Continuously Under Construction 1 - Pyramid
The first in a series of three projects. The emphasis in on community.
The bricks arrived to Testing Grounds on 31 pallets.
The build involved 130 students, 6 tutors, 5 RMIT staff, and 4 Testing Grounds staff.
It was built from the bottom layer in 3 hours and 26 minutes of collective effort.
It stood 2.52 meters high, with a 36.6 meter square footprint.
Built for Melbourne Design Week in Collaboration with Testing Grounds, These are the Projects We Do Together and generous support from Brickworks, the Pyramid was a playful platform for talks, gatherings, installations, and performances, while also standing alone as a public artwork and design object.
Beginning the first-year program by building the Pyramid on Testing Grounds acted to immediately shift the students away from any preconceptions of what interior design study — or even university — might entail. It proposed to them that interior design is a relational practice embedded in social connection.
I had emailed the students and asked them to gather at Testing Grounds on their first day. The students arrived, visibly confused they stood around staring at their phones. Separated from the affordances of a classroom or lecture hall and in the unfamiliar structures and qualities of the Testing Grounds site for the first time, there were no clear cues for them to follow.
The giant pallets of bricks scattered around the site slowly receded as the Pyramid grew. The students would take turns passing the bricks up and placing them carefully in the growing Pyramid. When they rested they would gather in groups in the shade, chat and eat watermelon, forming a temporary audience for the unfolding event. Working hard together outside facilitated social contact on their first day in a way that would be difficult to instigate so quickly in a classroom.
The students gravitated to different roles. Some organising, some controlling the implementation, others were concerned with the details or preferred doing more of the lifting. It was astonishing for them to see what they could achieve working together in three hours. As the last brick was put in place the students cheered and then all climbed on to for a group photo. The sense of achievement is enhanced by being credited with the build on the Testing Ground website and the result of their work featured on the NGV website, as well as meaningfully participating in Melbourne Design Week on their first day of university.
For the duration of Melbourne Design Week, design students will use The Pyramid as a basis for a range of workshops, investigating the potential implications this fantastical form has on its environment. What is it doing here? Could it be useful? What can we learn from it? What should we do with it?
Case study available here and more information in the Testing Grounds Archive here
A film of making the Pyramid available here
The Projects / Testing Grounds team Joseph Norster / Millie Cattlin / Isabel Holloway /Arie Rain Glorie / Trent Griffiths / Molly Braddon
RMIT Staff Olivia Hamilton / Andrew Miller / Dave Smith / Liz Lambrou / Jess Wood
RMIT Tutors Ellena Flahvin / Shehani Perera /Silvana Markas / Beatriz Chamsay / Jacqui Miller / Lauren Gostin
RMIT Students Joohyun Julie An / Milan Arandara / Isabella Ardley / Sarah Arnott / Gianna Atienza. /Madeleine Barr / Amber Bessell-Browne / Alicia Braid / Jayde Briggs / Emily-Rose Brims / Samantha Callahan / Tiffanie Calleja, / Lance Casimiro, / Francesca Catalano / Natalie Cerda-Lizama / I Lam Chan / Yanzhu Che, / Chen, Ling / Jia Ying Chua / Si Ying Chye / Evan Clezy / Holly Corrigan / Jessica Cozzo / Courtney Daniels / Shilian Ding / Kathryn Dowling / Natalie Fewster / Charlotte Finnis / Chloe Gleeson / Danielle Goodwin / Joanna Gray / Georgia Greene / Sarah Gulli / Merve Gun / Shengjie He / Aaron Henderson / Xin Yi Heng / Ma Andrea Hipolito / Joanna Ho / Kathleen Hoo /Imogen Brooke Hoyle / Yihan Hu / Jiamin Huang /Ashvika Jayetileke /Jaimee Jiang / Zhaowei Jiang / Felicja Jordan /James Kang /Sinead Kennedy /Wen Wen Khaw / Hyeryeon Kim /Peter Kostopoulos / Sophia Koundouris /Mia Kroopin / Rhonda Kwan / Xuanling Li / Stephanie Le Sueur / Ruilin Li / Yimeng Li /Liwen Lian /Giulia Licastro /Xiaojun Lin / Georgina Loughnan / Effemy Louloudakis /Chenming Lu /Chantelle Mandaglio / Deborah Margules Cedeno / Julian Marrone /Madeleine Marschall /Julia McKenzie /Jessie Milhe /Lisa Miyagi /Tristan Moloney /Yanah Montero /Jade Morris /Nabilla Musbandi /Victoria Narduzzo /Ching Siu Ng /Nathan Ng /Stefanie Olivetti / Emi Palfreyman /Lily Minton Paterson /Alexandra Pestrivas /Imogen Prior /Chao Qu /Nazdaneh Rezaie / Anna Richards /Jessica Said /Anousack Savankham /Georgia Sawicz / Breeanna Segafredo / Rushmi Seneviratne /Jasper Sharp / Dan Dan Shen / Qiwen Shen / Huiwen Shi / Sajida Sina / Tilda Somers / Brianna Souter / Ivan Staric-Brown / Jinru Sun / Yiwei Sun / Hoi Hung Sze / Li Yen Teng / Celline Than / Danielle Ting / Ingrid Tsang / Asterope Varagiannis / Trevina Vimala / Kanghui Wen / Kexin Wang / Shixian Wang / Anneliese Webber / Hongjia Wen / Kangqi Wen / Annabelle Williams / You Wu / Bin Xie / Fengyu Yang / Emma Yates / Linrong Yu / Ziwan Zhang / Xitong Zeng / Haoting Zhang / Jiaer Carrie Zhang / Shutong Zhang / Tianyu Zhang / Yuner Zhang / Jingru Zheng / Xueying Zhou / Yuan Zhuang
photography by Emma Byrnes