MArch II
Shakers are a millenarian nontrinitarian restorationist Christian sect founded circa 1747 in England and then organized in the United States in the 1780s. The Shakers believed in and practiced pacifism, gender and racial equality, and celibacy. Their belief in separation from the world created a distinctive culture related to utopianism. Similarly, their buildings exhibit characteristics of dualism and symmetry that are embedded in spatial organization, circulation, architectural elements, furniture, objects, etc.
The design investigates dualism and symmetry in Shaker’s buildings, and invents new building types that seemingly belong to Shakers but haven’t been done by Shakers. Four buildings — workshop, artist studio, single-family house, and gallery forming — are proposed for the Shaker Village in New Lebanon in New York state.
