ARCH 401 | FALL 2017 | MIAMI, FLORIDA

Miami Beach: an area known for it's rich and glamorous residents, boat shows, and being vulnerable to climate change. With rising sea levels threatening the lives and livelihoods of it's citizens, the city pumps millions of dollars in funding of engineering projects and additional sand to keep water at bay. To show people who frequent the Miami Beach Convention Center what this change might bring, on an environmental and societal level, we propose the Museum for the Cultures of Bodies.

Our museum will take place in the center of the convention space and will extract from the porous limestone underneath the structure of the convention center to build up walls for different exhibit spaces. These exhibit spaces will range in varying heights, visibility from the convention center, amount of light, and levels of water that will naturally arise from the limestone. 

In these exhibit spaces, patrons will observe artifacts for restrictions of bodies throughout history, particularly from the Victorian era. Patrons will also be encouraged to use the water that seeps in from the limestone below. The patrons also become a part of the exhibit in this way, as the exhibit shows the current evolution of cultures of bodies.

The juxtaposition of convention center with a natural topography will showcase the current contradiction Miami and cities around the world find themselves in. By making climate change real and tangible, and by revisiting the change of bodily cultures throughout history, we, as a society, may begin to create meaningful dialogue about how to react to climate change beyond delaying the inevitable.