The start of 2022 brings six new 3rd-year students to Hale County, Alabama! Get to know the students who will be continuing the work on Rosie’s Home this Spring!
Anna Leach is from Gadsden, AL
Grant Schurman hails from Mount Carroll, IL
Jon Hunt Ficken is homegrown from Auburn, AL
Julia Whitt is from Abbeville, AL
Sarah Recht calls Atlanta, GA, home
Will Robinson comes to Rural Studio from Madison, AL
What’s happening in Hale?
These six 3rd-year students are following up on the work from the Fall 2021 semester for clients Rosie and Frankie. Rosie’s Home is planned as a continuation of Rural Studio’s residential post-frame research. This spring, students will see the post-frame structure, or “pole barn,” raised by a locally contracted team.
With this investment in labor and a covered site early on in the building process, site work can continue through weather delays and should lead to an overall cost reduction in the project. Following the construction of the roof, the 3rd-years will work to design the interior scheme based on 20K Turner’s Home plan, which was originally built by another group of Rural Studio students in 2012. Additionally, they will be charged with much of the exterior detailing of the home beneath the roof.
But wait, there’s more!
In addition to their studio work, the group will be taking two classes. First, there’s Woodshop with instructor Steve Long, where the infamous “chair project” is making a return! Students are assigned a famous wooden chair and must research the dimensions and production. Then, they will design a process for constructing it in Rural Studio’s very own shop.
The students will also study with local architect Dick Hudgens in the long-standing History and Watercolor class. The students will visit historic homes, churches, and agricultural buildings in the Black Belt each Monday afternoon. They’ll learn the history of how these structures were built and used, as well as the context in which this history happened. The students will also complete watercolor assignments along the way to document what they are learning and build representation skills.
With all this happening, it’s going to be a busy Spring! But that’s certainly not a new phenomenon out here. Keep an eye out to see what hands-on assignments have kicked off the year for these folks.
