| SDC Environment 
| View from N. Central Avenue
May 8, 2002 | Program Statement
SDC Home Page
Sojourner-Douglass College web site Master Plan Notes | The Program of the Sojourner-Douglass College Campus environment is derived from its history, mission, location, today’s social-economic circumstance and a VISION of the future. The purpose of the SDC Campus is to support the process of that vision becoming reality and to be a living example of it NOW; the Campus is to be the experience of what life is to become through individual education and betterment. This is true for student, educator and administrator alike: in physical environment, in symbol, in spirit, in governance, in thinking and learning styles; the Sojourner-Douglass environment demonstrates the College’s thesis. | | Architecture is the embodiment of idea in form. It is the symbol of ideals and the reality of our ability to achieve them. There are many reasons for education: personal betterment, increased earnings, the broadening of understanding, the building of a creative and just society... The overreaching reason is the maturation of a human. This is an aspiration. The environment that this is done in is far more than a utility; it is the proof of that aspiration; a piece of what human life is and can become. What we build is one measure of our commitment to making this educational ideal real. Else, great effort remains an abstraction. To build with economy and without compromise; to dedicate the effort to create a space for true learning and creativity; to manifest, artfully, the values of the institution; this is to practice the supreme art of place-making. To do so over time, with the experience of using the envionment determining the next phases of design and building, is to practice the Timeless Way of Building. | | The how an environment is built is as important as the design of it. If it is built as a thing, as a commodity, as a means only to acquire money; if it is built with conflict and non-attention in a mean-spirited way; it will remain an object with no soul or meaning; it will fail except to provide for the most base of human needs. | | How a building is used is not without consequence to the spirit. Occupying the physical environment is as important as the designing and building of it. It is using that makes practice out of thought; living memory out of experience. How humans employ it is the measure of a building’s success. | | The place the building makes in the world, on the Earth, and the impact it has on the greater environment is not neutral or insignificant; the opposite is true. Do you teach economy and respect in an environment that wastes and pollutes? Does, in sum, the building add to life or take from it? How does it fit in the ecology of it’s place and the social-economy if it’s region? These questions have to be answered successfully by how the building functions. | | The building facilitates the activities within it while giving them meaning by connecting them to the purpose they add up to. The building is the frame within which each act is taken; the stage for human life. | | The SDC Campus serves a diverse and complex community. To do this successfully, the Campus must bring together a unique set of functions and capabilities rarely found in a project of this intimate scale. | | Matt Taylor
Palo Alto
August 28, 2002 
SolutionBox voice of this document:
INSIGHT • POLICY • PROGRAM |
posted: August 28, 2002 revised: April 24, 2003 • 20020828.821912.mt • 20021110.222581.mt • • 20030424.776129.mt • (note: this document is about 5% finished) Matt Taylor 650 814 1192 me@matttaylor.com Copyright© Matt Taylor 2002 | |
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