"As a sensing device, the façade of Storefront’s gallery space is supplemented by a simple bio-receptive material: wood. Previously a living host for species such as beetles, worms, fungi, and bacteria, wood—even in its inert state as a building material—is a well-suited home for microbial life due to its molecular composition and its micro and macro shapes.

On the facade, wood tiles cut from standard lumber are deliberately eroded through sandblasting at various depths. Unlike milling or cutting, sandblasting enhances the variation in wood by eroding soft areas and leaving behind hard areas, revealing the unique characteristics of each piece of wood.

The tiles are assembled on the panels of Storefront’s facade, forming a pattern of diverse microclimates. Each microclimate has distinct grains and knots that form different pockets of shade and moisture, collecting and hosting microbes throughout the duration of the exhibition. These microbes are present in the micro texture on the surface of the wood, through deep channels in the wood grain, and through twisting fins that serve as a filter for air passing between the exterior and interior of the gallery.

Eschewing our common modes of cleanliness and sterility, the façade installation provokes us to think of buildings as complex and living. How do we transform that which is inert, flat, and uniform be be into something alive and textured? As our methods, tools, and mindsets for design shift, we move toward the imagination of a new and living forms of architecture."

storefront.nyc