An Analysis by Shane King ARCOSANTI
Table of Contents
Timeline
Construction Workshop
How Arcosanti Functions as a City Shortcomings of Arcosanti
Acknowledgement
This analysis is based on my first-hand experience living and working at Arcosanti. In addition to my experience in architecture and urban design, I was given architectural tours and seminars and attended all meetings during my stay that I used to collect and analyze information.
Paulo Soleri's vision of what a city should be was drastically different than many other thoughts at the time, and also came at the perfect time in society. The 1960s were a turbulent time in American history with the civil rights movement, the Vietnam War and antiwar protests, countercultural movements, political assassinations and the emerging “generation gap”. People were ready for tangible change and Soleri’s vision for a different type of city offered that.
To get his idea off the ground, Paulo Soleri surprisingly didn’t have a business plan, which explains why investors that approached him with deals usually fell apart. He gained a lot of support by sharing his ideas at expositions and exhibits, showcasing his drawings and models
People from all over came to join and at the peak, there were 55 people in a workshop that did all of the physical labor- there was never a construction company involved. During the construction of Arcosanti, they lived down the Mesa near the Agua Fria River in tents and 10’x10’ concrete cubes at what is referred to as “camp”.
The design of Arcosanti was guided by the ideaology of "arcology" (a portmanteau of architecture and ecology) was envisioned on the 4,069-acre land Arcosanti was planned on. A model city of 5,000 people was restricted to 25 acres, however, only 5% of the original plans were realized. The last sizable building was completed in 1989.
Today, less than 50 people live here, but tours and workshoppers keep the place teaming with life. Events such as music festivals in recent years have been hosted here, drawing in the likes of Florence and the Machine.
Legend
Cafe/ Gift Shop
Ceramics Apse
Adminstrative Offices
Bronze Foundary
East Crescent
Vaults (Large Covered Gathering Space)
Wood Shop and Welding Studio
Airbnb Rooms
Camp (First Settlement of Arcosanti)
Music Center Gym Library Pool
The bronze and ceramics apses face south. It fills with shade in summer, light in winter.
January 21st
Foundary Apse
Being perched on the basalt rock mesa offers a strong foundation and impressive views of the expanive desert landscape.
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In August 2023, my fascination with Arcosanti began when a friend surprised me with a trip to Cosanti in Phoenix, one of Paulo Soleri's other projects. I arrived at Cosanti feeling uninspired in my career, but left with renewed passion and excitement. When I discovered they offer a four-week on-site construction workshop starting in November 2023, I followed my instincts and left my full-time job to gain this hands-on experience.
I joined three other people in the workshop. We were treated as employees of Arcosanti and given the same access and inclusion as the residents. While the construction work was educational, what made this experience most valuable was studying how it has functioned for over 50 years.
Week 2: Remodel of Paulo Soleri's Former Apartment
Week 4: Construction of Camp Kitchen Dining Room
People come to a city for three reasons: trade, security, and gathering.
Two primary economic engines have helped build Arcosanti: the ceramics apse and the bronze foundry. It's a primal experience to watch the workers in the bronze foundry pour the 100-lb molten, red-glowing bronze into the sand-cast molds as the music on the loudspeakers and people go silent. It has become a ceremonial experience that requires concentration. Arcosanti is known for bronze bells, but the ideas are also monetized in multiple ways.
Bronze bells are individually crafted at Arcosanti and have been in production for 65 years. (cosanti.com)
Ceramic windbells are cast directly into sandy soil or in plaster molds before being carved by skilled artisans with abstract patterns, figures, animals, and designs inspired by nature and kilnfired. (cosanti.com)
Knowledge is also exchanged to tourists through a steady stream of tours that come, in addition to workshops.
Private donations and grants have also played a signicant role in its development.
Located an hour's drive from Phoenix and 45 minutes from Prescott, with McDonald's and a Love's gas station being the last bit of civilization, Arcosanti requires effort and time to venture in or out. The only entrance to the site is from a 2-mile stretch of unpaved road, which is treacherous for anyone with a low-lying car with small tires.
