The Autumn project, Faenza, investigated the properties of soup as a potential social condenser. Each working with a unique soup, linked to a global culture, students interrogated processes of soup making and consumption and reinterpreted them for deployment at the sensitive Abbey ruins site in Reading. What do towns and cities seek to import? What are the advantages? Can you control who / what comes? Should you? Town development plans, policies that determine what is permitted and what is not, what is actively discouraged and what is supported with funding and facilities shape both infrastructure and transient, presences and populations. What are the pros and cons of visiting new exhibitions, of new commuters, new pilgrims, new bands, new celebrities, new films, new drinks, new menus, new soups….? How long would you want these many ‘visitors’ to stay? Which parts of the economy might they inflate? What are the related costs? Tidying up, for example, coach parks, public toilets, tourist centres, emergency provisions? £300,000 worth of tents were left behind by (too?) wealthy festival goers after last-years Reading Festival. What effect do such imports have on regular local bands, local artists, local soups? What are the cultural consequences of consuming? 

Module Convenor: Oliver Froome-Lewis 

Design Studio Team: Oliver Froome-Lewis, Negin Ghorbhani, Mike Kane, Sayan Skandarajah, Michelle Tomlinson 

Visitors: Gillian Horn, Tim O’Callaghan, Penélope Plaza