UB architecture professors Gregory Serweta and Maia Peck design exhibition at Center for Architecture in NYC

UB architecture faculty members Maia Peck and Gregory Serweta have recently completed an exhibition design on inclusive living in collaboration with Pentagram at the Center for Architecture in New York City.

Reset: Towards a New Commons, curated by designers Barry Bergdoll and Juliana Barton, looks at how architecture can take a proactive role in creating more inclusive, diverse and dynamic communities across the country. 

The exhibition showcases models for collective habitation, through installations presented by four interdisciplinary teams exploring four sites in cities across the country, from housing for people with disabilities in Oakland, to public playscapes in East Harlem.

In their design of the exhibition, Peck and Serweta, AIA - both adjunct professors in UB's Department of Architecture - drew inspiration on the idea of community from the neighborly cooperation of line-drying laundry between buildings in New York. Crossing the storefront’s double-height space, samples of the exhibition content were hung at all levels, democratizing viewing attention to all parts of the exhibit - from the mezzanine to the street level.

In the mezzanine space below, they also designed the exhibit’s Reading Room, with wheel-chair accessible nesting tables and sittable shelving furniture to allow flexibility for different individual and group activities. The walls are painted high-contrast colors, which serve as links back to each of the four exhibition teams, with bold magenta highlights tying everything together. 

Reset: Towards a New Commons is on view through September 3, 2022, at the Center for Architecture, 536 LaGuardia Place, New York, New York.