Rural Studio, Auburn University's off-campus undergraduate program in Newbern, Alabama, continues to gain recognition for their student-led design/build projects that assist the communities in one of the South's most under-served regions. Rural Studio has won several awards from 1995 until most recently as the 2015 recipient of the AIA's Whitney M. Young Jr. Award. Named after the civil rights-era Urban League leader, the annual Whitney M. Young Jr. Award is given to an architect or architecturally related organization whose work greatly contributes toward progressive social advocacy and responsibility.
Established in 1993 by D.K. Ruth and Samuel Mockbee, the student-led Rural Studio has completed parks, museums, a fire station, Boys and Girls Clubs, parks, and homes throughout western Alabama -- a region where 40 percent of the population lives under the poverty line. One of Rural Studio's projects that has attracted attention in recent years is the 20K House Product Line, which is a developing business plan that consists of easy-to-replicate affordable homes. With 16 houses so far, they are designed for their local climate and context. They include one- or two-bedrooms as well as passively ventilated front porches.
As students engage with local residents throughout the semester, they not only gain hands-on architectural experience, but they also learn about the racial, economic, cultural, and everyday issues that come with it.
2 Comments
Rural Studio > all crap starchitecture
Rural Studio is what the young architects of today should all strive to emulate. An architecture that is completely connected to its community and its people. It's the lack of connection to Jane and John Q. Public that has lead to architecture's irrelevance in the U.S. today.
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