We continue our progress south and west, this time our destination is the desert city of Phoenix, AZ. En route we decided to make a stop at a place called Arcosanti, an experimental town in the high desert of Arizona, 70 miles north of Phoenix. This place is the brain child of Italian architect and artist Paolo Soleri, who believes the current way we live is unsustainable, with urban sprawl resulting in high use of energy and creation of pollutants. His philosophy is to build high density living with efficient circulation of people and resources, multi-use buildings, and solar orientation for lighting, heating and cooling. Soleri calls his design concepts “arcology” (architecture + ecology).His ideas have not been widely accepted so in 1970 he embarked on a privately funded project called Arcosanti. Its' aim is to house 5000 people on 25 acres of a 4060 acre land preserve.
The plan is grand and virtuous but when you visit Arcosanti you can see there is a long way to go to achieving the initial goals. For a start much of the planned buildings have not been constructed therefore it only supports a community of less than 100 people. In the near 40 years since work started on Arcosanti funds have been hard to come by which has meant very slow progress. The main source of funding comes from manufacturing and selling bells designed by Paolo Soleri, all of which are made on site. They also have a source of income from running workshops, events and offering overnight accommodation. But it is evident that things are not going to plan. Mind you it is a simple and self-contained way of living and perhaps if Mark does not manage to find a job we’ll come back here to stay!!
We take the tour of the Arcosanti site and it is evident the place is suffering some neglect. Luckily enough we are there in time to see them pouring the molten brass into the moulds for their bell manufacturing. This is small scale manufacture so it is all done manually and not without some risk. Our tour also takes in some of the communal areas which are well thought out. What strikes you is that this is a commune – the residents are mostly young but if you had to classify them by sight you would call them hippies. We are not sure this is what Paolo Soleri envisaged when setting up Arcosanti, but to his credit he still visits the community weekly even though he is the grand age of 89. You wonder what will happen after his death. After the tour we go into the cafeteria for a really good and healthy buffet lunch. Arcosanti is an interesting and idealistic concept and we laud its goals and it is a shame that is has not received the funding to complete the project – you never know what the future holds. Soleri is most likely right about the un-sustainability of modern urban development so his ideas might have their day yet.
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