Contemporary Aesthetics of Concealment for Baltistan

The design research of this studio examines the Baltistan region to develop a building typology for a girls dormitory in a region where girls education is threatened. Distinct cultural artifacts ranging from regional art to traditional architecture serve as a basis of research into methods of promoting female empowerment and girls education through aesthetics of concealment impacting the region. Within this studio, we look at new design research techniques to manipulate, blend, weave, and splice different aesthetics from cultural objects. Our goal is to synthesize qualities from these cultural objects into a contemporary architecture that has the capacity to cut across cultural and disciplinary boundaries –producing the greatest cultural impact.