Arcosanti sits like a fortress at the edge of a mesa. The residents who live at the main complex reside in concrete dwellings firmly built on solid foundations that are built to last. Gates and signage discourage visitors from entering the residential areas if no tour guide is present. Private houses have locked doors, but common areas are always unlocked.
Even though the location is in the middle of a desert, the Aqua Fria River at the bottom of the mesa supplies the water needs with the help of four wells. The food is grown on-site in two greenhouses, gardens, and terraces, and there are plans for expansion if there is enough money and workforce.
All these elements provide a sense of security for the residents, who feel safe here. One resident I spoke with said humorously that this is where he would come from if there were ever a threat of apocalypse.
Cordes Lake Pop. 3,954
People come for various reasons, but one that is true to most is to find a place they belong to. Arcosanti was founded on a unifying belief of creating something unique, and to become a resident, everyone has to participate in a workshop or have employment at Cosanti. It is a right of passage that is welcome to everyone; different religions, skin colors, ethnicities, sexual orientations, etc.,. There is a welcoming attitude toward the people who want to be a part of Arcosanti, and people are viewed as equals from my experience. One can see some of their work completed from workshops when walking around; this creates a sense of belonging. Arcosanti is an intentional living community, people sharing a conscious choice to live and work together as a group.
“Sense of belonging is strongest in communities where the residents are involved in their community” (Smith 53). This is a social factor that Arcosanti does exceedingly well. Everything is voted on, and all voices are heard during town meetings and daily morning meetings. The iconic mixed-use architecture, with its communityoriented spaces, encourages social interaction, which reduces isolation, enhances community connectedness, and increases the sense of
belonging. There are spaces to have community movie nights, the library has crafts nights, the cafe holds dinner parties and film screenings, and the rooftops have bean bag chairs for casual hangouts, to name a few.
The expressive forms and hulking concrete structures are architectural styles most related to brutalism.
The VaultsAmpitheatre Pool
Rooftop Hangout
Library/ Craft Space
Communal Room w/ Fireplace
They allude to an identifiable sense of place; if you are familiar enough with the site, you know from even zoomed-in photographs that it is Arcosanti.
It’s rumored that George Lucas visited Arcosanti in the 70’s and used the architecture as inspiration for the scenes on Tattooine. Goodfon.com
A strong statement made by the head of archives of 40 years, Sue Kirch, when she gave a seminar during my workshop said:
“This place is a failure.”
Over the span of half a century, Arcosanti has transitioned from a beacon of audacious vision and pioneering ideas to a place mired in inertia. The passing of Paulo Soleri in 2013, coupled with the damaging allegations against him, dealt a severe blow to Arcosanti's centralized vision and reputation, resulting in a significant loss of public support.
People working with him often described him as egotistical and demanding, someone hard to go against, alluding to an authoritarian leadership. At times, an autocratic leadership style can cross the line into unfair and even abusive behavior (Wang, Lui, & Lui 2019), which can be noted in the case of Paulo Soleri and the allegations against him. He could get away with this behavior because people were there by choice and believed in his vision; if they disagreed, they had the choice to leave.
Today, the atmosphere at Arcosanti is thick with tension, a direct result of the current CEO's unfavorable leadership. The community is actively seeking a replacement, and social platforms are being used to vent frustrations over the current problems of residential relations, leadership, and living conditions. As witnessed during the recent political elections, social media has the potential to exacerbate conflicts. As a workshop volunteer, I was included in the Slack community and could see all public messages. I was shocked at what people said to one another on the internet when they lived in such close quarters and would see them nearly daily. As a result, leadership is considering banning Slack to encourage more humane discussions.
While I lived at Arcosanti, I attended daily meetings with the construction and maintenance crew to discuss plans, needs for daily tasks, and budgets. Costs and the speed of tasks were the highest concerns, but there wasn't anyone directly in charge of anything. During my time there, a new employee (who had previously joined a workshop) was hired to manage the department and address this problem. There was a drastic improvement in operations by the time I left the workshop thanks to his well-liked personality and knowledge.
The people I worked with had little concern over the style or quality of furnishings and fixtures. Without a design review board to approve or deny these items, a standard isn't upheld, and the sense of place at Arcosanti is being eroded at the same speed as the community is falling into disrepair.
