Teston Awarded Grant for Public Interiority Research - UTK College of Architecture + Design

April 18, 2022 Teston Awarded Grant for Public Interiority Research

In spring 2022, Liz Teston, associate professor in the School of Interior Architecture, received the . The grant supports an investigation that will “effectively contribute to the knowledge, teaching, or practice of the art and science of architecture,” according to the AIA website.

The $10,000 grant will be used to conduct further investigative research on Teston’s project entitled, “Public Interiority,” which aims to rethink the threshold of interiority and make a case for interior-feeling places in the urban outdoors. “While we frequently experience interiority inside structures, public interiority is a perceived condition found in the public sphere, without structure, and shaped by a combination of influences,” said Teston. “The grant will support my current field observations, physical artifacts, and drawings for forthcoming works like the Public Interiority book and planned public events a symposium and exhibitions.”

Teston’s multi-year research taking place in Manhattan, London, Bucharest, ��Ƶ and Nashville casts aside the facade as the primary interior delineator and includes the examination of the politics of design. The term, public interiority, means more than memory, cultural identity, and the everyday design contexts (although they are present in the work); its taxonomy includes politics, atmospheres, program, psychology and building form. This is especially critical in the post-COVID-19 context as the indoors are being redefined.

In the School of Interior Architecture, Teston teaches studios with a focus on inclusive design and hopes the grant serves as a basis for collaboration, reimagination and transformation of interiority in exterior spaces as well as redefining the interior architecture discipline. By redefining this field, it will allow interior architecture to expand its reach and keep it relevant in the current contemporary context.