Videos from the Wanderlust School of Transgressive Placemaking

by Allison Meier September 17, 2013

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If you’re going to organize a speakeasy in a water tower, a secret pop-up market in box trucks, or a post-apocalyptic battle dome in the desert, logistics are key.

Back in June, Wanderlust Projects with Atlas Obscura presented the Wanderlust School of Transgressive Placemaking at Acme Studio in Brooklyn to examine the details of bringing neglected places to life. Wanderlust Projects is a collaboration between Ida Benedetto and Nathan Austin, whose work in transforming overlooked spaces includes experiences like the Candyland Trespass Safari in the abandoned Domino Sugar Refinery, and most recently Room 186 in a São Paulo, Brazil, love motel.

article-image Annetta Black of Atlas Obscura (left), with Mark Krawczuk, Nathan Austin, and Ida Benedetto, speaking at the Wanderlust School of Transgressive Placemaking

Now videos of each of the four panels held as part of the School are online. They include “Safety & Security Off the Grid” featuring Atlas Obscura’s Annetta Black, who discussed the challenges of organizing Obscura Society events like a visit to an abandoned Beaux Arts train station in Oakland, as well as the Thunderdome at Burning Man.

Other panels included “Trespassing and the Law,” “Site-Specific Experience Design,” and “Documentation and Legacy,” involving an impressive line-up of NYC and national “placemakers,” including game designer Nick Fortugno, founder of Improv Everywhere Charlie Todd, journalist Annie Correal, media scholar Stephen Duncombe, and Mark Krawczuk of the Lost Horizons Night Market. Basically, if you were interested in the risks and rewards of urban exploration, what to know if you get caught trespassing, the challenges of telling a story that involves experience to distant audiences, or just had a curiosity about the interventions at the margins of the urban landscape, there was something for you.

article-image Altas Obscura’s Dylan Thuras (left) at the Wanderlust School of Transgressive Placemaking

“The turn out was amazing,” Ida Benedetto of Wanderlust said of the series. “There’s clearly a real appetite for not only living unconventional site-specific experiences, but thinking about them and making better ones, too. That’s exciting to see. I’m grateful for everything we learned from the speakers who participated.”

The videos are embedded below, and you can also find them all here on the Wanderlust site.

Broken Legs, Surveillance Cameras and Black Mold: Safety & Security Off the Grid
Speakers: Mark Krawczuk, Annetta Black, and Myric Lehner