RURAL IOWA HOUSING TYPOLOGY RESEARCH, COLLAGES, AND DRAWINGS
RURAL IOWA HOUSING TYPOLOGY RESEARCH, COLLAGES, AND DRAWINGS, 2021
︎ Class: SNAFU, Advanced Studio
︎ Typology: Research
︎ Location: Beaver and Grand Junction, Highway 30, IA
Along the remnants of the Lincoln Highway there lie hundreds of forgotten towns. What were once bustling stops along the nation’s first cross-country roadway are now all but ghost-towns, victims of Eisenhower’s Interstate Highway sytem. In these small towns, rurality is a way of life. The largest structure in town is often the grain elevator, if not the lonely watertower. Density is low, and theres a
noticeable distance from facade to sidewalk and house to house. Theres a distinct “heaviness” to the roofs of these houses; the roofs are large and occupy a significant portion of the house’s silhouette. These facades are functional, with mismatched, asymmetrical, apertures tailored to the program of the room into which they open.
Noticably absent from these town’s definitions of rurality is nature. While “rural” towns in the Pacific Northwest or the Rockies are framed by wild forests and idyllic landscapes, little about the towns of Beaver or Grand Junction, Iowa is “wild”. Growth is abundant, of course, and the corn fields, soy beans, and livestock certainly are growing, but it is a domesticated, controlled growth. The nature in these towns is no different from the nature found in New York City’s parks and planters. However, the rural housing typologies of the Midwest- the farm house, the four-square, the ranch house- seem to make up the vocabulary of architecture found in our national parks.
︎ Class: SNAFU, Advanced Studio
︎ Typology: Research
︎ Location: Beaver and Grand Junction, Highway 30, IA
Along the remnants of the Lincoln Highway there lie hundreds of forgotten towns. What were once bustling stops along the nation’s first cross-country roadway are now all but ghost-towns, victims of Eisenhower’s Interstate Highway sytem. In these small towns, rurality is a way of life. The largest structure in town is often the grain elevator, if not the lonely watertower. Density is low, and theres a
noticeable distance from facade to sidewalk and house to house. Theres a distinct “heaviness” to the roofs of these houses; the roofs are large and occupy a significant portion of the house’s silhouette. These facades are functional, with mismatched, asymmetrical, apertures tailored to the program of the room into which they open.
Noticably absent from these town’s definitions of rurality is nature. While “rural” towns in the Pacific Northwest or the Rockies are framed by wild forests and idyllic landscapes, little about the towns of Beaver or Grand Junction, Iowa is “wild”. Growth is abundant, of course, and the corn fields, soy beans, and livestock certainly are growing, but it is a domesticated, controlled growth. The nature in these towns is no different from the nature found in New York City’s parks and planters. However, the rural housing typologies of the Midwest- the farm house, the four-square, the ranch house- seem to make up the vocabulary of architecture found in our national parks.