A Place for Art

The UCIRA AfH Container Village is hosting an array of research, design, construction and agricultural programs hosted by University of California Institute for Research in the Arts (UCIRA) with Architecture for Humanity (AfH).

Anchored by modified shipping container prototype classrooms and art studio(s) a teaching landscape encircles outdoor classroom, lab, research and art containers adjacent to grounds alternately used for workshops and children at play from the pre-school, elementary school and university that ring the site. In the middle of all this an asbestos-embedded building, sited on a Chumash archeological zone, is off limits to students, though it was formerly studio space for graduate art candidates.

Interventions began in early 2009 to create a place for cross-spectrum community education and curriculum building. The project with UCIRA represents the spirit behind the 2009 Open Architecture Challenge, challenging teachers, students and design professionals to work together to design the classrooms of the future.

Location