Spring 2017 Comprehensive design studio project

Proposing a new community institution for the town of Callicoon, NY, based on the historical model of the agrarian Grange hall. The project is rooted in the observation that new population that are interested in leading rural or semi-rural lives in small towns, partially in response to rising living costs in many urban areas, while older communities in these locations have experienced economic and demographic changes of their own. Greater geographic flexibility for certain types of workers have created financial and social links to urban centers making them more accessible from these adopted, and decidedly non-suburban, homesteads. The objective of this project is to cultivate a bridge between the many people, old and new, that live and work in the area. As such, and with the explicit ambition of adapting the historical typology of the Grange hall to our contemporary purposes, it will also be viewed - openly and critically - as a link between traditionally urban and rural modes of living.