The addition of the camp kitchen dining room was constructed using the same materials as any lackluster construction job for a cookie-cutter house in suburbia. An interior designer and I had to argue against some of the style and design details to help improve the community's image.
With a multitude of voices and freedom of choice, achieving a unified design process becomes a daunting task. In the case of Arcosanti, where individuals choose to be part of the community for similar reasons, the question of whether a utilitarian leadership style would be more conducive to progress becomes a complex issue.
Is the leadership style that Paulo Soleri used the most effective at building the grand structures built in the 1970s, or is it time for a more democratic structure where everyone's voices are listened to? Is this the way Soleri would want Arcosanti to continue? The Shortcomings
Arcosanti
Complicated social structures are partly created by the divide between the camp located down the hill and the main complex at the top of the mesa. Camp was the first settlement of Arcosanti and consists of the original 10'x10' concrete cubes used as bedrooms. It also has communal bathrooms and a kitchen. However, after 54 years of use, the utilities and structures are deteriorating, posing serious health risks such as mold, insects, and structural instability, putting the residents' health at immediate risk. Leadership recently required the residents to vacate the premises until the conditions improve, which will take months, possibly years.
The 'us vs. them' mentality between the camp and the main complex has eroded the sense of community in many ways. In light of this, construction workshops have been given a crucial mission: to enhance the kitchen, create an indoor eating space for Camp, and eventually insulate and update the 10'x10' cubes. This task is not just about improving living conditions but also about fostering unity and restoring a sense of community.
In a place where building codes and zoning have little control over the design of buildings, there is no excuse for ignoring climate considerations. Until the 1980s, a state fire marshal review was not required, and the only thing needed to begin construction was a use permit. This was explained by Paulo Soleri's helping architect, Tomiaki Tamura, during one of his lectures given to people in the construction workshop while I was there.
According to the Urban Task Force, a sustainable city is a compact and flexible structure whose parts are interconnected and articulated with public spaces. Arcosanti exemplifies this concept well. However, despite the apses that provide shade in summer and light in winter, the architecture doesn't respond as effectively to the climate compared to ancient desert cities.
Source: worldhistory.org
Source: worldhistory.org
In nearby native American cliff dwellings such as Chaco Canyon and Mesa Verde (pictured left), natural landforms inside cliffs provided physical shelter from the desert heat, creating a change in microclimate and a sense of enclosure.
The 3,000-year-old city of Yazd and other ancient desert cities followed a compact form with breezeways, courtyards, an inward-focused layout, and wind chimneys to bring cooler air into interior spaces. Arcosanti follows a more linear form which exposes it intensely to the sun during the summer months. Without the use of shade structures and balconies to block the sun, thin concrete walls and large walls/windows are directly exposed to the elements, unlike in the case studies mentioned here.
Another thought leader started practicing his construction techniques when Arcosanti was being built: Michael Reynolds's Earthships. They are entirely autonomous and provide residents with comfort year-round; it is everything that Arcosanti falls short of.
In a recent article by ABC News (Zee et al. 2024):
"Everybody on the planet can wake up in the morning and be comfortable without fossil fuel. Everybody can grow food in their house, everybody can have electricity from the sun and wind," Michael Reynolds, founder and creator of Earthship Biotecture, told Zee. "These buildings do that."
Earthship Features:
• 50% of an Earthship is constructed from recycled/ upcycled materials
• Wastewater and grey water are used on-site
• Water catchment from rain and snow
• Energy produced from solar photovoltaic
• Interior Food Production
Thermal mass heating and cooling
Since the Camp at Arcosanti needs extensive reconstruction/ updates, it would be ideal for implementing Earthship-like ideologies. The main structures of Arcosanti would be more difficult to modify, but improved grey water systems, solar power, and interior food production systems would be the biggest areas to improve upon.
Electricity:
A layer of frugality overlays the Arcosanti project. Facilities use about 1/5 the electricity standard developments use because the buildings have been designed and built compactly (Inside Arcosanti, the Utopian Eco-city in the Arizona Desert). During one of the daily morning meetings, the current CEO of Arcosanti announced that the electric bill was about 700 dollars, which is high for their standards. Considering the size of the buildings and the 50 people living there using resources, this is more sustainable than most houses.
