Marina Lodi

The urban underground has the potential to serve the life of New York City. Beyond its utilitarian role as infrastructure, it remains an underutilized and marginalized space. Can one break with the idea of the underground as a dark and forbidding environment, and instead exploit its natural qualities as a platform for new programs supporting the urban life above? Perhaps once the ground level is broken, descending and ascending can become a unique part of the city experience. Exploring adaptation through light and materials, this thesis proposes a narrative and cinematic approach to subterranean space. Using the myth of Persephone and the birth of spring as an analog, the architecture will be choreographed to transport the user along a meditative exploration of — and adaption to — darkness. The abandoned Delancey trolley station, adjacent to the existing subway on the Lower East Side, will host this new program for the urban underground.