Lilly Saniel-Banrey

Designer of many things. Sowing joy and wellbeing into the details of everyday life. Currently at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design. See a full scope of work including architecture, graphics, objects, and documents. Or just see my current projects.

Loose Ends, Lean-tos + Backdrops


Proposed 2023
Chelsea, MA

with Kirsten Sexton
Harvard Graduate School of Design
Studio led by Jennifer Bonner
Through the lens of the still life, contemporary media culture, and the shifting urban condition of Chelsea, Massachusetts, this project proposes loose ends, lean-tos, and architectural backdrops as a new aesthetic for urban housing models and as an expedient densification device. Large CLT additions protect existing office structures, transforming an existing office block into over 500 beds and 100,000 square feet of public programming. The architectural gestures are caricatures in nature, exaggerrating an existing blankness or monotony present in multi-family design. This exaggerated blankness is punctuated by moments of collective impulse and energy. 

This project is receptive of change, as differing wall types host a variety of uses that are not predescribed, but rather open to interpretation.  Flashes of activity are revealed at discrete moments and the wall begins to operate on multiple scales.

 A formula of lean to + back drop + existing  foregrounds the use of wall as a device for reintroducing a human scale to the site. Public space becomes bracketed by large, almost caricatured architectural gestures. Housing is lifted from the ground floor and a seamless corridor for art. Residents and visitors alike enjoy puncturing light wells, connecting art and housing through shared light. 


Layers of Boxes, lean-tos, and rolled out cyc walls become the backdrop for life, exaggerating both the mundane and the eccentricity of the urban condition and posturing as the main architectural interest.


The Cyc walls allow for multitudes of pop-up urban moves and backdrop each new day.