The Scar of Decay: An Architectural Allegory of Resiliency
Decay is often perceived as a state of melancholy, an outcome of collapsed past reflected into the present. One can look at the abandoned Floyd Bennett Airfield in Jamaica Bay, New York, as an infrastructure in ongoing decay, showing its commercial failure from the past. In 1905, years before it became an airport, the site was an archipelago of islands that were tidal estuaries supporting a rich ecology. Despite its historical significance, in the present, the field has become a forgotten space because of the metaphoric resonance of voids from the past. Although the decaying airfield illustrates the passage of time, the inevitability of collapse shows traces of faded lives, moved communities, and shrunken economies. Also, fostering this process of decay are increasing concerns towards rising sea levels’ impact on Jamaica Bay. By embracing the expected sea level rise through the course of time, the environmental effects will revert the existing landform to its original state, revealing in turn a landscape of decay. This thesis operates with the process of decay as a transformative allegory, bound to happen over time. It creates a scar in the existing airfield as a functional and metaphorical gesture in this empty landscape to underscore an architectural strategy towards resiliency, embracing the consequences of change. Throughout time, ecology takes over—in the end, becoming a ruin as a beacon of light but responsive to the ‘ecologi-cay’ around.
Advisers/Committee
