Arch 8252 - Graduate Studio - Professor Martha McQuade - GDI
 
The order of the strip mall parking lot creates an opportunity for program to be developed that will draw the public in, reviving commerce and creating a center for socializing and community.
  
 
 
 
The American strip mall was envisioned as the center of commerce, providing an oasis along the main arteries of the city. Instead it has become a place of faltered economics behind a vast desert of parking that alienates pedestrians.
 
     
 
 

The grid dissipates into dense rows, funneling the open spaces towards the commercial, which creates the structure of the strip mall. The form created by the density of poles blurs the distinction between strip mall and parking lot.
The steel poles reduce to a grid of LED embedded ground lights and small planters, defining zones for vehicular travel and
parking. The transformation of the grid allows the strip
mall to serve as an oasis to vehicular travel, while
preserving a zone where the pedestrian is empowered.
 
Density of the poles disrupts views creates intrigue in passerbys on what lies within and beyond. Within this dense, pedestrian oriented space a zone for a community garden is created. This area of green disrupts the heat island effect of the traditional parking lot while converting this once deserted space into a center of the community.
 
 
 
Manipulating the grid of the existing strip mall in the z-axis creates zones of density, instituting a centroid of interaction.