Description:

Create multi-media documentation and reflection of the field trip and weekly readings supporting the ideas explored and lessons learned. Each reflection should contain all the following parts:

  • Weekly readings related to the topic and site of the field trip
  • (4) sketches from the field trip
  • (1) photo or video collage documentation
  • 500-word reflections essay linking your observations and experience to topics discussed in the weekly readings

Objectives:

  • Observe buildings, landscapes, and context in their totality and detail, and Document observations in sketches and other means. Learn to identify the various styles and tectonic elements within the built environment.
  • Read architectural writing and become familiar with the way architecture and its history is discussed.
  • Research case studies of buildings and urban spaces.
  • Write architectural and urban ideas in your own voice.

Site #3: Roosevelt Island & Long Island City

  • Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms State Park: “I had this thought that a memorial should be a room and a garden. That’s all I had. Why did I want a room and a garden? I just chose it to be the point of departure. The garden is somehow a personal nature, a personal kind of control of nature, a gathering of nature. And the room was the beginning of architecture. I had this sense, you see, and the room wasn’t just architecture, but was an extension of self.” -Louis Kahn, Excerpt from a lecture given at Pratt Institute (from the website)
  • Smallpox Memorial Hospital: “Smallpox Hospital was the first hospital in the country to receive patients with smallpox. New York residents afflicted with the disease were quarantined by law at the “Blackwell’s Island” (the island’s name at the time) hospital. Once a successful vaccine was implemented in the late 1800s, the hospital was closed. Over the 1900s, vandals ravaged the metal detailing and the roof collapsed, leaving only the facade remaining.”(from the website)
  • Gantry Plaza State Park & Hunter’s Point South Park: “The park, which is wrapped by tidal marshes throughout much of its area, boasts features such as fitness equipment, a kayak launch, meandering walking pathways, and plenty of green space on which to relax. There is also a permanent art installation, titled “Luminescence” designed by local artist Nobuho Nagasawa. The piece includes seven sculptures that represent the seven phases of the moon that absorb light energy and glow at night.” (from the website)

Weekly Readings:

Process:

  1. Before the field trip: Compete weekly readings
  2. During the field trip:
    • Take photos of your observations and experiences
    • Sketch 1 looking toward the Manhattan East Side skyline
    • Sketch 2 looking toward the Long Island City skyline
    • Sketch 3 and 4 of FDR Four Freedoms State Park
  3. After the field trip: Upload the following items to Miro
    • A photo or video collage of your observations and experiences
    • Photographs or scans of your four sketches
    • 500-word reflection essay linking your observations and experience, readings, and explanation of sketches and collages

Deliverables:

Upload collage(s), sketches, and the essay to Miro

Blank template for instructor’s use: Miro Template Reflections 3

View student samples on Miro:

Summer 2023