We were assigned a homework by Peter to find a space where the old coexists with the new, as evidence that New York City is in a constant state of flux. I walked around and found a street that was rather funny to me, it was a street called Washington Mews that was near Washington Square Park. The street was blocked by a fence, which is something rare to see in the streets of Manhattan, however there is an opening for walkers to pass through. It felt like the fence didn’t serve a purpose other than to block cars from parking inside, still it feels strange to permanently place a fence if it was just for that sake. I came by again at night and witnessed the guard having to open the fence for the car inside to exit, it further proves how inconvenient and unnecessary the fence is.
From then I started thinking about ways to make sense of the fence. I was reminded of love locks that you could find in bridges in Europe. So I started sketching the fence with the locks dispersed on the fence. Then I realized if I were to use that idea, I would have to make a lot of those locks which I don’t think I would be able to do considering the time constraint. Aside from that, I didn’t think it would make much of a change to the fence than as a decorative.
So I revised my idea by wrapping the locks in the center of the fence which would make more sense because it interlocks the two bars, as locks would, to secure the fence in place. This way it gives a reason for the fence to be there and as to why there is a passage that’s always opened. It changes the function of the fence as a whole.
I moved on to making scale drawings with real measurements after doing on-site measurements. Later I started collecting plenty of cardboards as the material of the locks. The hollow curve in between the two walls became an advantage in creating bends such as to create the circular circumference of the school locker locks. I also played around with the cardboards to make the locks more interactive, which I decided to do with the last two locks.
After I was done with the making process, I went back to the site and installed the cardboard locks onto the fence. I was actually scared that 5 locks wouldn’t be enough to cover the fence because I thought there would be too much space in between, but I was surprised to see that it worked really well especially because it was large in size. After I placed the cardboard locks, I noticed that people stared at the fence longer and because it was large enough, people from across the street were able to spot these locks. Overall, I’m really satisfied with my cardboard locks and the reactions that it got. It was a really enjoyable experience during the creation process and also when placing it on site because it felt like I was exhibiting my own work. I only wished that people would actually approach the locks and try to interact with it.
