A Not So Spooky Urban Skeleton

 When I attempt to define an urban skeleton and what that means to a community I immediately think of something scary, bare in spatial characteristics and a place that feels unconnectable to the people. I visualize structural ruins, broken, weathered facades and neglected landscaping. Having lived in the wealthier suburbs of a skeleton-filled city, I don’t have a strong personal experience with this need for self-building within my realm of place. I do, however, connect with the sense of pride of being a part of a community, and the passion that resides in high ambitions for public community spaces. 

Connecting this with the Guerilla Architecture video on how a specific application of self-building within a community was inspiring to me. I found myself amazed how the strategies crafted (taking into consideration the limited access to construction materials, equipment and most likely funds) by the community seemed to be incredibly successful. Although the process of doing this illegally is something that I would be too timid to ever commit to, I respect the hustle. Being able to utilize tools of the trade to reconstruct and redefine spaces that no longer serve as a purpose to the people that want to use the space is understandable. To take matters into one’s own hands, when other hands can’t provide for you is ambitious. 

In hopes of transforming spooky abandoned structures into ideological community spaces feels almost second nature to a tight-knit community. I find great beauty in successful architecture that is successful because creativity bought it there. Designing for a built environment that possibly incorporates reused car doors found in a junkyard to clad a wellness center in an operational way that has never been done before, yet provides a stronger functional passive cooling system than with typical façade treatments...that’s the good stuff. That’s where the beauty of innovation stems and where the community’s connection is articulated. Seeing actual instances through architecture on the care and responsibility people have to their meeting spaces and their judgement of what is important enough to risk personal and political individuality is what removes the scary, ugly and unsafe qualities to an urban skeleton. And for this as well as a big fan of all things spooky, I don’t think I am able to classify the urban skeleton as a piece of architecture that is undesirable to a community. The potential of a dead space is far too high to ignore. The urban skeleton is only a space waiting for someone to care enough to incorporate into their community circle.