CITY FROM A GRAIN

The Geologic Processes of Construction

Location: Shenzhen, China

2020 Spring Studio Work, Harvard Graduate School of Design

Instructor: Andrew Witt, Robert Pietrusko

Sand is critical not only to building materials like concrete and glass but also to silicon and other technology products. But due to overbuilding and intensive use there is a global sand crisis, and the shortage of sand is a preview of other more severe shortages of construction materials to come.

Shenzhen is a city that grows and rebuilds itself at an unprecedented speed, outstripping the geologic resources that it demands such as sand and other minerals. In face of the impending resource shortage, it is also a city that has also recently opened to areas to mining and geologic exploration. This project works on methods to rearrange, recycle, and replace existing building materials across multiple spatial scales and a temporal scale of 50-years. By revealing the hidden story of urban materiality, “City from a Grain” also urges for more environmental responsibility in the era of Anthropocene.

This project proposes an urban experience park that makes visible how natural resources are extracted and aggregated to build 21st century cities. The park is a network of specific sites that selectively preserve the architecture of the recent past while excavating the geology below. It draws reciprocal connections between above-ground urban developments and underground geological formations, showing that the built environment is intricately interwoven with processes that are far older than cities themselves. It aims to educate the public about the resources of the city and how they can be radically reused.