Project by Zachary Beim @zacharyjbeim + Hannah Zhao
Connective Canopy provides an additional piece of infrastructure to a site that is heavily fractured and highly manipulated – one of connection rather than division. The project links existing community resources to an urban forest of gridded poplar trees, creating pedestrian infrastructure that doubles as adaptable affordable housing for a highly transient population organized around courtyards and meanders through the forest canopy. Here, domesticity is defined by shared spaces, the forest as an active participant, and change over time.
We reject the isolated private unit, instead providing a gradient of private-public boundary, from private bedrooms, to shared courtyards, to communal paths, to the forest canopy itself. Polycarbonate enclosures above the winding path through the canopy allow the housing to maintain a visual link to the forest, where domesticity is driven by flexibility and customizable privacy walls rather than utility or defined spaces.
