Open House

OPEN HOUSE: SERVING NEW YORK

Open House is a project by Droog in collaboration with Diller Scofidio + Renfro. Open house was presented in a one-day event on Saturday, April 23rd, 2011. The event was kicked-off with a symposium at Studio-X New and followed by a bus trip to Levittown, where visitors could view and participate in nine house installations in the neighborhood, designed and executed by architects, designers and artists in collaboration with the homeowners. Our installation showcased concepts for future open houses, with proposals for new housing configurations and regulatory modifications.

Future Open Houses, by EFGH: Existing rules of the suburbs are becoming outdated as home-made services and collaborative consumption are becoming increasingly widespread. Future Open Houses imagines how the new residential service economy might affect the protocols of an archetypal suburb. As a case study, six blocks of Levittown visualize the potential outcome of a bottom-up suburban service economy. New organization, zoning codes and public-private relationships are proposed. A catalogue of housing typologies and spatial negotiations is presented for a future suburbia in which increased density, opportunistic land use and new combinations of public and private programming co-exist.
 

  • Founded by inventor, industrialist and philanthropist Peter Cooper in 1859, The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art offers education in art, architecture and engineering, as well as courses in the humanities and social sciences.

  • “My feelings, my desires, my hopes, embrace humanity throughout the world,” Peter Cooper proclaimed in a speech in 1853. He looked forward to a time when, “knowledge shall cover the earth as waters cover the great deep.”

  • From its beginnings, Cooper Union was a unique institution, dedicated to founder Peter Cooper's proposition that education is the key not only to personal prosperity but to civic virtue and harmony.

  • Peter Cooper wanted his graduates to acquire the technical mastery and entrepreneurial skills, enrich their intellects and spark their creativity, and develop a sense of social justice that would translate into action.