ARCH_500-600 Options Studio: ‘Faux Terrain: The Art of War’

“We may distinguish six kinds of terrain, to wit: (1) accessible ground; (2) entangling ground; (3) temporizing ground; (4) narrow passes; (5) precipitous heights; (6) positions at a great distance from the enemy.”

—Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War,” Chapter 10: “Terrain”

At the turn of the century the urbanization of American cities created sophisticated multimodal systems of infrastructural terrains. Automotive and locomotive transportation caused a new form of urban situation where pedestrian ground was reshaped and three-dimensionalized by modern urban planning. Cities developed elevated grounds and new terrains through robust construction campaigns to expand and modernize.

The “faux terrain” is an artificial ground and territory that has been superimposed by layering technological histories. The ground demonstrates the complexity within the socio-spatial terrain of the city, developed from the interplay between many incongruous elements of the urban condition. This includes new forms of humanizing interactions that are activated by the terrain, allowing dynamic event space, access, scale, and materiality to transform the mechanical geography into a place of social gathering.

The “Art of War” is an exploration of design tactics that reconfigure existing problems into creative site gestures and phenomena. This process calls for a change of paradigm in architectural practice by intensifying the inquiry into formal site operations. Students researched and developed new prototypes of architectural interventions by designing research and development facilities for Autodesk’s Build Space site located at Route 90 and the Massachusetts Turnpike overpass between Massachusetts Avenue, Newbury Street, and Boylston Street in Boston.