McEwenStudio/A(n)Office

contemporarydesignforaninterdisciplinaryworld

V. Mitch McEwen
Partner, A(n) Office
Principal, McEwen Studio
20 Jay St #207 | Brooklyn, NY 11201

April 12, 2014

Mayor Bill de Blasio
City Hall
New York, NY 10007


Dear Mayor Bill de Blasio:

Thank you. Thank you for being you. Thank you for talking about a grassroots approach to New York
City governance.

Your time is precious, so I will be brief.

Your focus on affordable housing is inspiring. You boldly include public housing in your affordable
housing plan ("Safe, Affordable Homes for All New Yorkers"). The ninth point of this plan states your
commendable goal to "Make Our Public Housing the Pride of Our City." The two quick paragraphs
that follow mention, however, as specifics, 1) removing mold and 2) hiring tenants to make safety
repairs. These are important matters, but these improvements are not quite getting to the level of
the "Pride of Our City."

For New York City to be proud of something, it better be impressive. It better have style and a story
behind it. It will likely be something the rest of the country does not yet have or cannot have. New
York City is proud of the Yankees and Jay-Z, skyscrapers and Fashion Week, Basquiat and the Lower
East Side, downtown dance, the United Nations, the Harlem Renaissance, the art market, 24-hour
transit, Puerto Rico, Museum Mile, and surfing the Rockaways in the summer. (Puerto Rico is not
actually in New York City, but it is very close.) Snaking the drain and cleaning out mold are a great
start, but that will never be enough.

How does it happen, then? How can New York City Housing Authority housing really become the
Pride of Our City?

McEwenStudio|20JaySt#207|Brooklyn,NY11201|www.mcewenstudio.com

McEwenStudio/A(n)Office
contemporarydesignforaninterdisciplinaryworld
I trust that you are already working on this, so I will be brief. My proposal is in two parts. The first
part is so obvious that I will skip over it rather quickly. The second part demands some nuanced
consideration, as it may be overly ambitious.

1) Build new public housing with the most forward-thinking, innovative design firms in the country. (A
bonus-- most of these firms are local.)

Launch international competitions or invited competitions, or expand the DDC Design + Construction
Excellence program to include even more firms with an even wider range of experiences. Whatever
you do, please do not use the large corporate firms that do so much New Urbanist work in Florida
because, honestly, they make New York City look like Florida.

2) Retro-fit from the ground up. This second part of my proposal would involve some changes to the
structure of NYCHA property management.

Let us look with fresh eyes at one area in Brooklyn, not so different from other neighborhoods in its
layout, but famous and heralded for its location, amenities, and gentrification: Fort Greene, Brooklyn.
Please see the enclosed Figure 1 as a reference.

Looking at this map, or a map of many other neighborhoods in Brooklyn, one does not need a degree
in planning to notice that public housing was used in the 20th century as a buffer between industrial
zoning and private residential neighborhoods. Of course, with the transition from heavy and light
industrial to digital production, Etsy, and commercial design offices, what used to be a buffer now sits
on prime real estate. One might consider this evolution in land use to be poetic justice, deriding
planners' initial intentions. More frequent, however, will be calls to build revenue generation into
existing public housing, integrate retail and commercial activity, plug in some market rate housing -
i.e. a slippery slope to privatization.

This is what makes your approach so bold, Mr. Mayor. Rather than apologizing for public housing,
asking it to pay for its accidentally prime location, you say -- What we have is not enough.

The enclosed map shows Fort Greene, Brooklyn and surrounding neighborhoods, including Farragut
Houses and Walt Whitman Houses along with Brooklyn Navy Yards, Fort Greene Park, DUMBO and
adjacent neighborhoods, up to Brooklyn Bridge Park and the East River. In a simple way, this map
considers New York City parks and New York City Housing Authority open spaces together as one
system of public space. What if NYCHA's public spaces were open to the public?

This leads to part 2 a) of my proposal.

McEwenStudio|20JaySt#207|Brooklyn,NY11201|www.mcewenstudio.com

McEwenStudio/A(n)Office
contemporarydesignforaninterdisciplinaryworld
a) Tear down the awful black gates. Why are NYCHA's landscaped areas gated off like a giant
suburban front yard? Under the authority of NYCHA, get rid of the gates. The rest of New York City is
comfortable with privately-owned public space. NYCHA needlessly maintains gated communities.

b) Convert the "park" component of NYCHA's 20th century 'towers-in-a-park' typology into actual
Parks. Imagine if the open space around NYCHA towers were landscaped with as much consideration
as Brooklyn Bridge Park or the Highline. Both are managed by New York City Parks Department. With
the design vision and political will, it is possible, no?

c) Retro-fit the architecture without removing the tenants. This can be done, as well. La Tour
Bois-le-Prtre in Paris is one of many inspiring social housing retrofit projects. The tenants of La Tour
Bois-le-Prtre gained larger, daylight-filled living rooms and the neighborhood gained a better-looking
tower, through pre-fabricated modules inserted from the exterior. There are many notable examples
throughout Europe, Latin America, Singapore, and elsewhere. New York City needs to lead in the
United States. No other city in the country has the density of social housing, the political
commitment, or the plethora of urban design and architectural talent.

If it seems inappropriate or superficial to be talking about design when there are important safety and
maintenance issues to consider, let me just emphasize in conclusion that these are not fluff issues.
When NYCHA housing separates itself from the rest of the city physically and logistically, it isolates
its residents and leaves itself politically prey to privatization land-grabs. As far as the significance of
design and style in these considerations, let us not forget that Marcy House's most famous former
resident founded a fashion label, along with a recording music empire. Through hip-hop, especially,
New York City's housing projects have set style for millions, if not billions around the globe.

I hope your administration will be the first to do justice to that legacy, as well as the first to treat New
York City public housing as worthy of design greatness. Make our public housing the pride of our city
by building new housing projects with the most innovative design talent, converting existing NYCHA
open spaces into 21st century urban parks, and retrofitting apartments with care for both existing
residents and changing neighborhoods.

Sincerely,

V. Mitch McEwen
Partner, A(n) Office
Principal, McEwen Studio

Enclosure (Figure 1)

McEwenStudio|20JaySt#207|Brooklyn,NY11201|www.mcewenstudio.com