Architecture + the City Festival

The following festival wrap-up comes to AAO from Kiley Arroyo, AIA|SF Director of Public Engagement

     

AIA San Francisco and the Center for Architecture + Design's
7TH ANNUAL ARCHITECTURE AND THE CITY FESTIVAL

  • Duration
    Every September 1-30 | 30 days
  • Audience
    15,000-20,000 architects, designers, design enthusiasts, artists, gardeners and the general public
  • Programs
    45-50 architectural conferences, exhibitions, family programming, films, lectures, tours, and more
  • Tour Leaders
    45-50 architects, designers, landscape architects and architectural historians
  • Partners + Sponsors
    100 community partners
  • Docents
    300 volunteers
  • Locations
    45-50 venues around the city

     Architecture and the City is the nation’s largest architectural festival showcasing tours, films, exhibitions, lectures, interactive workshops and more. The festival offers individuals an unparalleled opportunity to get involved with the local architecture and design communities and to engage in exciting conversations about the city. In an enthusiastic display of support, Mayor of San Francisco Gavin Newsom spoke on behalf of the city, officially proclaiming September as Architecture and the City month. This year’s theme Investigating Urban Metabolisms explored the idea of the city as a living, breathing, multi-dimensional organism. With a strong emphasis on how our city is organized, programs examined the information, ecological, transportation, surveillance, life cycle, social and creative systems that under-pin life in contemporary metropolises. This year’s programs explored the positive impacts architects and designers make on our communities; enhancing their sustainability, promoting creativity and increasing our collective quality of life.

     Over 15,000 architects, designers, engineers, historians, civil servants, design enthusiasts, artists, gardeners and members of the public participated in this year’s Architecture and the City festival. The festival takes place over the course of 30 days, each September in San Francisco. Over 100 different community partners and 300 volunteers helped to make this year’s festival a smashing success. Approximately 45 different programs were offered throughout the city and Marin County, in an effort to provide participants with multiple ways to learn about and enjoy architecture and design.

     Highlights of this year’s festival were the sold out, Wednesday night film screenings. Films were shown each Wednesday for five consecutive weeks in San Francisco’s Main Library. In a commitment to equitable access, each of these films was made free to the general public thanks in part to the generosity of our library partners and to a grant from the LEF Foundation. By paying closer attention to our audience’s needs in terms of the location and timing of programs, we were able to deliver this series in a consistent and convenient manner, which encouraged individuals to adopt Wednesday as movie night. Furthermore, the films selected generated as much interest from professional practitioners as it did from the general public, demonstrating our community’s growing understanding and appreciation for architecture and design. Lastly, by presenting films at the public library we were able to attract a brand new audience for architectural events. This year’s festival also offered unique programming for specific segments of our community, such as those tailor made for families, those interested in walking through San Francisco’s ever evolving neighborhoods and still more for those drawn to our city’s diverse array of culinary artists. These events also benefited from consistent scheduling. Walking tours, for example were held every Wednesday afternoon, while lectures tended to be held Thursday evenings. As a result, individuals could participate in the festival at times and in ways, that best suited their interests and daily lives.  

     This year’s festival included the 8th Annual San Francisco Living Home Tours weekend. Over the course of two days, almost 1500 individuals had the unique opportunity to explore some of the city’s most cutting edge examples of residential architecture. The weekend was preceded by the Architect’s Forum, which brought together each of the architects responsible for the weekend’s headliners. We have previously held the Forum and continue to find this type of pre-tour discussion to be both educational and illuminating to practitioners and the public alike. This year’s homes ranged in style and budget and included affordable housing objects further demonstrating that great design comes from creative problem solving and not always from an abundance of resources. One visitor commented, “I really liked that an architect’s house was included (the Mission house) that proved you can achieve great design on a budget.” Once again, this year’s festival partnered with Stable Café to serve as the Home Tours headquarters. The café and its beautiful outdoor terrace provided us with a beautiful space in which to tell tickets, display an exhibition and to host the popular “Talk to An Architect” casual roundtable discussions.

     In addition to repeat performances by some of our more popular programs, we added some new exciting events to this year’s lineup. We were particularly fortunate to have the chance to invite individuals to an intimate tour of Oliver Ranch, as part of our Behind the Scenes series. Located in the heart of Sonoma County, 70 miles north of San Francisco, the picturesque 100-acre Oliver Ranch is home to 18 remarkable site-specific installations; the most recent of which is Ann Hamilton's The Tower where commissioned dance, poetry, theatre, and music performances take place. During his tenure as president of the board at SFMOMA in the mid 1990s, Steve was frequently approached to give tours of his property. Realizing this was a fundraising tool that could help the museum, Steve found himself leading numerous tours. As the ranch grew in acclaim and word of mouth, requests for tours grew and the Oliver’s saw that their ranch could benefit other non-profits as well. While the Oliver’s never plotted the course of their philanthropy, they recognized and generously took advantage of their unique circumstances so they might give back to the non-profit community through the arts. We feel particularly privileged to have had the unique opportunity to collaborate with such a generous partner and hope to include an Oliver Ranch tour in next year’s festival.

    After a successful GOOD Design SF in 2009, we were delighted to close this year’s festival with a second incarnation of GOOD Design Bay Area. Six design teams from throughout the region were matched with government and urban leaders, who proposed six very different challenges to each of them. The designers were then given several weeks to come up with solutions, which they then presented to more than 250 attendees. It was an energetic night of cross-disciplinary problem solving and a truly fitting way to end to San Francisco's month-long, city-wide Architecture and the City festival. This event was further complemented by a simulcast screening of the project pitches and a reception on floor on the same venue. This allowed 100 participants to continue to debate and discuss the ground-breaking ideas generated below, in a lively, media-rich social setting.

Project teams and themes included:

     We were delighted by the success of this year’s Architecture and the City festival and look forward to working on 2011’s lineup. While this festival provides our community with exciting opportunities to expand their understanding and appreciation for architecture and design, it also provides our organizations with a wonderful platform upon which to test and present our own goals and ideas. We could not do it alone and are forever grateful to each of our partners for their creativity, hard work and sustained commitment.

  

Posted by aao on October 27, 2010 - 9:23pm