Faced with the interconnected challenges of population loss, vacant lands,
and economic disinvestment, citizens of legacy cities like Detroit increasingly
seek opportunities to manufacture their own social, economic, and ecolog
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ical revitalization. This master’s project offers a case study exploration of the
potential for arts-based revitalization through a campus landscape design for
Pewabic Pottery, one of the last surviving pottery studios of the early 20th cen
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tury Arts and Crafts era and a widely-appreciated Detroit arts institution. The
medium for this exploration is Pewabic’s current 1.5-acre campus, which in
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cludes a half-acre of vacant land once occupied by neighboring businesses.
The project also considers multiple future scenarios considering purchase of
adjacent parcels both vacant and occupied. We adopted a process-orient
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ed approach to advance revitalization efforts by drawing connections be
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tween arts-based revitalization literature and the slate of participatory design
practices used across multiple design disciplines. Methods used to engage
Pewabic’s community of stakeholders included a series of design workshops,
event tabling, and surveys. With the information gathered from these activi
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ties, we developed three concepts for the site: 1) Hospitality, 2) Fusion, and 3)
Minimalism. Each concept considers alternative design variables regarding
location of a new education studio, relationship with the historic Water Works
Park, expansion of Pewabic’s campus to include additional adjacent parcels,
and, finally, garden design styles. We developed these design concepts in
the hope that the redevelopment of the campus landscape will contribute
towards revitalization of other nearby neighborhood spaces by serving as
an aesthetic catalyst for ecological design principles, and by enhancing
Pewabic’s capacity to attract and engage visitors along the East Jefferson
Avenue corridor.