Visual
2022
THE STORY OF A SINGLE TREE
An Urban Tree in Boston
THE STORY OF A SINGLE TREE
An Urban Tree in Boston
Cambridge, MA • Massachusetts Instite of Technology • Supervisor: Mohamad Nahleh
In the process of cultivating trees and planting them along streets,
cities were naturalized and trees were urbanized.”
- Sonja Dümpelmann
In the farming, consumption, and domestication of trees, they have been organized and engineered to accommodate our needs. In the built environment, natural matter is being commodified at unprecedented rates: we grow standardised tree species designed to withstand unnatural environmental conditions, in order to create a collective—yet formally separated—pattern of trees. In the architectural practice, designers often incorporate a collection of trees into their digital worlds without much consideration or acknowledgement for each individual tree as a species that has particular needs. Our lack of practice of care toward the individual tree is intrinsically tied to our lack of understanding of how it operates. The Story of a Single Tree seeks to challenge current societal and cultural perspectives of a tree ftor consumers. This is the story of tree #7,784, located at 251 Marlborough Street in Boston, MA. The story is told through two lenses: current modes, and alternate ways to understand and interact with it. Each lens will examine the following three themes: (i) temporality (ii) physicality (iii) value.“
cities were naturalized and trees were urbanized.”
- Sonja Dümpelmann
In the farming, consumption, and domestication of trees, they have been organized and engineered to accommodate our needs. In the built environment, natural matter is being commodified at unprecedented rates: we grow standardised tree species designed to withstand unnatural environmental conditions, in order to create a collective—yet formally separated—pattern of trees. In the architectural practice, designers often incorporate a collection of trees into their digital worlds without much consideration or acknowledgement for each individual tree as a species that has particular needs. Our lack of practice of care toward the individual tree is intrinsically tied to our lack of understanding of how it operates. The Story of a Single Tree seeks to challenge current societal and cultural perspectives of a tree ftor consumers. This is the story of tree #7,784, located at 251 Marlborough Street in Boston, MA. The story is told through two lenses: current modes, and alternate ways to understand and interact with it. Each lens will examine the following three themes: (i) temporality (ii) physicality (iii) value.“
- ***
- Exhibited at MIT Architecture HQ Gallery
- “Cartographies of Entanglement: Across the Scales and Timescales of Contemporary Urbanism”
Tree #7,784, from a Massachusetts nursery, spent 4 years growing before being transplanted to 251 Marlborough Street, Boston.
As humans experienced physical qualities and characteristics of plants, botanical illustration became a means of studying and classifying them, for the purpose of their admiration or consumption. The drawing shows a two overlaid botanical drawings of tree #7,784: one in the city, and one in the forest.
Trees have a territorial intelligence which allows them to process information that is available in their environment. Rather than reading tree #7,784 merely through physical characteristics that are visible to the human eye, we can read the tree through the environment that shapes it - and that it in turn shapes. The superimposed data across varying timescales allows us to read the physicality of the tree through a different lens to what a botanical drawing would typically provide
Just as trees are being farmed and replanted to cater to our urban environments, they are also being farmed and cut down to be consumed by humans in the form of wood. Indeed, whether in a city or rural area, in public or private spaces, we use and interact with elements of trees on a daily basis. However, these products that we interact with have taken on new forms; thus, detaching our consumerism of the tree or forest from its source. The image shows a lexicon of items—or rather, products—that originate in one way or another from a part of a tree.
Urban wildlife reside in urban or suburban environments, relying on both plants and the built environment to survive. Indeed, species have adapted to thrive in cities, which serves animals through water and food provisioning, flood control, and nutrient-cycling. The drawing overlays environmental data across various temporalities, including yearly averages of temperature, rainfall, and wind precipitation data for the area. Also depicted are yearly rates of soil moisture and bark temperature,as well as some species that reside in the tree for varying periods of time.
Humans experience the temporal nature of trees above ground, through its transformation amid different climates, seasons, years, and so on. The image presents the transformation of tree #7,784 throughout the four seasons. For each season, the part of the tree that is most aesthetized and utilized is highlighted. As trees move with nature, they become physical reflections of each season, causing us to experience their temporality through their transformation.
The temporality of a tree exists on a different time scale and language to that of humans: through communication. Although not visible to the human eye, a tree is always in movement. A singular tree is never alone or isolated from its neighbors: trees and other plants are linked to one another below ground, forming an underground network that facilitates communication, memory, and learning. The drawing is split into two environments, depicting the tree as it currently stands in the city, as well as how it would exist in a forest.