Reconciling the Industrial and the Urban

Dan and Marie Adams are interested in the potential of active industrial landscapes to “inject fascinating moments back into the city.” By working in spaces where a designer’s role is often unidentified, their Somerville, Massachusetts-based firm Landing Studio finds possibilities for interweaving industrial activity with public and recreational uses.

Their Authenticity installation includes models and time-lapse videos illustrating how the global activity of industrial ports and highway systems interact with local environments over time. The two designers exhibit a catalogue of interventions and moments where industry, nature, and public activities can intermix to create new urban relationships — “we think it’s just a lot more exciting to be playing basketball as an oil tanker passes by within feet.”

Lundgaard & Tranberg Architects | Kannikegaarden | Ribe, Denmark | 2015 | Photograph courtesy of Lundgaard & Tranberg Architects

Ongoing projects include Infra-Space 1, which turns space beneath an elevated highway in Boston into parking, green space, and stormwater management; the Rock Chapel Marine Headquarters Building in Chelsea, MA; and an installation for the Design Biennial Boston. Past projects include P.O.R.T. (Publicly Organized/Privately Owned, Recreation Territory), a waterfront public event space and park in a maritime industrial dock at Rock Chapel Marine in Chelsea, MA; OIL TANK FUTURES PROJECTIONS: TREES/GIANTS/GOODBYE, an installation in Chelsea, MA; and the design of a temporary light festival on an active industrial salt dock for the LUMEN film festival with Staten Island Arts.