50 Designers, 50 Ideas, 50 Wards: 25th Ward
Wouldn’t it be ideal to live a walkable distance from your workplace in Chicago’s downtown? To take a water taxi home while enjoying the views as you travel down the Chicago River. To pick up authentic Mexican food for dinner for your family. To have your children walk home safely from a top performing high school. To be minutes away from museums and a creative district for weekend events and festivities.
This proposal for the Chicago Architecture Foundation’s “50 Designers, 50 Ideas, 50 Wards” exhibit envisions a masterplan for the Pilsen area, Chicago’s 25th Ward, to increase its population by keeping the community safe, livable, and a vibrant place to work and relax. A neighborhood functions like a living organism with joints and tissues. This plan proposes lasting change by reinvigorating its manufacturing community and enhancing its residential and educational community. It envisions LIVING JOINTS with accessible residential buildings which house families and college students. It envisions FASHION JOINTS which transform abandoned warehouses into textile manufacturing and shopping areas. It envisions CULTURE JOINTS with museums to provide a rich history of the inhabitants of the area, from the 19th century German, Irish, Czech, Polish and Lithuanian immigrants to the current Latino and Mexican residents. It envisions OUTDOOR JOINTS with running and walking Paseos along stretches of old tracks and ties that recall the history of a railroad’s former use. It envisions RIVER JOINTS which redevelop the South Branch of the River.
In addition to the physical and online exhibits, the Chicago Architecture Foundation also produced interactive tours of sixteen wards on the Vamonde app, in a collection titled “Reclaiming Public Space.” Each tour includes an interactive map, visualizations from designers, as well as text and audio from people involved in the design process.