thesis statement

This thesis aims to subvert traditionally heteronormative structures of power, formally and sociopolitically, in order to reclaim space for queer people in a stubborn landscape.

In subverting the physical and ideological typologies of a catholic church and military armory, the proposal utilizes familiar forms to house unwelcome identities. The adjacency of spirituality and violence act as reimagined mechanisms of covertly queer protection.

Drawing upon decades of queer codes, theories, and forms (found and made), the design theorizes ways in which a jeopardized minority population may covertly, then over time overtly, inhabit typologies that are traditionally harmful to them.

Queer theories and methodologies, both emergent and experimental, guide a reimagined design timeline that liberates architecture to become a conscious force which designs, builds, protects and transforms the proposal during and after construction. In order to accomplish this, critiques on heteronormative conventions—architectural, representational, sociopolitical—must be formed. The tools of the oppressor can effectively become the defenses of the oppressed.

Though harmful realities of the present landscape must be addressed, the proposal holds hope that the defensive tactics will only be temporary, and the designs being dispersed from the armory may effectively, over time, work to challenge and change the metaphysical landscape.

Note

The taught, practiced, and normalized boundaries of architecture must be expanded beyond formal beauty, technological progress, or futuristic aspiration alone. Our discipline is moving towards a future of hybridized approach and diversified authorship, two queer horizons upon which this thesis finds great hope. As this thesis took shape in the shadow of a future-formalist school pedagogy with its own conservative detractors, I was able to find my own design purpose. In many ways, the friction formed new tendrils of creativity and the bothands became foundational to something much bigger than any single plan, project or person.

The Denouncement of Permanence — In a world of continual impermanence, from ecological transformations to socioeconomic shifts, we must formulate inclusively hybridized approaches that lead to final designs which do not see themselves as static interventions, but rather fluid propositions of nonlinearity. The illusion of permanence must not proliferate in a world of open systems and dynamic change; temporality can be a design tool rather than avoided reality.

A Challenge to Binary Thinking — Our discipline’s obsession with grids, binaries, silos and tradition must be questioned to reflect an increasingly dynamic and decentralized world. The linear perspectives & top-down approaches of past must reconcile with today’s digitized, globalized context of constant, rapid flux, where static grids of blackand-white are less acclimated to address the gradient of issues and publics we now have.

The Hybridization of Discipline — We can no longer ignore the environmental and sociopolitical contingencies facing architecture; the design profession and its surrounding vectors must perforate the bounds of communication and collaboration to foster meaningful, empathetic change that is expectant and inclusive from the origin of design to its implementation in diverse contexts. Beyond lip service, we must extend and engage to foster collective resilience and progress.

A Reconsideration of Authorship — The agency of the architect has eclipsed the agency of the inhabitant; designs for the communities we serve must include adaptive networks of participation, centered on the constituents and their uniquelyunderstood needs. The definition of authorship must be challenged without fear of new architectural norms or considerations.

The Queering of Space — Relating to binary opposition, the unique capabilities of queer theory to respond to and reform typologies of oppression in evermore fluid modern contexts must be considered under an architectural lens. The identities, subcultural traditions, and spatial potentials of ‘queered space’ must be studied as its own distinct methodology, capable of extending beyond any single category of oppression.

These perforated lines of inquiry have led to a larger discussion on what it means to hold, challenge, or subvert normative notions of discipline, representation, and design implementation. Through the emergent field of queered design, I aim to announce several strategies, still in development, of how design might be effectively “queered” towards more subversive, inclusive, and discursive futures.

As these five pillars of inspiration began forming the foundations of the design proposal, my personal experiences as a queer person from the south became something to productively draw upon. In the context of my academic career, of which this design research is a culmination of, queerness has been inescapable. I entered my first year of architectural education as a closeted queer in unfamiliar territory, both physically and academically. As I progressed through the program and my own personal revelations, a new vocabulary of named perspectives was able to emerge.

Once I felt my thesis turning towards the region that so negatively affected me in my formative years, terror and exhilaration seemed to grasp me simultaneously. The idea of utilizing design and theory to address pertinent issues of inequality, directly related to the self-discovery I have been able to make over these five years, became a passion I see lasting long beyond the production of this book. In many ways, this project is a shimmering encapsulation of my growth over these first years living in truth, with all its pain and potentials.

The Sanctuary for Queer Design and Defense represents my first foray into what it means to subvert architectural norms, specifically related to the rigid binaries and overwhelmingly heteronormative structures it currently operates within. What began as a social argument soon branched towards formal (in the typologies addressed), then representational (in the shimmering of queer design), and eventually political (in the suggestion of how such a subversive project might be built in a landscape that loathes it). This thesis aims to open a door of inquiry into what it means to intersect queer ecologies with architectural conventions. What does it mean to queer the landscape?

history & precedent

My research during the fall semester progressed in four phases: (1) ecological hybridity, (2) history/hybridization, (3) informal ephemeralities, and (4) urban edges/ethics.

I instinctively reached beyond the discipline of architecture and dove into the particular abilities of fashion design. I was drawn to its capabilities of integrating hybrid elements, from collaboration to fabrication, and then explored various film architectures and landscapes in efforts to understand the gradients between ecology and hybridity beyond and including the field of architecture.

This line of exploration led me to question how “architecture” has historically considered itself—through styles, eras, social classes and internal movements— and where its current “crisis of agency” (amid growing interdisciplinary integrations) might exist.

When I began considering potential sites and sociology, I returned to a continual obsession in researching the informal sides of cities and how rapidly-evolving socioeconomic systems affect and perpetuate certain modes of design over others. From there, I found a string running through all of my research interests: division, formally and socially, on the urban scale.

One of the most impactful elements to me personally in the forming of this thesis has been the complicated development of my own questions and ethics related to our field, and how it has, or more excitingly can, operate.

The perforation of discipline and crosscontamination of ideas has become a moment of investigation that underlies many aspects of this thesis, both theoretically and in the design proposal itself. Marrikka Trotter and Esther Choi’s Architecture at the Edge of Everything Else was a seminal text of reference. I now believe that creative subversions, or at the very least fluid explorations, of traditional power and agency are crucial in the progression of future urbanisms. These subversions are uniquely able to work towards a more inclusive design process that embraces the fluid nature of things rather than working against them, and adopt a readily queer perspective more capable of withstanding uncertainty and change.

This stance beings into question many emergent topics, the primary ones of this thesis being: challenging permanence and temporality, embracing new definitions of authorship, forming new modes of nonbinary thinking and form-making, and exploring what it means to “queer” design against more traditionally static and often fallacious considerations of spatial design.

typology & form

A natural line of research dove into historically queered spaces. Sites of coded queer use, across hundreds of years, began forming a kit of forms and socio-spatial relations: pleasure gardens, bath houses, cruising spots, and other sites of exchange began forming relationships between “planned” formal uses and equally, if not more often-enacted “informal” uses. Not all informal or subcultural use scenarios are deemed “negative” by the dominant public, and both utilize the same spaces regardless; so how can we begin designing with an air of creative expectancy for the diverse realities of the built environment?

The reality of informal and/or temporary use became a consistent consideration of the design research, specifically in its connection to queer populations throughout history seeking refuge in creative spaces.