Thesis: Behind Closed Doors

Thesis: Behind Closed Doors

Student: Hannah Schafers

Faculty Mentor: Jeffrey L Day, FAIA

Student Project Description

Hannah Schafers:

Motels once controlled the outskirts of American highways, but have now slipped from the public imagination.  Rather, thousands of holiday inns dot the American landscape providing a comfort of sameness. The fading typology signifies something lost in contemporary American life.  It represents a pleasant fantasy of freedom and a way to escape the global continuum of constant flow and effortless connection.  If the purpose of the motel is to escape this mundane life, why does it conceal a meaningful experience unique to our everyday world?  Under this mundane roof, four complete strangers assume an identity in which no one knows their past, their family, or, their name, just the room number behind the closed door.  Departing from the script of everyday life, these new identities search for a place where they can still invent a new persona, a new past, and a new destination.