“Framing a Modern Mess” Offers a Re-Imagined Pruitt-Igoe as Historic Cultural, Ecological Site

The Pruitt-Igoe site in North St. Louis has been the subject of Melissa Elliott's Masters in Landscape Architecture studio at the University of Virginia, where she completed her studies in May 2011. Melissa previously wrote here about her experience visiting the Pruitt-Igoe site and attending the Open/Closed vacant land conference in St. Louis and Turning Urban at UVA in quick succession. This is her final design proposal, including notes on the design not chosen. This article should provide an excellent jumping off point for exploring the recently announced Pruitt-Igoe Now design competition. Melissa's site detailing the proccess of this project is Framing a Modern Mess.
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As the city seeks to re-frame its “modern masterpiece”–the Gateway Arch–through an international competition (Framing a Modern Masterpiece), what is the status of its famous modern disaster–Pruitt-Igoe–and what role could this site play in the city’s future? This project seeks to situate both the Arch and Pruitt-Igoe within the historical narrative of urban renewal in St. Louis. The competition branded the Arch a “modern masterpiece” while failing to fully acknowledge its lineage as an urban renewal project.

Similarly, architecture critics have characterized Pruitt-Igoe as a failure of modern architecture while failing to contextualize it as a high-density, low income housing project constructed during urban renewal. This narrative has received very able treatment in the documentary The Pruitt-Igoe Myth. My project sought to re-contextualize the Gateway Arch and Jefferson National Expansion Monument as one successful project in a city where urban renewal policy also proved disastrous. I also position Pruitt-Igoe as an alternative to the Gateway Arch: an alternative history of St. Louis, as well as an alternative ecology. This final design proposal re-imagines Pruitt-Igoe as a site of urban memory: both cultural and ecological.