Cold Comfort

In 2006, we wrote about Object Orange, a Detroit artists’ collective that was painting some of the city’s abandoned houses Tiggerific orange in an effort to call attention to its rapidly decaying neighborhoods. Last winter, a pair of Detroit artists hit on an even more dramatic method of highlighting the city’s deterioration–Ice House Detroit, “an […]

In 2006, we wrote about Object Orange, a Detroit artists’ collective that was painting some of the city’s abandoned houses Tiggerific orange in an effort to call attention to its rapidly decaying neighborhoods. Last winter, a pair of Detroit artists hit on an even more dramatic method of highlighting the city’s deterioration–Ice House Detroit, “an architectural installation and social change project” by Gregory Holm and Matthew Radune that froze one of the city’s 20,000 abandoned houses in solid ice (which required spraying the house with a fire hose for more than a week.)

Here’s a (rather ominous) video of the final result:

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Previously: Elizabeth Evitts Dickinson wrote about an immersive design program in the Motor City, sparking intense debate in the comments section. Nate Berg reported on the Broken City Lab in Windsor, Ontario, just across the river from Detroit. Here’s our 2006 story on Object Orange.

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