Being located close to the geographical center of the United States carries with it the burden of balancing the theoretical investigations of the East Coast with the formal sculpturalism of the West Coast.
The radical experiments in education that Heather Woofter and Sung Ho Kim carry out at Washington University in Saint Louis express the poetic dimensions of this balance. Their teaching is centered on the conviction that architecture is a critical practice framed by the conditions of history, representation, material production, and space-making. Their studio teaching is based on the short- and long-term integration with seminars that study and interrogate contemporary approaches to form making and practice. Their seminars place creative investigation as a fundamental component to research, evaluation, and documental production.
Tempered through Axi:Ome, Woofter and Kim’s inquisitive and inventive professional practice, all of these different pedagogical systems stand as exact duplicates of their practical work. Their teaching and practice, in ultimate balance, recognize the importance of the studio experience as an innovative laboratory adjusted by the critical and transformative lens of investigation, experience, and creative problem solving.