identifying my perspective

1. personal design philosophy
- do not get sucked into trends, but always looking forward to what could happen, or will happen
- reading is more important than any skill that i have been taught in design school, we cannot design for this world, especially not in a forward thinking way, if we do not know what is happening right now or what has already happened in civilations before ours
-humanitarian design must not consist of the design of public spaces, but must always consider how that design, even if it is a small home (or inflatable bag) will influence and aid the now and future of human civilization along with the rest of life on this planet
-if you look at everything in a very large context, is what your doing that important?
-is your sweet new mobile pod home that is completely green and will disintigrate back into the earth leaving nothing behind at the touch of a button important to someone that can never afford it? no
-can you make it so that it is? yes, make it so that they can afford it
-designers must find a balance between making things asthetically wonderful and challenging each other to see what the extents of the built world are, and making sure that everyone has a place to live and a way to feed themselves
-we cannot feel ok about ourselves designing a chair when a homeless person walks by the storefront window it sits in and sees the $3000 price tag.
-but we cannot give up our ability and need to design on a level that awes and inspires.
as a designer i must not only help those that could give a flying frog about " good design,"
but also improve, stimulate, and impress those that expect nothing but good design.
Many people work their entire lives so that they can have a few years of relaxation and their children can have an easier life than they did. I owe it to them to design beautiful and touching spaces. And i owe to myself to design things that make me have a mental breakdown trying to figure out how its going to work and can then sit around with other designers and discuss it while drinking beer, because that is what makes me happy, damn it.
-what do we do? continue to learn, always involve ourself in some sort of education system, let that system not be about boundries and answers, but about questions

"...making and perserving fixed places that are the settings for the interaction of people and ideas over time..." -Robert A.M. Stern, dean, yale school of architecture

vision of independent study project

i would like to use this opportunity of time to investigate a facility that is all about education of art and design, while also providing areas for people to interact with each other on a physical level.
Physical activity is of utmost importance to the well being of people, and how are people to comment on society if they are so depressed because all they have done is sit at a desk, or stand behind a chop saw. No matter what someone wants to do with their lives, even if they get their dream job, it will become monotonous if nothing new comes into play.If there was a place where people can work in awesome facilities, while being provided various outlets to help bypass moments of boredom, exhaustion, blockage, rage,ect., i believe a interactive community could
evolve.

one problem with my dream place, is that it must fund its upkeep. The money to build the facility presumably could be raised and federally funded, but how will the buliding stay alive. A facility that is too expensive to be used by the people that need it is worthless. And if people have no money and want to learn a skill, they should be able to do that. Normally, i would say run to the government, but do we really want them to have the control, and besides, oh yeah, Louisiana has no money. so this will be an issue, probably my largest, since the word grouping " economically feasable" were the first out of my professor's mouth when i presented the idea.