Pueblo, Tasha A. Sandoval

Capstones

After more than 80 years, the only queer beach in New York City, the People’s Beach at Jacob Riis, is in danger. In 2022, the city announced the demolition of the Neponsit Hospital, a long-abandoned structure that shelters the beach from the street, creating a sense of privacy and safety. Can Riis Beach live on as a safe and joyous utopia for queer communities without the presence of the hospital buildings? Some beach-goers are campaigning to ensure that whatever replaces the hospital space centers the queer community and preserves the beach’s queer history, including the legacy of Ms. Colombia, a …

The Production And Destiny Of Public Space In An American City: Examining The Emergence And Disruption Of Brooklyn City Hall Square, Jason Montgomery

Publications and Research

Urban form should reflect collective value for place in communities. Urban squares in particular have the potential to serve as the nucleus of communities, urban artefacts that link place to memory and heritage while serving basic needs for everyday life in the city. Civic squares, those linked to governmental institutions, have further potential to facilitate community gatherings for memorialisation, commemoration, celebration and political action. Despite these important functions and potential, the incremental planning of Brooklyn in the early nineteenth century placed little emphasis on squares of any kind, despite the community’s expressed desires. Brooklyn’s first civic square, here referred to …

Techne Issue 06, Michael Duddy, Farai Matangira, Sanobar Nazirova, Ololade Tolu Owolabi, Darwin Diaz

TECHNE

INTRODUCTION Sanjive Vaidya, RA, Department chair

“Midnight on Feb. 5, 1952, a cross was burned in front of Stoughton Hall, where the 11 black members of the Harvard Class of 1955 lived… One of the 11 black students was the late J. Max Bond ’55, who became one the nation’s leading black architects, stressing socially progressive themes and public service.” -Hartman, Chester. “Cross burning in Harvard Yard?” The Harvard Crimson, 17 Sept 2014.

Symbolizing structural and social barriers for minorities and people of color accessing higher education, this violent scene is heightened by its setting. The venerated campus represents a …

Women Of Colour And Black Women Leaders Are Underrepresented In Architectural Firms Featured In Key Trade Publications (Review), Nandi Prince

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Student Self-Grading Form, Brett Whysel

Open Educational Resources

This is a word document that students use at the beginning, midpoint, and end of a semester to set relevant goals, measure progress towards goals, and self-grade. It is intended to build motivation, metacognition, and accountability. Instructors may use it on its own or to supplement other assessment tools, and improve the accuracy, validity, and fairness of final grades.

Building For A New National Body: The Architecture Of Manuel Amábilis And Neomaya Modernity, Emily A. Cocco

Theses and Dissertations

In the history of architecture following the Mexican revolution, Yucatecan architect Manuel Amábilis (1889-1966) has often been passed over in favor of discussions of architects working in the nation’s cultural and political center, Mexico City, many of whom engaged in neocolonial and functionalist modern style to envision a modern Mexico transformed by the revolution. This omission is short-sighted, since Amábilis’s Maya revivalist architecture provides an iteration of postrevolutionary Mexican architecture that visually and ideologically manifests the socialist and proindingenous aims of the revolution while imagining a paradigm of modern nationalism that was not rooted in Western ideals. Amábilis’ neomaya architecture, …

Nycha & Arcscholars: Senior Center, Naomi Langer-Voss, Tylee Rivera

Publications and Research

Who are we?

We are a diverse group of scholars ranging in age, gender, and background from all over New York City. We share a common interest in solving our urban challenges through studying and proposing improvements to the built environment. From professors at CUNY CITY TECH to NYCHA Design & Implementation specialists and NYCHA residents, we encompass a group of scholars united by this common purpose.

What are we here to accomplish?

This team of ARCscholars is working collaboratively, sharing lived experiences, creatively thinking & planning and applying our research discoveries to the proposed design interventions. We seek to …

Micro-Metropolis: Space, Work, And Waste In The Maquettes Of Constant And Bodys Isek Kingelez, Shoshanah B. Rosen

Theses and Dissertations

Constant Nieuwenhuys and Bodys Isek Kingelez both create futuristic utopias in the form of architectural maquettes. This comparative study explores each artist’s reverence for technology, global connectivity, and new forms of economic production. It argues that these utopias represent desires endemic to late modernity and capitalism, including consumption, nomadism, automation.

Contextualizing Britain’S Holocaust Memorial And Museums: Form, Content, And Politics, Rebecca D. Pollack

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The quantity of Holocaust memorials in Britain and their prominence in public debates beseeches the question: Why does a country with a modest Jewish population, that was neither occupied by the Nazis nor lost its citizens in the horrors of the Holocaust, devote large quantities of resources and time to memorializing the events of the Holocaust? While there are private and synagogue-based Holocaust memorials in Britain, this dissertation centers on Britain’s statefunded Holocaust memorials and museums, a substantial network of memorials that is often left out of the abundant literature on Holocaust memory. Each memorial project is examined through the …

Hudson Yards: Hybrid Capital's New Home, Massimo D. Scoditti

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis focuses on the material and metaphysical aspects of the Hudson Yards, the largest private development in US History. With its roots in the administration of Michael Bloomberg, the site is representative of neoliberal ideology. It is also one in which cultural production is central. This is in terms of the rationalization and mythos of the building of the space itself and the dreamworlds created to obscure the mechanisms of extraction and accumulation that make such a complex possible. The Hudson Yards is particularly interesting because, as Cindi Katz might suggest, topography lines connect it to transnational capital. And …

Past-Futures Of Harlem: Black Urban Space At The Limits Of Spatial Justice, Dane C. Ruffin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The racial capitalist development of the U.S. metropolitan landscape has been shaped by the involuntary displacement and dispersal of Black communities. From the dispossession of the Half-Free Negro Lots around the Fresh Collect pond in the seventeenth century to the clearing of Seneca Village to build Central Park in the nineteenth century to the turn of the twentieth-century police-facilitated “race riot” in the Tenderloin district of Manhattan, which fueled the move to Harlem, the four-hundred year history of Black Manhattan alone provides substantial evidence of this and is in no way unique in this regard. Incomplete, yet ongoing, is what …

A Call For The Library Community To Deploy Best Practices Toward A Database For Biocultural Knowledge Relating To Climate Change, Martha B. Lerski

Publications and Research

Abstract

Purpose – In this paper, a call to the library and information science community to support documentation and conservation of cultural and biocultural heritage has been presented.

Design/methodology/approach – Based in existing Literature, this proposal is generative and descriptive— rather than prescriptive—regarding precisely how libraries should collaborate to employ technical and ethical best practices to provide access to vital data, research and cultural narratives relating to climate.

Findings – COVID-19 and climate destruction signal urgent global challenges. Library best practices are positioned to respond to climate change. Literature indicates how libraries preserve, share and cross-link cultural and scientific knowledge. …

Circular Economy In The Built Environment, Kevin Hom

Publications and Research

The circular economy is as much an attitude as a program. The circular economy (CE) is an action plan which identifies a series of goals and associated outcomes. It is a comprehensive response to the impact of the industrial revolution and the linear economy model which was the economic basis of the industrial revolution. This manuscript discusses the philosophy and strategies of the circular economy and the role that the built environment has in implementing this philosophy.