Off the Grid

Rural Studio’s lecture, The Challenges of Sustainable Rural Living, organized by the Architectural League of New York and originally hosted by the Cooper Union, finally took place on Wednesday after being postponed for two years and forced back online at the last minute.

“We take our work seriously, but we don’t take ourselves seriously,”said Andrew Freear, director of Rural Studio, between presenting a photograph of students donning costumes as porta potties at a final review, and a slate of recent works. Since its founding in 1993, Rural Studio, a program within Auburn University, has completed over 200 projects serving its home base Hale County, Alabama and its neighboring regions; many were constructed by the students themselves. Freear and Associate Director RUSTY SMITH, presented numerous works that included Newbern Town Hall, Perry Lakes Park Birding Tower, public restrooms, bridges, ball parks, community parks, Akron Boys and Girls Center, farmers markets, and much more. The majority are timber construction and many occupy dilapidated buildings that have been abandoned, damaged by arson, or fallen into disrepair.

The buildings are the tip of the iceberg of the Rural Studio’s Front Porch Initiative, a feedback loop of research, advocacy, and training that questions conventional building practices. The initiative proposes an intellectual framework that concerns less with how a wall looks than what it‘s made of, who builds it, and what it affords. When asked about the intricacies of building in rural areas where regulations are scant, Smith answers: “When nobody’s watching, that’s when it’s most important to do the right thing.”