IDEAS OF INSTANTANEOUS ARCHITECTURE

Crowds gather in public squares all facing upward. Music begins in the form of screams tearing through the skies, and in an instant an inhabitable space is formed before the “ooooos” and “awwwws” of it’s spectators. Colors sparkle through the skies as the space expands exponentially, disintegrating more and more with each passing moment.

In a time when architects investigate spaces that are flexible, responding to the environement, recursive to its own elements, deconstructable, and can be scripted as a sequential chain of events, the firecracker becomes the ultimate exploration. For a period of time in history, the Crystal Palace in London was a momentous piece of architecture that was explored by many. And for a period of time in history, a firecracker could share these same inhabitants. If only one could slow down the pace of time where the world around you moves at the speed f one second over the course of a day, or a week, or a year. One could then imagine these spaces as structural nodes in the skies waiting for tenants to come and grow with them. The could be the perfect environment for children to grow into if the pace of growth of the nodes could be calculated to keep in time with that of the child’s bones and muscles. As you grow, your bed grows, the toilet is a little taller, the counter a little bigger. The architecture becomes a part of time and becomes a part of you.

time. space. architecture.

About pettydesign

James Petty is an American architect experiencing and contributing to the Yale School of Architecture.