LOCAL ARTS DISTRICT

local art's district...

A destination designed for locals & artists to collaborate, learn, & create in a welcoming environment by encouraging the community to invest in their youth.  Our site, The Savannah Civic Center, is notably one of the major focal points of the Historic District.  However, for such a large urban footprint, it lacks user-density in it’s  interior and exterior spaces.  The space today functions as an arena, hosting a plethora of events.  The main arena is attached to the Johnny Mercer Theater, which will be the only existing structure preserved throughout the design  process.

Savannah, Georgia,  an Atlantic Seaport and Georgia’s third largest metropolitan area,  yearly attracts millions of tourists to its nostalgic urban landscape, mesmerized by its cobblestone streets, parks, and charming 22 - park squares.  The Savannah’s Historic District contains the highest-population density, nestled between the following districts :  Live Oak,  Hillcrest Area,  West Savannah, and Carver Heights.  The socioeconomic divide has in turn over decades created a divide in Savannah’s local communities.  In certain locations of it’s urbanscape, where large cultural events and gatherings occur,  there are only few opportunities s you see the all of Savannah’s community come together as one diverse unit.  It’s not seen too often in the Historic District, due to the city’s government wanting to preserve Savannah’s Southern nostalgia, by separating itself  from contrasting districts that are equal part of the whole of Downtown.  In response this issue, the Local Art’s District begins to form into a possible solution that might heal the division of Savannah’s people. 

The design concept is told through a collective of collages that were designed to portray the impact that the socioeconomic divide and infrastructure divide has had on Savannah’s community.  The images tell a story from the perspective of Savannah’s residents that reside in West Savannah, defining their visceral experience of Downtown Savannah.