A class at Virginia Tech empowers future architects to build a prefab baseball fieldhouse from start to finish.
"For us, the most important thing is that a single group of students sees a project from beginning to fruition." Virginia Tech architecture professors Keith and Marie Zawistowski met while working at the Rural Studio, the famed community architecture program at Auburn University, so it makes sense that when they became teachers themselves, their students would get the chance to engage in hands-on learning. The Sharon Fieldhouse, a minimalist structure set against the Appalachian highlands in Clifton Forge, Virginia, was the result of design/buildLAB, their prefab building class, which empowers students to engage with the community, create a design by consensus, and build a structure, all within a year. Dwell spoke with the Zawistowskis and student Ryan Myers about the class, building for the community, and planning for foul balls.
