It’s one thing for your final project to stand up to final reviews, but quite another for it to withstand heavy outdoor use by generations of children!
This spring and summer, Associate Professor John Comazzi (Architecture) taught a design-build graduate module in partnership with Anoka County Parks & Rec to fabricate and install learning kiosks at the Wargo Nature Center Heritage Lab for local schools and summer camps. The students’ designs were influenced throughout the process by site visits, guest speakers, and critiques by community partners.
Comazzi explained that more and more architecture degree programs are incorporating courses beyond the traditional design studio—including professional practice, environmental technologies, and structural design. “With this type of integration, design-build offers unique opportunities for students to formulate strong connections across multiple content areas,” he noted.
They also give students a taste of designing in the real world. Comazzi said that one of the most powerful lessons design-builds impart on students is that “you cannot plan out every aspect of the project in advance, and you have to learn to adjust and pivot on the fly. Of course, unexpected occurrences can also lead to pleasant surprises.”
This particular design-build also challenged the students to work with clients, developing professional skills while refining their design strategy. “In preparation for our public presentations with our community partners, the students worked in groups to formulate a narrative about their respective designs,” Comazzi described. He added that the partners’ feedback was “instrumental in moving the projects forward and also determining which approaches did not meet their needs for one reason or another.”
The Heritage Lab program introduces students in grades 1 through 6 to Minnesota history, with themes including voyageurs, American Indians in Minnesota, pioneers and settlers, and milling, mining and lumbering. “The goal is to provide them with a hands-on, fun, educational opportunity that will connect them with the area around them and make history interesting,” said Krista Harrington, Wargo Nature Center Program Supervisor.
The students’ structures will enhance the Heritage Lab experience. “The stations are designed to be interactive and hands-on and the presenters are in time-period appropriate costumes. The students may participate in activities like being in a one-room schoolhouse during Pioneers or learning what it was like as a Civil War nurse and being at a field hospital or visiting a trapper’s camp during Voyageurs,” Harrington explained. YMCA’s Camp Heritage will also integrate the structures into day camp programming.
The design-build process gave its community partners a fresh perspective on their day-to-day. Harrington noted that her favorite part of the process was seeing what the students came up with based on the partners’ requirements. “We went through several reviews, variations and changes and we ended up with these super cool structures. I had absolutely no idea what to expect and the final product is way more impressive than what I pictured.”
“The ideas and collaborative process that the students went through really served as a kick start to get me out of my normal thought process. It made me start to question what we do and begin to widen our horizons, so to speak,” added Wargo Nature Center operations supervisor Lisa Gilliland.
After nearly three years of work, College of Design student group AIAS Freedom by Design installed and unveiled a set of playground instruments for Karner Blue Education Center this May.
Architecture students in Professor Julia Robinson’s (Architecture) Studio V are preparing design proposals to reconsider how to serve youth presently in Hennepin County’s juvenile detention and rehabilitation centers.
There are 25 statues honoring historical figures in New York City’s Central Park. They include a sculpture of a Polish king, a Venezuelan military leader, a Prussian naturalist, and even a sled dog. But not a single one of these statues is in honor of a historical woman.
