The Collaboratory
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Led by Meredith Drake Reitan (Architecture), Suzi Noruschat (USC Libraries), and Andrew Rutkowski (USC Libraries) and supported by Ahmanson Lab staff, this 2021-2022 Collaboratory sought to bring the social complexities of the early 20th century Bunker Hill, a neighborhood lost to redevelopment in the 1960s, to light while contributing to contemporary debates about community and economic revitalization practices.
Students spent fall 2021 investigating the archival record of Bunker Hill in order to document the scale and character of displacement. In spring 2022, Ahmanson Lab staff, along with students and faculty in the Collaboratory researched, designed, and fabricated a 3D, fully immersive, reconstruction of Bunker Hill from the late 1930s and early 1940s. (“The Historic Bunker Hill 3D Experience”).
To document displacement, students examined household survey cards from USC Libraires Special Collections (compiled by the Works Progress Administration in 1939). To design our 3D reconstruction, the team used historical photographs from the period accessed primarily from the USC Libraries Special Collections, Huntington Library, Los Angeles Public Library, and the Getty; architectural drawings produced in 1939 by WPA artists and held at the Los Angeles City Archives; Sanborn maps from the Library of Congress; and aerial photography from 1941, housed at UC Santa Barbara’s Aerial Photography Collection.