It is explained during tours that Arcosanti does not require much heating or cooling because of the architecture and how it allows light into buildings in the winter to heat and blocks it during the summer for cooling, but experiencing living there shows otherwise. Fall nights were brutally cold, requiring space heaters and multiple layers of blankets. Residents explain that the summers are equally uncomfortable in the buildings; extremely high temperatures are a big complaint.
The power lines leading into Arcosanti are the community's umbilical cord; without them, only a portion of the outdoor lighting and one classroom, known as the solar room, would remain powered. The solar panels for this were from a small grant, hinting at the possibility of further expansion if they hire a grant writer (they have had one in the past, but not currently).
While the current amount of renewable energy produced onsite may be underwhelming, there is a promising potential for improvement.
Only a tiny portion of the food at Arcosanti comes from the greenhouses and gardens on site. Most are bought from the supermarket via a food truck to supply the cafe with the small menu it offers guests from Thursday through Sunday. As a result of its isolation and lack of resources on site, there are weekly grocery store runs coordinated amongst residents.
Paulo Soleri grew up in Turin, Italy, and recreated a reminiscent landscape at Arcosanti. Olive trees rescued from the city of Phoenix and towering Italian cypress trees have become just as much a part of the architecture as the buildings themselves. However, they require a lot of irrigation and hand watering every day. They use grey water for this, but a better system would be to recirculate the use water from showers, washing machines, and sinks to water plants through a filtration process to later use in toilets (Earthships.com)
The materials used for the Camp kitchen dining room used materials and fixtures from Home Depot, missing an opportunity to utilize recycled materials.
The clay used for creating the ceramic bells and tiles is no longer sourced locally because the company no longer exists. It is now shipped from farther away and uses clay not found in Arizona, increasing its carbon footprint.
The bronze bells, the primary income source, require intensive mining. However, they have become a symbol of the community and are deeply rooted in its history. This resource-intensive bronze concern has been voiced in town meetings, but it will have to continue until another trade can replace this income source.
In many ways, Arcosanti has been a failure. Solerie's vision for a self-sufficient and self-contained city is a far cry from its reality.
Perhaps Soleri's headstrong attitude wouldn't let any other ideas dictate Arcosanti's construction methods. Other thought leaders developed new technologies and ideas that surpassed Arcosantis over the decades. With new leadership, there is a higher chance outside ideas will be easier to penetrate the thick-walled intensive concrete structures that are Arcosanti, one day asserting itself as a thought leader once more.
Still, despite Arcosanti seemingly being a failure and an uncertain future, it is a place filled with inspiration. If one has a bold vision, it is worth taking the risk and pursuing making it a reality.
Citations:
“About Us.” Urban Taskforce, 28 June 2021, www.urbantaskforce.com.au/ about-us/.
“Off Grid Sustainable Green Buildings.” Earthship Biotecture, 23 Apr. 2024, earthship.com/.
“Shop Handcrafted Bronze & Ceramic Windbells.” Cosanti Originals, cosanti. com/. Accessed 29 Apr. 2024.
Simon, Jade. “Inside Arcosanti, the Utopian Eco-City in the Arizona Desert.” Vogue France, Vogue France, 29 Mar. 2018, www.vogue.fr/lifestyle/ travel/story/inside-arcosanti-an-ecological-utopian-city-in-the-arizonadesert/1667.
Wang, Zhen, et al. “Authoritarian Leadership and Task Performance: The Effects of Leader-Member Exchange and Dependence on Leader - Frontiers of Business Research in China.” SpringerLink, Springer Singapore, 23 Dec. 2019, link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s11782-019-0066-x.
Zee, Ginger, et al. “An Off-the-Grid Community in New Mexico Offers Insight into Sustainable Building.” ABC News, ABC News Network, abcnews. go.com/US/off-grid-community-new-mexico-offers-insight-sustainable/ story?id=109347638#:~:text=The%20community%20of%20over%20 100,use%2C%20according%20to%20Earthship%20Biotecture. Accessed 29 Apr. 2024.