Scales of Reuse I Reuse at Scale

FALL 2022 - OPTION STUDIO
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Scales of Reuse

Reuse in architecture should be simple and direct. However, the continued use of well-functioning elements for the same or another function at a different location can be made nearly impossible by non-reversible connection details, changing building codes, economic pressures, built-in obsolescence, and - increasingly - low-quality materials and contaminants. Reuse is the most effective circular economy strategy towards the necessary and quick decarbonization of the building industry. Reuse not only prevents carbon emissions from production and transportation of new items, but preserves social and historic values in the community, creates green and equitable jobs and helps build a local circular economy.

The Option Studio Scales of Reuse I Reuse at Scale will first investigate scalable strategies for reuse in architecture relating bothto the harvest of materials in the current built environment and the design for disassembly of future buildings. In a second phase, it will apply these strategies to the design of housing units for five families at the Quarter Acre for the People BIPOC Cooperative Farm Intentional Community of Khuba International – a project that seeks to alleviate land-based injustice through the provision of education, resources, networks and land governance, and to give People of Color the opportunity to have a foothold in the future of agriculture in Ithaca, NY.

The studio will encompass first-hand material experimentation and a series of workshops and lectures on reuse in architecture in collaboration with local and national stakeholders and experts in the field, as well as personal and on-site exchanges with the client families and Khuba International on the role of architecture in (local) agriculture. The studio will be taught in conjunction with the elective The Circular Economy: Science and Business of Construction, which is recommended but not mandatory.

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