”The burgeoning trend in design-thinking education is embracing the F-word. One organization that embodies this empowering education model is Public Workshop.“~ Fast Company What better way to cap a long day of meetings to find a few of our Chicago #teendesignheroes—Jeisson, Audrey, Jovanna, Edwin, Joseph and Diana–standing proudly at the top of the Fast Company […]
Coming to Taliesin was scary for the fact that I felt a bit intimidated by the rest of the students. I knew for a fact that they had more work experience than I in the technical aspects of design, where I was doing a wretched job at figuring it out. But In the end it […]
July 6, 2011
This was our awesome team of design super heroes, all who have recently graduated from high school…except for our family baby, Diana…and we all worked tremendously hard to be a part of this journey through the Newhouse Competition. From that competition, we all won awards that showed the amount of endless work we put into our […]
July 6, 2011
Six super talented Chicago Public School students from diverse backgrounds. Two superstar Teaching Fellows. A rich architectural legacy that exudes experimentation and ‘doing’. Seven days and seventeen hours of relentless testing, building, experimentation, failure and play- challenging all assumptions about how learning and design occur. It’s a summer design camp on steroids- a ‘doing’ camp […]
I woke up with Michael Jackson blaring in my head this morning, a rare occurrence on a weekend morning that I can only attribute to a memorable moment on the second to last day of our design-build workshop and learning lab with my #teendesignheroes. Feverishly design-building our telephone booth porch with only a few hours […]
It is a difficult task finding sparks between varying personalities and wildly different skill sets, particularly for someone trying to allow peaceful coexistence among a static group and with a set goal that demands positive interactions and successful chemistry. For our team, with Alex and Katie being the ones in charge of setting everyone up […]
Spending sixteen to eighteen hours a day building things in rural Wisconsin with my #teendesignheroes from the Chicago Public School system leaves little time to share all of the amazing things that are happening with the outside world. This design-build workshop for teens is one of my most important laboratories for testing the limits of […]
June 27, 2011
Prepare yourself to build, tear down, build, tear down, and build again, so that finally, you can have what you may call your first draft. Sound tough? You’re telling me! Thankfully, while it is challenging, it’s also one of the best experiences I’ve ever had. During our third day at Taliesin, we were happily joined […]
‘Architects going into schools to talk about and teach architecture is like birth control for architects.’ -the president of a prominent architectural organization that focuses on design education At a recent summit on design education that pulled together an elite group of designers from across the country, I was struck by a deep, growing enthusiasm […]
Only five days until our favorite week of the year! Taliesin was Frank Lloyd Wright’s architectural playground. An ever evolving place, he and his apprentices were constantly experimenting with the structure, space and building materials of existing buildings on the property- adjusting, tearing things down and starting anew. They did this to better meet the […]
September 16, 2010
Project: Design Build Workshop for the Chicago Architecture Foundation Location: Chicago Project Director: Alex Gilliam for the Chicago Architecture Foundation Year: Summer 2010 Forty seven mosquito bites on one person, in the span of an hour? Sleeping in Stalin’s daughter’s bedroom? Visiting dignitaries, torrential thunderstorms, lots of post-hole digging, hand sawing and a pretty incredible […]
July 23, 2010
Project: Wedesignawesomethings! Location: Chicago Project Director: Alex Gilliam for the Chicago Architecture Foundation and After School Matters Year: Summer 2010 What the heck is Tajmah making? An Aqua Man costume? Is Public Workshop gearing up to compete with Speedo? No sir, no mam. It’s one of our early prototype oven mitts for a local Chicago […]
July 22, 2010
Project: Landscape Prosthetics Location: Chicago Project Director: Alex Gilliam Year: Summer 2010 Honestly, this super short project (one afternoon) was simply intended to be a device for quickly engaging my brand new crop of teen apprentices, forcing them to collaborate, bond and quickly feel empowered to change the world around them. Given that I have […]
April 19, 2010
It’s been in the works for a couple of months now but it’s now official, Public Workshop will be working with fifteen Chicago teenagers starting in late June of this summer to design-build food carts for a local community organization. Actually, we should clarify that they may not actually end up being food carts, depending […]
Event: Chicago K-12 Design Educator Potluck Presentation: You Can Change Your City by Alex Gilliam of Public Workshop Date: Thursday February 4th from 6.30-8.00 pm-ish Location: Landon Bone Baker Architects, 734 N Milwaukee Ave. Here’s why you shouldn’t miss it: Normally Public Workshop wouldn’t trumpet giving a presentation at a relatively informal event but ladies and gents, […]
September 28, 2009
73 designers and children designing, learning and building intently together. 3 fantastic Newhouse/ Taliesin Fellows helping facilitate. Fabulous collaboration, support and organizing by Krisann Rehbein, Raul, Jean and the Chicago Architecture Foundation. 9 structures in three hours. A ridiculous amount of pine, 4000 zip ties and sandwiches. 1 fantastic Grant Park. And 1 Intuitive Building […]
July 31, 2009
Well, I can’t honestly say that the Millenium Park portion of that statement is a sure thing but the rest of it is now settled. On the weekend of September 19-20 I will be designing/leading two participatory building/prototyping events for the Chicago Architectural Foundation . I am really pleased that this is going to happen. […]
July 7, 2009
When I volunteered to post a blog that sums up this year’s trip to Taliesin, I didn’t realize it will be this difficult. It’s hard enough to accept that the best week of this summer is over, I have never been disappointed to be in Chicago until now. Skyscrapers have replaced the hills. Endless businesses have replaced the prairies. The sirens and noisy cars have replaced the birds and crickets. There are no stars under this sky, and the breeze here isn’t sweet.
July 3, 2009
The Man Of The House On Thursday July 3, 2009 we had a very special visitor. Dean Arnold, the man responsible for making it possible for the six of us to visit an amazing architecture school and legacy of FLW, Taliesin. Mr. Arnold is the civil engineer of the firm W.E. O’ Neil based in […]
July 2, 2009
The Building Begins Today was actually a very especial day because it started off so different than the other days. We all had to wake up early in the morning, to get ready to start building. We were each separated into groups of three. One group was assigned to build a place to sit and […]
December 20, 2011
News