Featured in Extraordinary Playscapes, the summer exhibition at BSA Space, The Plas Madoc Adventure Playground in Northern Wales is one of the world’s newest adventure playgrounds. Fondly known as "The Land," it employs some of the play movement’s oldest "junk" philosophies.This new documentary explores a place where old tires and dumpster detritus take the place of swing sets and slides, and is “a must-see for anyone interested in play work, or play, period.” (Amy Fusselman, "Savage Park”)
Playgrounds are spaces where children and adults can have fun together. They also play an important role in the development of social and problem-solving skills. Explore the way playground design can improve the quality of life for children and families through a tour of the exhibition Extraordinary Playscapes and then design and build the perfect playscape for your neighborhood.
This program is in partnership with Design Museum Boston.
By examining the history and science of play—including 40 notable examples of playground design by international leading experts—this exhibition will explore how designers translate play objectives into innovative environments. Curated by Design Museum Boston, the exhibition highlights include public programs with playscape design experts, workshops for adults and children, and a Playground Passport that will promote play spaces in the neighborhoods of Boston.
Join the Mattapan Cultural Arts Development (MCAD), Powerful Pathways Consulting, and the BSA Foundation for an interactive community conversation on arts, design, and placemaking. Through presentations, breakout discussions, and a mini-charrette, attendees will explore how design thinking can be applied in making inclusive communities and demonstrate how one of MCAD’s current projects engages the neighborhood in creative civic activity and advocacy.
This is a program of the Mattapan Cultural Arts Development, Powerful Pathways Consulting, and the BSA Foundation, and part of Boston Design Week 2016.
Explore architecture and interior design through a three-day hands-on design workshop in which you will create your own micro-housing unit—the new trend in innovative housing.
In this Learning By Design workshop you will have the opportunity to work with professional architects, tour an architecture firm, design and create a 3D model, and present your work to a panel of professionals. This workshop is for teenagers aged 13 to 16; no experience is necessary, but register now, as space is limited.
The BSA Foundation Grant Project Pin-Up returns this year with a new opportunity to explore some of the projects that the BSA Foundation has brought to life in communities around Greater Boston. The BSA Foundation was created by the Boston Society of Architects/AIA to enhance public awareness of the built environment and the processes that shape it. The BSA Foundation Grant Project Pin-Up will connect BSA members with educators, artists and other BSA Foundation grant recipients to discuss recent successes and future options.
To celebrate the upcoming Extraordinary Playscapes exhibition in June, BSA Space is teaming up with co-curator Design Museum Boston for an event exploring how to make the urban environment more accessible to play. As part of the ongoing series Design Museum Mornings, this session will feature Maggie Cooper, City Initiatives manager at KaBOOM!, a nonprofit focused on bringing balanced and active play into the daily lives of all children. Join Cooper for a candid conversation as she shares how to bring communities together through initiatives like group playground builds and playability walks, especially for children growing up in poverty. Free
As part of the Cambridge Science Festival, discover the art and science of architecture and city planning. Find out what Boston might look like in 2030, and imagine new modes of transportation and vibrant places for “live, work, and play”! Explore how architects and urban planners apply notions of sustainability, transportation, housing, parks, and open space in their work, and share your thoughts on how to make the city more beautiful, resilient, and equitable. Lastly, bring your own fantastic ideas to life using LEGO® bricks, and present them to your design buddies.
KidsBuild! will be held at BSA Space on Saturday, April 9 and Sunday April 10. Guided by professional architects, families will choose a construction site from a fictional city grid, design and build a building, and be awarded a certificate of occupancy from the city building inspectors.
Iñaki Ábalos, chair of the department of architecture at Harvard University, is a founding member of Ábalos + Sentkiewicz, an accomplished architecture practice with offices in Madrid, Boston, and Shanghai. Ábalos will discuss issues of architecture and the environment in his recent award-winning work.
Common Boston is teaming up with the BSA Foundation to produce a re-imagined and reinvigorated festival. Based in part on “open house” weekends in cities like New York and Chicago, the 2016 Common Boston festival will offer you unique access to dozens of architecturally and culturally significant spaces and places—many not open to the public, and all for free!
Explore the unique challenges faced by Brooklyn Grange, a group of urban farmers determined to run a commercially viable farm in New York City. The film Brooklyn Farmer follows the team as they set out to build the world’s largest rooftop farm within the constraints of the Big Apple.
This month, Family Design Day will be taking inspiration from the exhibition Global Citizen: The Architecture of Moshe Safdie and following Moshe Safdie FAIA’s design principle (and book of the same name), For everyone a garden, participants will transform a basic shoe box into a dream apartment with unique green space that reflects the goals of Habitat ’67, the 1960s housing complex that launched the architect’s career.
World-renowned architect and 2015 AIA Gold Medal–winner Moshe Safdie FAIA’s masterful use of light and geometry is explored in Global Citizen. This international exhibition is a retrospective that spans decades, from Safdie’s formative period in the 1960s and early 1970s to his recent projects around the world. Featuring more than 100 objects, including drawings, sketches, videos, photographs, and scale models, Safdie’s architecture is portrayed not only as visual art but also as a medium for advancing social, political, and cultural goals.
This exhibition is curated by Donald Albrecht and designed by Nader Tehrani.
In conjunction with the exhibition Global Citizen: The Architecture of Moshe Safdie on display at BSA Space, this portrait film celebrates the life and work of world-renowned Israeli-Canadian architect Moshe Safdie FAIA by highlighting his outstanding contribution to the field of architecture. From the Holocaust Museum, Yad Vashem, in Jerusalem to the masterplan for the city of Modi’in to the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, this personal documentary delves into some of Safdie’s most famous design projects and explores what makes each one unique.
The Suffolk Downs Urban Design Workshop is the third in an ongoing series of Urban Design Workshops organized by the BSA Foundation. The workshops’ overall goal is to open up dialogue and stimulate thinking about the design potential of places with particularly significant and compelling opportunities.
This month, Family Design Day is all about skyscrapers! Boston, home to the Hancock and Prudential towers, is taking steps to elevate the city’s skyline. But how tall can architects and engineers actually build? Learn more about the architecture, science, and art behind what keeps the world’s tallest buildings standing and then, using a kit of parts, design and build your own skyscraper.
