public interest

Miriam Gee and Steve Badanes: Community Design/Build Pioneers

By Chrissy Bellmyer, Operations Director
In 2010, Steve Badanes - a Yestermorrow Instructor and Architecture Professor at the University of Washington (UW) -  received an interesting phone call while in his woodshop on Whidbey Island, Washington. It was from Miriam Gee, a young architect living in Honolulu, Hawaii.  Inspired by the documentary “Citizen Architect,” a film...

Read this post >

Guertin Park, Montpelier VT

By Chrissy Bellmyer, Operations Director

In the middle of downtown Montpelier, right on the Winooski River and only a stone’s throw from the State House, is a strange 9’ by 26’ bump jutting from the bike path. It’s an empty, flat, unremarkable piece of pavement and fence that thousands of eyes scan over every day. Hundreds of legs walk and ride past. There’s nothing to see, and nothing there. But in a few weeks, there will be.

Read this post >

Claire Adams: On the right path

By Dan Eckstein, Curriculum Director

Growing up in Manhattan, Claire Adams has always had a fascination with buildings and urban spaces. The juxtaposition of old versus new, of density versus public space. Her high school sat on the artificial landscape of Battery Park City, literally reclaimed from the Hudson River; yet the historic neighborhoods of Soho and Chinatown were a short walk away. This interest led her to formal academic studies in landscape history, urban studies, and landscape architecture at Smith College, which has proved fulfilling to a point. But she was nagged by an intrigue in how those buildings and spaces were created – a desire to participate in the actual experience of ‘making.’ She tracked down and enrolled in Yestermorrow’s Semester in Sustainable Design/Build during her junior year. It offered the opportunity to get the hard skills she sought, while still allowing her to earn academic credit toward her degree.

Read this post >