A House to Grow In: A Proposal for the Contemporary Re-Pioneering of the Iowa Prairie

Abstract

While the complexities of contemporary life have many considering a rural relocation, the current American imagination of a desirable rural life has contributed to uninformed urbanite settlement and a lack of population growth in agricultural rural communities. The thesis seeks to write promise and adventure back into these agricultural communities by proposing a contemporary re-pioneering of current farmland. In Clinton, Iowa, a new farmhouse typology and site strategy will aid in the incremental establishment of the former Iowa prairie and a pioneering family; this will become the foundation of a new rural narrative based on the resources of rural America: ecology, tradition, and the transcendent. In this reformed rural narrative, the transcendent value of stewardship will guide the design and is made manifest through the hidden abundance of the native prairie and a contemporary reimagining of traditional building and agricultural practices.