The blurry, undefined edge of a city “is a philosophical region, where city and landscape overlap, existing without choice or expectation.” 1 This urban condition hardly ever influences the city’s core, leaving the periphery isolated, autonomous, and untapped. In this blurry zone, architectural opportunities present themselves. In New Orleans, a small Vietnamese community called Versailles lives in this undefined realm at the eastern boundary of the city. Its residents are removed from the core, disconnected by sheer distance, and wedged between ecology and industry. Typically, “that which literally lies on the margins often gets figuratively marginalized,” 2 but this community is resilient, taking full advantage of its overlap with the natural environment. A product of a forced migration in the wake of Saigon’s fall in 1975, this community drew on local parallels to Vietnamese climate and fishing commerce, allowing newcomers to morph this neighborhood into their own. Yet the scars of heavy industry still plague Versailles, which has endured a fraught history with nearby landfills. This thesis seeks to create productive frictions between community, ecology, and industry through exploring a blended topography where construction and landscape are commingled. This will allow for the architecture to be both anchored and stretched. The Eco-Line - part composting and gardening hub, part cultural and economic incubator, part ecological and recreational park - weaves a new edge of experience on New Orleans’s periphery. As opposed to forcing a connective intervention inward on New Orleans, the Eco-Line hugs the easternmost edge of Versailles, exploring a new urban condition that blends with the natural environment. / 0 / SPK / specialcollections@tulane.edu

In the progress of city development What's your positon in a city What's an architecture's position in a city What's the condition of the city's edge / Master of Architecture