Program

In line with the goals of a Yielding Architecture, the program has been separated into rooted and evolving program types.

rooted_ known entities, or foundational programatic elements that the rest of the institution/program requires prior to their own evolution. These program elements have been grouped according to use type in order to maximize their potential yield [performance].

evolving_ the program types that are adaptable. The spaces in between the "rooted" program will be allowed to yield [evolve/adapt/change] according to the needs of the institution/public.

Tabulated Program

Analysis

The program groups were studied individually in order to maximize each units performance. Similarly, the relationships between each group type is studied to organize the program volumes.

   

    

Infrastructure

the underlying foundation or basic framework (as of a system or organization)

[from Merriam-Webster Dictionary]

Infrastructure is a publicly maintained support system that creates/allows/incites certain potentials actions/structures/forms/spaces for both individuals and groups . The success of any environment or institution is directly related to the strength and relevance of its infrastructure. Infrastructures also determine the amount of independence afforded an individual. Rigid, inflexible infrastructures dictate how one is to operate and limits the body politic from enacting structural change.

The Future Farm is fundamentally an infrastructure [support system] that allows individuals to be self-sufficient by creating a flexible physical structure that has the capability to adapt to changing economic, social, and environmental conditions. Additionally, The Future Farm's educational mission is an infrastructural resource that places individuals in control over the production of their own primary survival resources [see post below].

Democratization

Premise:
The single, fundamental drive of an individual is survival. As such, our lives are ordered by the dual needs for food (immediate survival of the individual) and sex (long-term survival of the species). In contemporary culture, the three primary resources for survival are food, water, and energy.

According to Karl Marx, political power is dependent upon control over the means and methods of production. For example, a capitalist system places control in the hands of the individual, while a communist system in the hands of a ruling elite. Thus, an individual that is unable to control the production of his own primary survival resources is effectively rendered powerless.

    Proposal:
In our current political/economic system, people do not have the leverage or space to maneuver for political, economic, or social change because they depend upon that system for their primary means of survival - food, energy, and water. Our dependance upon the grid [food, water, and energy production and distribution] to which we are attached forces us to accept it, regardless of its inefficiencies, inequalities, and environmental effects.

But what if we were able to detach ourselves from the grid and from the systems of production, distribution, and control that curtails the grassroots foundations of a democratic state? What if individuals were given the infrastructure in which to produce their own food, water, and energy and, consequently, the space and leverage to rally against the controlling bureaucracies?

The Future Farm will be the vehicle through which individuals reclaim their independence from the corporate-controlled systems that dictate their very means of survival. Control over what, when, and how will shift from the elite few to the empowered many. As such The Future Farm will be a catalyst for political action, as the newly empowered populace, removed from the yoke of controlling bureaucracies, will have the leverage to demand social and economic change.

program

site analysis diagrams

trash interceptor

While on a site visit, I was coincidentally watching them clean this thing out this morning. What a great idea. Here's hoping it continues working so well.

argument/parti01**

**UPDATE**

Since this scheme is based entirely on technological solutions, my next goal will be to develop a strategy that relies on low-tech solutions. The final design will, I'm sure, incorporate elements of both.

Also, the use on shipping containers in the above scheme received some negative criticism from my peers. While I still think there is still rich potential in the idea, it is equally important for me to discover the modular solution (based on performance capabilities) and not impose an a priori solution based on "the whim of the architect."

As I am using the two-fold definition of yield as a framework for understanding architecture, it seems to make sense to split the problems associated with agriculture in two as well. Thus, the active understanding of yielding architecture, which is concerned with performative capabilities, will use the problems of food supply as a test case. Currently, mass hunger and malnutrition results from an amazingly complex web of factors including (but certainly not limited to) government subsidies (Farm Bill), limited amounts of arable land and water, rapidly increasing demands for bio-fuel, and production efficiency ceilings. Additional considerations must also include the enormous environmental impacts of agriculture, the runoff from which is the primary culprit in the many chemicals polluting the world's water systems.

Alternatively,  yield can also suggest the need for an emergent, evolutionary architecture. Here, the cultural and social problems associated with agriculture provide an interesting opportunity for applying yield as an architectural methodology. It is no coincidence that organized governmental rule surfaced simultaneously with agriculture. An economy that produces surplus must have a means of controlling the distribution of that surplus. It is also not coincidental that it was the ability to produce surpluses that allowed for a non-working, ruling class to emerge. Thus, inherent in any agricultural society is a top-down, bureaucratic system that serves not the interests of the ruled many, but of the ruling few.

Detailed in the above diagram, this first architectural proposal consists of establishing a literal and conceptual framework, within which multiple configurations may exist. Shipping containers are used to create growing and living pods, each of which can be individually owned and operated, allowing for the demands of the inhabitants (vegetal and human) to determine the organization of the building. Neighborhoods and districts would evolve over time as like people moved their pods near each others. Similarly, people who enjoy certain types of food will see to it that the are located near pods growing their favorite crops. The containers themselves can be self-edited and combined and are allowed to be relocated through use of a permanent crane structure attached to the roof of the structure. The end result of this "vague design" is a place whose character and authority is generated from bottom-up, grassroots efforts, not authoritative master planning imposed from by a self-serving bureaucracy.

