PROJECTS
Maredith Byrd - Positive Friction
Kyle Malachowski - Holland in Holland
ROCK, PAPER, SMARTPHONE
Hard to say much of anything in red on orange, but in short, this studio approached the assigned functional type of POST OFFICE as one of the few kinds of places left that is all about paper.
ROCK represents the need for persistent, well-made settings to channel the flux of life. Once upon a time, public buildings were made out of stone. PAPER is where studio work stll gets done best--and is what the POST OFFICE handles. SMARTPHONE changed the world, but seeks your distraction. So this studio was often about taking ownership of one's attention. However, Rock/Paper/Smartphone also maps nicely to Model/Linework/Digital workflow balance.
Since one problem with POST OFFICE design is the lack of recent good ones to study, this studio instead interpreted colorful civic architecture of other kinds from another culture, one that consistently still aims for the public good. With its UG3-veteran professor fresh off a sabbatical visit to design-forward Amsterdam, this studio asked what about Holland in Holland? What is it that Dutch Design does so well that a staid town in Michigan might try at all?
Holland, Michigan needs a new drive-up+walk-up POST OFFICE to replace its drab brick one from the ‘80s, and to be least as good as its stone one from 1915, which is now a museum, which recently had an exhibit about the POST OFFICE as a place for good architecture for trust in government.