The project is situated in Richmond Virginia, the former capital of the Confederate States. The city has been slow to effectively reconcile its past and only recently has the citizen’s simmering contempt spilled into the streets. After an exhaustive period of social isolation coupled with the death of George Floyd, an eruption of protests and counterprotests impelled Richmond into a battleground of social and political unrest. It has also forced unattended crises to be reexamined and confronted with a sense of deserved urgency. The numerous Confederate statues which fantastically deify its icons, have become an even more obvious sore in the wake of the burgeoning social-political reaction.

Monuments were once again the primary indicators of social change, and its erection or destruction are used to measure the prevalence of one ideology over another. This sentiment coupled with the overabundance of Confederate monuments in Richmond had fostered “counter-monuments” to undermine its symbolic influence in the city. The Emancipation and Freedom Monument, the Richmond Slavery Reconciliation Statue, and the Civil Rights Monument were erected around historic or important locations to dignify the historically oppressed narratives ignored and symbolically subjugated by their Confederate counterparts. Some modern monuments have even begun to exhibit elements of meta-critique, such as Rumors of War by Kehinde Wiley which subverts classical equestrian statues by replacing the traditionally white subject with a black figure. Others have become indexical of its social-political unrest and altered in meaning, such as the defamation of the Robert E. Lee Statue, with its kaleidoscopic vandalism as a championing of collective solidarity against symbols of oppression.

However noble these intentions are, the counter-monuments suffer the same ontological shortcomings of all conventional monuments- they act primarily as seen objects. A monument’s often sculptural role diminishes meaningfully direct engagements with the subject beyond visual contemplation. In the occasional monuments which are pavilioned and occupiable, the space remains self-referential and rigid in its use. As a reinforcement of its symbolic duty, the conventional monument must remain explicit in its imagery and transparent in its messages leaving little room for programmatic activity and interpretive subtlety. Despite conveying aspiration, a monument is unable to house literal activities of aspiration within itself.

To instill real-life programmatic answers to the aspirations exhibited by conventional monuments, this project aims to remedy these shortcomings while retaining a monument’s symbolic significance. This involves rethinking the meaning of a monument into something which not only commemorates ambition through imagery but is actually capable of fostering it within the space. Here, the project returns to the difficult social-political atmosphere of Richmond. This proposal identifies intolerance and lack of meaningful communication as prime instigators of the current social polarization and seeks to reverse this within its space. Food is an effective and inviting universal tool in communicating culture and will be one of the project’s programmatic impetuses. 



“People are telling you a story when they give you food, and if you don’t accept the food, you are, in many cultures, whether rural Arkansas or Vietnam, you’re rejecting the people.”

-Anthony Bourdain

No matter how fleeting, every act of consideration and acceptance is an act against intolerance; and the acceptance of food is the acceptance of that people’s labor and, often, cultural pride. A gesture of tolerance and acknowledgement. This is what is hoped to be achieved in abundance at the proposed monument. It will house an open food / farmers market of various cultures. The culturally diverse selection of vendors is meant to reflect the multi-cultural reality of this country and how enriched it is in its coexistence. 

The new monument will also house a small public library- a space of exchanging knowledge and information. Here new ideas can be explored and discovered in unexpected ways, and through which can communicate new paradigms to an individual more personally and perhaps even more effectively.

Finally, the project will continue to deliver the conventional symbolic expressions of commemoration through its architectonic forms. It is elevated beyond mere structure as its literal intersections simultaneously act as load bearing structures as well as symbols of the intersecting lives of those who visit the space. It is contained under a single roof to unify these principles into one collective sentiment.

By ascribing this architectural project the status of “monument”, its begins to challenge conventional understandings of the seen-object nature of traditional monuments and its effectiveness in elevating the public’s ability to practice aspirational principles evoked in them. Architecture cannot solve complex social-political problems as directly as policies and regulations. However, during a tumultuous period in which ideological differences seem to overpower shared principles, it is nice to find a place where people are invited to sample foods of many cultures and engage in an act of unexpected learning. All are welcome in the new monument.