Thesis: hotel ciénega
( the complicit architect )
Operating within the framework of aesthetics, curation, and modes of facilitation my thesis asks questions about how architecture, and thus also the architect, are complicit in constructing worlds of multiple fictions. By designing a hotel sited in the southwestern United States desert I am leveraging the typology’s existing organizational structures to tease out lifestyles. Lifestyle being defined as the culmination of objects, images, and spaces that represent the values and aspirations of an individual. Lifestyles are actively curated. The thesis aims to open up the world around us, to see it with discerning eyes, eyes that allow greater understanding of the roles and stakes of architecture and design at the level of the discipline as well the individual designer.
Themes Explored in the Work:
- Aesthetics and the judgement of taste are entwined with class and social standing.
- Architecture has become as much about exhibition as it is about function.
- Every choice is preceded by judgment which reflects values, beliefs, and aspirations.
- Design versus curation.
- Is the architect a producer of culture? Or is he/she a concierge of culture that has already been curated by social media, businesses, techniques of manufacturing (among others)?