Studio Mayd: Molding Mini Rooms
One of six installations for the digital exhibition by winners of the 2021 League Prize.
Modest residential projects are the purview of many young architects. Usually unpublished and unpromoted, these projects support the economics and education of young studios. Studio Mayd’s installation deliberately highlights and investigates the learning garnered by the practice across a body of related, yet distinct, residential projects.
In doing so, we aim to make visible the realities of a young practice, document the body of knowledge Studio Mayd has amassed through working on residential projects, and elevate the experimental and research-based facets of designing at the residential scale—thereby highlighting specific forms of learning and analysis inherent in residential design.
Residential architecture has a unique relationship to scale models through the dollhouse. For
our purposes, the dollhouse offers a special opportunity to explore the interior, formal experiences of decorative detailing at the residential scale.
The Art Institute of Chicago’s Thorne Miniature Rooms, for example, provide an interesting precedent for such model-making and educational experiences. Highly detailed scale replicas of residential spaces across eras and geographies, these models sit within a wall, offering museumgoers abstracted frontal experiences.
Through the construction of detailed scale models focused on interior experiences and residential assemblies, Studio Mayd’s installation demonstrates the experiential and experimental potentials of residential trim molding applications.
