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Trailer Trash

 

If I've talked to you in the past few months there is a good chance I have told you about my recent obsession with the band Modest Mouse. One album in particular that I have really enjoyed is their sophomore release "The Lonesome Crowded West" (for real you could check it out).  A lot of the songs describe the rough early life of the bands lead singer Isaac Brock and his childhood spent in poverty. One in particular that really hits home is titled "Trailer Trash". Lyrics like "Eating snow flakes with plastic forks, and a paper plate of course"  allow the listener to gain insight into what the struggles of living in poverty can be like. It was lyrics like these that reminded me of Samuel Mockbee's mission with rural studio. During an AIA Conference that Samuel Mockbee attended in the 90's, a guest pointed out that most architects design buildings for the wealthy while his rural studio designs for some of the poorest people in the world. The point was made even further when Sir Michael Hopkins (another architect on the panel) announced he was currently working on a project for the Queen. Meanwhile, Samuel was currently creating a house out of haybales for Shepard Bryant. This stark contrast shows two very different approaches to architecture. Samuel spotted the poverty in his surrounding community and he used what he could to try to design a solution. Michael Hopkins ignored these questions of community all together. Instead, his design process was focused on creating a work of spectacular architecture in a vacuum. It wasn't to say it was bad architecture, it was just to say it didn't try to answer the harder questions of poverty or communal involvement. His projects purely were  a reaction to the capitalist desire to make a profit with a very stylishly designed building. Rural studio was in the opposite situation. It had to reuse materials like road signs and car windshields, fighting against the rigid capitalistic system to help the less fortunate. Mockbee turned literal trailer trash into trailer treasure. However, I believe the harder question is: Can helping impoverished society coexist with the efficiency of a rigid capitalistic system. Is there a way architects can creatively use the ideas of scarcity and austerity to create designs that allow the less than wealthy to have access to good design, while still turning a profit large enough to keep people wanting to do it? In other words, can the idea of trailer treasure become a profitable way of designing? I hope so, because I would love to see more and more starchitects put their talents toward designing for people other than just the wealthiest clients. 

Comments

  1. AnonymousMarch 10, 2021 at 9:50 PM

    Agreed Kevin. We can (and should look) most certainly to design for many others than the top paying clients. Building a repour with more people (no matter their socioeconomic class). I think if we did this and educated far more people on the benefits of good design the profession would prosper exponentially.

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  2. AnonymousMarch 11, 2021 at 8:32 AM

    Nothing against Modest Mouse but you need to find a new band to listen to because I'm tired of you talking about them non-stop. Nevertheless, I totally agree with what your saying in this post. Architects should, I think, start to look a little more at what the community needs than what the top few high paying people want.

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  3. GabrielleMarch 11, 2021 at 3:42 PM

    I loved this story by Mockbee and I think this idea ties back a point that was brought up in one of the past debates as to whether you would prefer to design "background buildings" that benefit the people that use them daily or "starchitect-type" buildings that most people may only visit once or twice in their lives. Though Mockbee's pieces could potentially be considered "background buildings", they have a significantly higher impact on the people that use them daily - on the people that rely on them for survival. I echo your final comment in hoping that the idea of "trailer treasure" may eventually become a profitable way of designing. Because if there is no money in it, it is not likely that many architects, designers, or firms will place much of an importance on it.

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  4. HarrisonMarch 25, 2021 at 12:32 PM

    Cool post bro, and that's a great tune. Also, re the Mockbee / Sir Michael Hopkins exchange, I think it's a great anecdote for obvious reasons, but I just find it hard to believe that Hopkins would respond in the way that he did. I mean, I do believe that this occurred, but the idea that architects, or any particular demographic of people, shouldn't be "asking these types of questions" is dumb AF. Like thinking about the stuff that we build from the trees that we cut down and the stone we grind up from/on the planet we share is the concept that only a particular set of people are qualified to contemplate and act on? Pleez. And that guy works for the queen? No wonder Meghan and Harry bailed.

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