Work in Progress

We are excited to publish the inaugural edition of the digital format of Work In Progress, RISD Department of Architecture’s print publication. In tandem with the continuing student run print version, this edition will serve to catalog and recognize the achievements and the presence of the RISD Architecture Alumni community in the broader context to which we all belong.

This first issue posed a simple call for submissions. We wanted to see who was out there, and what was out there. We asked for current work, recent projects or experiences, on-going thoughts, sketches, models, photographs, and academic papers. As Alums, we were expecting a wide response. What we received did not disappoint.

Alum Lauren Crahan (BArch ’96), a Principal at Freecell with John Hartman and Peter Dorsey, Adjunct Faculty at the Department of Architecture submitted “Lighthearted”; a community engagement piece sited in New York City’s Times Square. The work represents the broad spectrum of projects RISD Architecture Alums are engaged in.

We are also taking the opportunity to feature the Department outside of the studio in what we hope will be a reoccurring column or article. Following the tragic natural disasters in Japan earlier this year, Architecture Instructor Aki Ishida’s Wintersession studio of twelve RISD students installed a collaborative work at the Japan Society in New York City during a 12-hour benefit for the Earthquake Relief Fund.

In the inaugural print edition of WIP, Professor Gabriel Feld proposed “a more open exchange with the larger community.” This digital platform intends to propose new and continue established connections among alumni of the RISD Architecture program. Simultaneously establishing a relevant archive of creative alumni work and experience it is our intention that WIP will foster conversation and maintain an ongoing dialogue.

Andrew Liebchen
Chelsea Limbird
Will McLoughlin
Editors