The world’s population is increasingly migrating toward coastlines, driven by the attractions of natural beauty, temperate climates, and economic potential. This trend has resulted in highly concentrated coastal regions that yield significant benefits, including enhanced global transportation networks, dense industrial and urban development, robust food production from aquatic sources, and substantial revenue from tourism. However, this very proximity to the water also creates immense vulnerability. Coastal communities are facing unprecedented risks that are accelerating due to climate change, primarily from rising sea levels, the collapse of critical ecosystems, and more powerful and frequent storms.
The design thesis studio addresses these challenges head-on by focusing on the creation of a practical catalogue of architectural strategies—a versatile toolkit—for enhancing resilience in coastal urban areas. New York City, with its extensive and varied coastline, will serve as the primary case study. Through a structured three-phase process of research, prototyping, and design, students will explore the intersection of climate resilience, adaptive urban design, and socio-economic equity. The final output will be a strategic architectural playbook designed to offer actionable solutions for cities worldwide confronting similar coastal threats.
In this studio, we will build directly on the momentum and findings from the F24 semester to tackle a specific set of urban and architectural problems visible in NYC’s coastal zones. These areas become a living laboratory for testing innovative prototypes that merge forward-thinking living scenarios with new economic models. The core mission is to design a future where coastal living is not only safe and resilient but also equitable and enriching and proactively answer the essential question:
How will we live by the water?
Courses:
Coastal Futures Thesis Studio, New York Institute of Technology, Jeannette Sordi, 2025
Coastal Futures Thesis and Urban Design Studio, New York Institute of Technology, Jeannette Sordi and Marcella del Signore, 2024
Coastal Landscapes Studio, Adolfo Ibañez University, Jeannette Sordi and Felipe Vera, 2017
Coastal Landscape Applied Research Seminar, Adolfo Ibañez University, 2017
See also: Coastal Futures Thesis
J. Sordi, S. Dambrosio, Part-Time Cities. A Survey of the Chilean Central Coast. ARQ, 2019.
JEANNETTE SORDI 