Are DIY politics a valid architectural strategy for a future warmer world?

The project imagines and anticipates a world in which our dependence on spawling global supply chains has lessened, signalling society’s return to a more seasonal way of life.

The project is a central hub for no-dig farming practices, a retelling of a village blacksmith and a union pub where a new DIY identity can flourish.

It aims to achieve all of this by the employment of a solar furnace. While the seasonality of casting output may be initially frustrating, the convenience of the power supply that we have enjoyed in recent years is a luxury that is costing us a habitable planet. While convenience would certainly be obviated in the mass adoption of this technology, a nostalgic reverence for natural cycles’ smithing would be eagerly anticipated like a harvest or the return of migratory birds.

This aims to create fertile ground from which healthier social structures can emerge, the belief being that we need to heal our relationships with each other before we can meaningfully fix our relationship with the earth.