Tender House Project: Open Office
Mejay Gula in Residence

The inaugural Interior Landscape Residency at Space p11, Mejay Gula's weeklong Tender House Project: Open Office, invites the public to contribute ideas, share stories, and help develop a city-wide cultural strategy to engage and activate Chicago’s historic bridgehouses.

Tender House Project is working to realize the latent potential of these iconic yet overlooked structures, proposing them as a discrete yet extensive infrastructure, an interior landscape at urban scale that, when reimagined, will breathe needed life into the city. The civic and cultural awakening of Chicago’s bridgehouses presents an opportunity not only to preserve an important architectural legacy along the river, but also to engage and connect communities now separated by the latter’s engineered edges and water. With 70 bridgehouses spanning 11 miles of the Chicago River system and linking 15 neighborhoods, this undervalued network has potential to transform public thinking about—and engagement with—all of Chicago.


https://www.tenderhouseproject.com

Mejay Gula is an architectural designer, curator, and cultural development strategist. Her work, Tender House Project, activates the latent potential of Chicago’s underutilized bridgehouses. Fostering a collaborative and sustainable development strategy, Tender House Project works to secure the Chicago River with sites of community agency, cultural exchange, and universal inclusion. By highlighting the value and possibilities of Chicago’s historic bridgehouses, this overlooked infrastructure can become a civic and cultural network that breathes needed life into the Chicago River.

Details on Interior Landscape Residencies at Space p11 can be found at www.space-p11.com/irl