Learning from Detroit

In the Summer of 2018 I participated in a one-month long independent design research project. My project specifically worked with a grassroots organizations and community garden called Feedom Freedoms Gardens.

1. Research

Context
Wayne and Myrtle Curtis are long time activist and community organizers in the city of Detroit. They were mentored under the activist and philosopher, Grace Lee Boggs, and remain apart of the Boggs Center community and mission. They started Feedom Freedom Gardens (FFG) in 2009 as a way to address needs of the community that were being otherwise dismissed or ignored. “We want to show people that you can have something sustainable that you’ve built with your own hands.” They’re committed to growing community as they grow healthy food. Together their community feeds each other, philosophizes and learns together, and creates a sustainable life together.

First Meeting at Feedom Freedoms
During my first week in Detroit me and a small group of designers went on a tour with Myrtle of her two properties in Jefferson Chalmers. As she talked through their history and their current endeavors, she walked us through the physical property of their community garden.


I noted the mention and concern of walls multiple times throughout our tour. She pointed to the different forms of barriers around her two properties and why they were important. For example, the bushes that surrounded her garden helped keep the children from running into the street but also gave an opportunity for learning about plants, bugs, and animals that occupy the bush. 

However, at her other property down the street, which they were still doing construction on at the time, she spoke about her concerns around what type of fence she should have and what they might communicate to her neighbors. Myrtle displayed a heightened sensitivity and awareness of resident relationships, tensions, and possible points of hostility.



Research Questions

I decided to prope more into this subject of walls on a more abstract level by studying the semiotics of walls within this context. My hope was that this would help inform a context-specific design concept that would be applicable to the current and future work of FFG.


Semiotics of Walls -

What do walls symbolize in Detroit?
How do walls take different forms?

What might be some of the underlying feelings residents have towards their property or others?

“Grow a garden, grow a community”

Feedom Freedoms

Physical
Barbed wire on top a wall

Symbolic
Barbed wire means security

Social
That barbed wired wall makes the neighbors feel like they are not welcomed and are possibly being watched.

Types of walls:

Windows // Doors // Gates // Locks  // Body language // Laws  // Personal space // Borders // Signs // Spatial layout // Interior offices (ex. cubicles) // Outside Security offices // Police // Prison // Lines // Weather (ex. umbrella) // Bars + Bartenders  // Restaurant // Gym // Grids // Technology // Hierarchy // Drawn/Graphics // Adolescent vs adult // Disability/mobility // Nature // Religious spaces // Sports // War // Foreclosures  // Urgencies (ex. Fire protocol and how an emergency changes borders) // Fragile // Impermanent  // Changeable  // Temporal // Invisible // Implied // Protection // Separation // Openness // Setting apart // Approachability  // Connection // Link // Wrapping //

Windows // Doors // Gates // Locks  // Body language // Laws  // Personal space // Borders // Signs // Spatial layout // Interior offices (ex. cubicles) // Outside Security offices // Police // Prison // Lines // Weather (ex. umbrella) // Bars + Bartenders  // Restaurant // Gym // Grids // Technology // Hierarchy // Drawn/Graphics // Adolescent vs adult // Disability/mobility // Nature // Religious spaces // Sports // War // Foreclosures  // Urgencies (ex. Fire protocol and how an emergency changes borders) // Fragile // Impermanent  // Changeable  // Temporal // Invisible // Implied // Protection // Separation // Openness // Setting apart // Approachability  // Connection // Link // Wrapping //

Conversational Object #1

The first deployment was with the Founder of Feedom Freedoms Myrtle Curtis. Her process was first to start weaving and then to elaborate on its meaning as she continued to weave. In the diagrams below, the text shows the symbolisms and meaning for each color and shape.

Conversational Object #2

“...some connections and similarities that are starting to form in my mind, don't know about on this tapestry”

Conversational Object #3

The importance of language: “...referring to literal neighbor brings context rather than vaguely saying ‘community’.”

“...‘To think dialectically is to recognize that reality is constantly changing and that new contradictions are constantly being created as old ones are negated.’ He (Boggs) therefore insisted on the need to create new concepts to fit new realities and political circumstance, and he argued that ideas which at one point are progressive can become reactionary at another point.”

Pages from a Black Radical's Notebook: A James Boggs Reader