Built Environment Description: Goat Farm

Its 4:30 when I walk onto Goat Farms grounds, the sun is beginning to set in the sky creating an dusky lighting over the art center. Buildings are dilapidated, shattered windows catch my immediate attention. Made of redbrick, clearly an old converted warehouse. A small farm is located in the front of the establishment right before the building. Goats graze in a containment in a building that is reminiscent of a traditional barn. Sparse patches of grass dotting the grounds as I continue to wander I run into more redbrick walls this time decorated with a mural of a cows skeleton. As I continue on I run into industrial lofts that house the resident artists apart of the art residency program there. I exit the building on my way to go back home, the grounds occupied by Goat Farm are very large and as it got dark it became apparent more daylight hours were needed to experience the whole of the art center. The last thing I notice on my way out is a raised platform- or gazebo of sorts that doubles as a stage on which concerts are preformed at the “Farm” in addition to the visual art pieces.Dilapidated Warehouse- Goat Farm

Actually An Annotation: Neighborhood Commercial Rehabilitation

Levatino, Adrienne M. Neighborhood Commercial Rehabilitation. Washington: National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials, 1978. Print.
Adrienne M Levatino an esteemed member of the Illinois Department Of Financial and Professional Regulation, Loyola University of Chicago School of Law graduate and author of Neighborhood Commercial Rehabilitation writes in her book about the methods of gentrification and neighborhood revitalization used by local governments in order to increase communal property value and revenue. She relies heavily on government documents and first person accounts of the changes occurring within a neighborhood. Levatino’s purpose of writing this was to educate scholastic readers on the gentrification and revitalization of communities and its result on its lower socioeconomic inhabitants. This book is useful because it gives an insiders look into the government process of gentrification and revitalization process in addition to the social implications behind it.