chainlinkGREEN

chainlinkGREEN
Philadelphia, PA. 2009 – present

chainlinkGREEN is a system of construction designed to realize urban gardens, shade canopies, parks, benches and other urban, social condensers using only materials common to an abandoned lot, including chainlink fencing, standard 90°, steel pipe, rubble, reclaimed lumber, and concrete debris. chainlinkGREEN’s distinct geometry and aesthetic is borne from three concerns: (a) to develop an efficient, 3-dimensional structural system using only the 90° angles common to chainlink fencing, (b) to realize a construction system that is simple to build without the aid of expensive tools or trained professionals, and

(c) to offer an intensely elastic environment that is capable of accommodating the wide variety of programs, materials and uses needed by our urban environments. chainlinkGREEN’s lightweight, easily constructed structure, realized through a simple distortion of the common fence typology, offers great utility, elasticity, and beauty within a very simple palette – creating a work that is affordable, accessible and at home in most urban settings. From an environmental standpoint, the elasticity of chainlinkGREEN’s potential material and programmatic palette offers opportunities to create sustainable urban gardens, storm water retention systems and animal habitats using only discarded materials and sites.

The first chainlinkGREEN installation was completed in 2011 at Bodine High School in Northern Philadelphia. This 220’ long installation provides the students at Bodine High School and the residents of the surrounding community with much-needed outdoor classroom space as well as raised gardens, scrapwood tatami seating platforms and shaded areas of assembly. Over the coming years, the Philadelphia School Board, inspired by the initial installation, intends to build additional versions of the chainlinkGREEN in schoolyards around the city. Similarly, Mural Arts, a partner in the first work, is planning to build new versions of chainlinkGREEN around the city.

In addition, the Mural Arts Program of Philadelphia is planning, through the generosity of a donor who was moved by the successes of the first chainlinkGREEN, a radical expansion of the Restored Spaces program that was used to build this work. In the coming years, the International Design Clinic will realize new versions of chainlinkGREEN in Philadelphia, NYC and other locations around the US. In each case, regardless of sponsor or site, chainlinkGREEN will remain a product of an intensely collaborative design process, through which local residents, artists, students and design professionals might jointly envision new uses and occupations for overlooked sites, building vestment and shifting chainlink fencing from a material that reinforces a divide between public and private to a device that overlaps various publics in a constructive manner.

+ Several venues have featured chainlinkGREEN, including a 2011 curated group show about innovative, community-based art and architecture at the AIA CENTER FOR ARCHITECTURE in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

FUNDING SUPPORT:
Mural Arts Program of Philadelphia
International Design Clinic

PARTNERSHIPS:
International Design Clinic
Mural Arts Program of Philadelphia
The Guild
Philadelphia School System
Philadelphia Water Department
Northern Liberties Neighborhood Association