City Planning

This week, we started planning our city! When I asked the kids what types of buildings we should include, I expected the list to include houses, schools, stores, and offices; I did not expect airports, military bases, and water treatment plants! These kids continue to amaze me.

Using the list we created, I showed the kids how to draw bubble diagrams. These are some of my favorite planning tools in the design process. Bubble diagrams are loosely drawn spaces or “bubbles” with lines connecting the spaces that should be directly adjacent to each other. Quick bubble diagram sketches are a great way to study space relationships quickly before starting to layout floor plans – or site plans in this case.

Working in small groups, the students created some bubble diagrams of their ideal cities. I found it interesting that the girls put government buildings at the city center, and the boys chose a hospital as the hub. I let them pin up their drawings to present to the class.

Next week I will distribute programs for individual buildings and assign a site to each student. Just like professional architects, they will have to design their building to meet the program requirements and to fit within the site constraints.