Reflections on the Envision Resilience Nantucket Challenge
Rendering by Cassandra Lanson
By Cassandra Lanson
I’ve never competed in a design competition before and before this year, I had never even enrolled in a landscape architecture studio. All of my expectations for how the semester would play out had been set from my freshman architecture studio and the tiny course description I could access online. Besides being thrust into a new learning environment due to the pandemic, I was also completely—as I saw it—unprepared.
The course description I had found spoke of LARC 2140: Designed Urban Ecologies. It promised to discuss large-scale urban systems and their intersection with the environment. But instead, I was thrown into the world of Nantucket. Learning about and designing for the Island meant I would be spending my semester tackling an issue close to my heart: sea level rise.
My feeling of unpreparedness did not last long. Sure, I had never tried coastal design before, but the introduction of the Envision Resilience Nantucket Challenge weekly Speaker Series helped me screw my head straight. Hearing lectures from guests and professors about relevant topics that influenced the Challenge, I started to understand how complex the proposal would be. I was suddenly aware of how many factors I would need to consider.
“I decided to promote ecological autonomy. Instead of imposing structures and forcing water into spaces, I wanted to rely on the marshland plant community that already existed in the Creeks, and expand it up the coast. ”
Northeastern’s approach was to allow all of my studio mates to choose their own study area and create a solo proposal. The precedents we studied and the lectures we heard inspired me; I felt unbridled, ready to let rip a sea of ideas. Though when it finally came time to start building my proposal, I suddenly felt completely lost. Noncommittal is an understatement.
The beauty of not having rigid constraints, of never having been to Nantucket in person, was that the possibilities felt limitless. The downside was feeling unbound and volatile.
Completing an interview with Shantaw Bloise-Murphy—who lives on the Island—and hearing about the interactions of my studio mates with other local residents, gave me a sense of what life could look like on Nantucket. After I spoke with lecturers and considered everyday life on the Island, I decided there was a need for radical change to fight impending sea level rise.
As a student studying Environmental Science, I let my love for ecology and my now powerful desire for drastic change drive my project. In permaculture, the edge is a condition full of diversity. I wanted to adopt the notion that sea level rise provided—as environmentalist Julie Sze puts it—“a moment of danger, a moment of opportunity.” Using this edge of the sea level, something dynamic and threatening, as a way to introduce environmentally beneficial spaces, became the crux of my project. As this mighty edge moved, how could I respond?
I decided to promote ecological autonomy. Instead of imposing structures and forcing water into spaces, I wanted to rely on the marshland plant community that already existed in the Creeks, and expand it up the coast. Luckily, with the flexible layout of the challenge, I made my idea come to life.
The pandemic prevented easy collaboration during this project. Remain Nantucket did a great job adapting to a less ideal online environment to bring students together. I enjoyed the Speaker Series despite it being on Zoom because I still had the opportunity to ask questions and discover new, relevant information. Collaboration within my class was also something that helped me produce work I was proud of. Again, not being in a traditional studio was different, but a year and a half into online learning (and Zoomland in all its glory), there were still tools to help decrease the isolation that interferes with design. Collaborative desk crits and interactions with the other Northeastern class researching Nantucket allowed ideas to be shared and much-needed feedback to be given.
Overall, I am grateful to have had so many resources to leverage for this challenge courtesy of Remain Nantucket. I would gladly do it all over again.
Earlier this summer, I was rather shocked to hear that a journalist from Landscape Architecture Magazine wanted to interview me about my design. I never imagined my bird-heavy presentation would catch professional attention. But having people reach out to learn more, and now having my work featured where more people can read about using design as a response to change, makes me proud to love the field of study I am in and grateful to everyone who has laid the foundation.
“My environmental lens pushed me to pursue plants and birds as the solution. But buildings are solutions too. Streets are solutions. Complicated gray infrastructure is a solution. A sponge, a sink, a container, a permeable membrane, a barrier, a break—they are all ways to tackle the problem. And we’ll need all of them to try and preserve communities while governmental change lags.”
Coming to the island after the studio had concluded, I think the ignorance I had to the real-world streets I was manipulating allowed me to push a drastic design forward rather than hesitate to change the fabric of the landscape so substantially. Still, there was a sense of responsibility and almost guilt I felt, walking up and down Washington Street, knowing my lines had erased the lived-in spaces I saw before me. Since we all struggle on various levels to grasp the change that is coming, it seems easier to cower from such bold changes.
Cassandra Lanson, ‘24 BLA Landscape Architecture and Environmental Science, College of Arts, Media, and Design, Northeastern University
Sea level rise, and climate change in general, is a complex issue. I’ve spent years studying Earth’s natural systems as a student, and how they are changing has always been of particular interest to me. The ideas that were proposed by my classmates and the other schools involved in the project are diverse. I think this pooling of architects, landscape architects, graduate and undergraduate students, and, in my case, combined majors as well, produced varied outcomes that continue to expand my understanding of sea level rise adaptation. My environmental lens pushed me to pursue plants and birds as the solution. But buildings are solutions too. Streets are solutions. Complicated gray infrastructure is a solution. Layered approaches or puzzles with different pieces to assemble are solutions. A sponge, a sink, a container, a permeable membrane, a barrier, a break—they are all ways to tackle the problem. And we’ll need all of them to try and preserve communities while governmental change lags.
The problem won't go away. We can all swallow our hope for the foreseeable future and admit that we cannot avoid the problem. Speaking with islanders, professors and lecturers showed me that. Collaborating with students with opposing ideas showed me that. Walking Nantucket streets showed me that. NOW IS NOT THE TIME FOR SHY DESIGN.
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Cassandra third year undergraduate student studying Landscape Architecture and Environmental Science at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts. She is passionate about using the tools of design to contribute to the restoration and conservation of land. Cassandra is heavily interested in permaculture, and phyto- and myco-remediation. She is also an avid hiker and loves the outdoors.
