Module 4 - Representation of Space, Information, and Design Interventions

    Of the many examples from this module’s lecture regarding “representations of space”, perhaps the most compelling to me are the many methods with which a designer can implore communication and storytelling. Specifically, comparing existing urban design conditions with new ideas, or redesigns of urban space that are intended to improve those spaces performance. A designer can effectively show how their ideas for the reconsideration of urban space can drastically improve urban life for that city’s inhabitants by utilizing before and after photographs and renderings. Such renderings allow potential viewers the opportunity to imagine experiencing such spaces themselves. This visual communication technique is especially helpful for those who are less familiar with experiential design.

    Since primitive peoples have been adorning cave walls with stories of hunting or battle human beings have been communicating visually as a method of recording and preserving their past, or looking forward to their futures. Today, we utilize visual storytelling in urban design and architecture as a compelling and informative tool for the public to more clearly understand our thoughts on how our creations can improve their lives. To me, visual communication and storytelling are the intellectual and psychological connection linking art and design, life and human sustainability. 

Two very different versions of Visual Communication and Storytelling can be seen below: 

First,an image from the Lascaux caves in France and Marcel Duchamp's "Nude Descending Staircase 2".

   

   These images are obviously made with very different mediums and seek to express very different stories, but are both examples of ways in which we as designers and artists can communicate intricate and important history through the visual representation of time and space. In urban design we see this same type of representation in many forms, whether it is in signage and way-finding devices, two and three dimensional public artworks, or building and spatial form, and so on... These visual materials tell us as spatial travelers where we are, where we are going, and perhaps most importantly when we are in time. Our collective history is characterized by the built and visual environment that surrounds us. This can be represented in many different ways, be it through district specific signage showing you are within the boundaries of a historic district such as Hyde Park in the northwest corner of Boise, Idaho. Hyde Park is a neighborhood that has, and continues to go through many changes as the city around it grows. The historic Hyde Park district reaches essentially the entire length of one residential street and spans out two or three block perpendicular in each direction. The area of town is marked visually by signage, but even more visibly by its historic shops and homes, and the old growth deciduous trees that line its sidewalks.

    Yet another urban space that is visually represented well is Friendship Square, here in Moscow, Idaho. Friendship Square is a modest public space complete with street furniture, a seasonal water feature, and playground equipment suitable for most ages. What appears to me as particularly memorable about Friendship Square is how the city of Moscow has placed it at what had previously been an intersection of a road crossing its Main Street. While it may be considered bold to essentially block a vehicular passage way it resonates as a shift in priority away from the automobile to many thankful Moscow pedestrians. While I am unsure of the square's age or history, I can tell that it will exist as a place for rest and celebration for many years.

The last urban space that I have examined for this module is Pioneer Square at the southern end of downtown Seattle. Over the last two decades this area of Seattle has transitioned from being a part of town most avoided because of perceived crime and danger to an active and vibrant sector of a seemingly ever-expanding city. Today, this neighborhood is home to a new multipurpose stadium, many new are galleries and restaurants, as well as updated public transit lines that have improved the areas image and activity. While pioneer square remains home to a significant transient population, improvements to the district have slowly led to a more desirable area for tourists and residents alike.

Module 3 - "Influential Urban Thinkers"

William H. Whyte: Prolifically Sitable

William H. Whyte was an author and urbanist whose career began in 1946 following his graduation from Princeton University and military service in the United States Marine Corps. His most notable was produced during the sixteen year period he spent as an assistant and advisor to the New York City Planning Commission. Whyte worked also as a prolific writer whose penmanship crossed many subjects and produced several novels throughout his career. He is perhaps most well-known for authoring The Social Life of Public spaces, a documentary piece that focuses on the success, vitality, and healthy of many noteworthy public spaces in the United States.

In addition to the fame Whyte garnered from The Social Life of Public Spaces, the many books he has written, and a career with the New York Planning Commission, he also worked extensively as a mentor to The Project for Public Spaces, “a nonprofit planning, design and educational organization dedicated to helping people create and sustain public spaces that build stronger communities”. (pps.org) Of his many contributions to the architectural union, perhaps his most meaningful has been The Social Life of Public Spaces. The hour long documentary, which is charming for its vintage, provides for those interested, and otherwise a glimpse in to the mind of a person carefully considering human pattern and tendency. The result of this groundbreaking work is nothing short of an insurmountable contribution to the field of urban design. Whyte’s seminal work continues to provide planners and designers with a framework for creating successful public spaces.

As it may be, I am left wondering whether or not the most impactful segments of The Social Life of Public Spaces are not the many interesting proven truths that are the result of this work, but the moments where Whyte himself acknowledges that some of the greatest achievements in urban design exist in spaces where people are given the flexibility and freedom to exercise their own inventiveness and ingenuity. By this, I mean spaces where space is universal, public furniture can be moved, or places that leave open their definition to be determined by its guests. This notion of self-guidance reminds me a good deal of what Whyte’s fellow urbanist, Allan Jacobs, would refer to simply as “the magic”.  A sort of organic dance that happens when humans are given the right kind of climate for finding their own comfortable spaces. This concept of greater public involvement in design suggests that maybe some of the healthiest and most active public centers are those that relinquish some control to the users themselves. Spaces that are created with less ego and more responsibility.