The pods would be serviced through a vertical core of pipes supplying water (nutrient-enriched in each pod for optimal plant growth) and electricity as well as for returning human waste and non-edible biomass for energy generation. The lower level consists of a collection and redistribution center, which takes on both performative and cultural roles. While gathering, filtering, and redistributing water and energy throughout the building, the lower levels also contain museum spaces, grocery stores, farmer's markets and restaurants, which collect/gather people while simultaneously distributing both food and knowledge.

Some of the technologies required for these cyclical and sustainable systems have been discovered by Dr. Dickson Despommier, who's research on vertical farms has produced wonderfully rich potentials for not only the construction/operation of vertical farms, but also their economic and political viability. The below image catalogues the technologies employed in one of his proposed vertical farm designs.

committee meeting 01_review

Thanks to my committee for the insightful and challenging criticism. Thank you Dave and Jonathan for the great notes.

Situate project w/in the history of visionary architecture

The essence of this criticism is, I think, coming to terms with the fact that a thesis, by its very nature, is paper architecture. The term paper architecture makes me a bit uneasy, as my interests lie not in fantasies but in reconfiguring existing systems with existing technologies. However, my proposal does in fact fit the bill, particularly in regards to visionaries such as Buckminster Fuller. I imagine that as my knowledge base broadens, visionary architecture will be incorporated as an important precedent for methodology.

How sustainable is the model I'm proposing?

Using yielding as a framework suggests an architecture/system that is endlessly sustainable. Ideally (and this is where the project becomes a bit utopian), the flexibility/adaptability I'm striving for will permit the systems to evolve, like natural systems, to meet the demands of new circumstances (sea level, food surpluses/shortages, political change, labor supply, etc).

At what scale am I addressing the problem?

This question is critical. Am I imagining a highly local and specific proposal or one that attempts to address the problem of agriculture at a national/global scale. My current intent is to solve both to varying degrees by situating my proposal within the national/global network, but focusing on the particularities of the specific site circumstances. Thus, the project will consist of a system/methodology that is rigorously tested at the local, site specific scale. Another potential is to consider the building as a system/model and the landscape as a more specifically designed thing.

Who is it for/who will be the user?

This question was raised in regards to labor and urban employment, but also calls into question my proposed inclusion of housing in the scheme. There is an interesting potential to have housing for both itinerant workers as well as chic urbanites. Accordingly, the project will be able to infect and (ideally) unify multiple levels of culture around a common need. Historically, agricultural has been characterized by horizontal communities, where shared experiences existed exclusively within particular socio-economic classes. Perhaps this project can create a vertical community where class differences are superseded by a common human drive to acquire/consume food and its accompanying rituals.

Site challenges:

An expected and important discussion revolved around the site, particularly its concrete-capped and chromium laden soil A unique circumstance of this is that land and space are not necessarily the same (the space can be reclaimed while the land is left untouched). The ideas emerged in the meeting that can be broken into two categories:

[1] phased remediation. Using phytoremediation to remove chromium as a first step [prepping the site]. This proposes consideration of phasing at all levels of the project.

[2] constructed new ground. There is potential here to exploit the history of the old ground through memorializing it as well as the opportunity to construct a new, yielding one. 

Also, the phase "contaminated jewel of the city" was used to describe the site and also as a reason that it needs to be public.

Lastly, how can I exploit the fact that the site is on the water. Can the project use the water as for distribution (there is historical precedent for this in Baltimore)? Can I desalinate the water? Can I use water from the nearby Jones Falls or waste/sewer water in growing plants?

the problem of agriculture

This powerpoint was used during my first committee meeting to describe the problem of agriculture. In order to keep the thesis manageable, it is important that I'm clear about what problems I will be addressing. Thus far, my research has led me to focus on the problems associated with the historical and contemporary models of agriculture.

abstract|outline|introduction.032308

status

In order to organize the large amount of research/ideas that I have collected thus far (and also in preparation for the first committee meeting next week), this diagram attempts to create a hierarchical categorization of ideas. To consider each of these pieces thoroughly in a single thesis is admittedly over-ambitious; however, at this point in my research, it is important not to weed out too much, as the ever-evolving thesis will draw from multiple and unforeseen ideas/information.

abstract.031308

[agri]process

Agriculture, as conceptualized here, is essentially the conversion of solar energy into human activity. Through photosynthesis, carbon dioxide and water are converted into sugars and oxygen, both of which are ingested by humans who subsequently convert the oxygen and sugars back to carbon dioxide and water via respiration. Ideally, this process is entirely sustainable, as only energy is removed from the cycle. However, neither respiration or photosynthesis are 100% efficient and the various ways in which humans shed the water resulting from respiration makes collecting all of it impossible.



More importantly, the above diagram isolates the two moments in the cycle in which there is an interaction between plants and humans. The below diagram looks at the ideal conditions for both plants (grown hydroponically) and humans and prescribes an inhabitable interface to mediate between the two disparate atmospheric conditions.

site photos

abstract.022508