Mall to Prison Inversion | Reuse Proposal

So often, unused and uninhabited malls resemble prisons. Hulking, anonymous, and closed to the outside, these two building types are some of the most reviled edifices in the contemporary American landscape. Rather than attempt a cosmetic renovation (why give Frankenstein a makeover when his ugliness is his most interesting characteristic?), we propose a far more radical transformation, one that operates precisely upon the mall's introverted nature. By inverting the mall's donut topology and grafting onto it a program of labyrinthine intricacy, the once unitary organization of the mall is fractured into a more complex weave of bodies, views, and spaces. Inside is turned out in order to create an architecture of incarceration where privacy and publicity, freedom and confinement, collide to delirious effect. Designed in collaboration with Jolie Kerns.

 
Previous
Previous

Where do you Live?

Next
Next

The State of Architecture