Thursday, February 24, 2011

Daniel Wicke of Rural Studio to Speak at Dwellings

We are happy to announce that Daniel Wicke will be coming to share the work of Rural Studio with us. Rural Studio was started in the 90's by architect Sam Mockbee as a way to combine real-world experience for Auburn architecture students with the extreme need for housing in rural Alabama. The students work with future homeowners using found, recycled and donated materials to build homes that are architecturally significant and appropriate for those that live in them. 

Daniel Wicke is the Rural Studio Outreach/Thesis Instructor. His duties as Outreach/Thesis Instructor include primary advisor to the Outreach program’s $20K House, co-teaching both the Outreach and Thesis programs with the studio’s director Andrew Freear, and overseeing continuing thesis projects. He has assembled Rural Studio’s work in the exhibit, Small Scale Big Change, at The Museum of Modern Art in New York and co-designed a pavilion representing the Rural Studio.

There have been two wonderful books and a documentary about the Rural Studio Program. The books, Rural Studio: Samuel Mockbee and an Architecture of Decency (2002) and Proceed and Be Bold: Rural Studio After Samuel Mockbee (2005) do a great job of capturing the philosophy and humanity behind the building projects. The documentary, Citizen Architect, is also a great overview that compares and contrasts the thinking behind Rural Studio with some of the other contemporary architectural thought. Exposure to Rural Studio will have you wondering what other issues of modern life could benefit from this type of thinking.

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