noah resnick currently teaches and practices in Detroit, Michigan. He is the Director of Graduate Architecture at the University of Detroit Mercy, and a founding principal of uRbanDetail, an intimate research based architecture and urban design studio that operates under the interrelated concepts of the architectonics of multiple scales; the architect as urban collaborator; and the architect as community builder.

Noah earned his BArch from the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, and completed his Masters of Science in Architecture Studies (SMarchS) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the Architecture + Urbanism stream. In addition to Detroit, Noah has lived and practiced in Chicago, Boston, and New York, as well as Berlin, Germany where he worked in the studio of Daniel Libeskind.

Noah’s work, his writings, and his firm have been featured in various international design publications, radio programs, and digital media.

professional portfolio
teaching portfolio

One concept at the core of our practice is to accept architecture as a predominantly collaborative endeavor. We appreciate that our design efforts can only be manifested as architecture through an engagement with those who will engineer, construct, finance, and use the project. In addition, collaborating on each project provides clients with the most flexible, successful project team for any given project scale, budget or schedule.

uRbanDetail’s firm, projects, and/or research have been published in the following media outlets:

March 2011 / New Hampshire NPR:
Good Design - Word of Mouth
March 2011 / Graham Foundation Panel Discussion:
The Power of Pro Bono Architecture
December 2010 / THE PLAN:
"Roosevelt Park Master Plan"
November 2010 / The Detroit News:
"Roosevelt Park Gets Some TLC"
November 2010 / rogueHAA.com:
"URBAN ARTSCAPE: A (Re) Generation Strategy"
July 2010 / PLACES: Design Observer:
"Detroit: Syncopating an Urban Landscape"
April 2010 / rogueHAA.com:
Artist X : Noah Resnick

1351 joliet place / detroit mi 48207
noahresnick@urban-detail.com

In engaging architecture and urbanism, our Detroit design firm, uRbanDetail, intends not only to design and research spaces on an urban scale, but also to construct the details of the city at the scale of the body. We strive to create wholistic environments, both physical and cultural, for humans to exist, inhabit, and transgress. This is accomplished at a multiplicity of scales, with a diverse set of research and design tools, and the proper balance between theory and practical knowledge. Focused on the conditions inherent in an urban fabric, our professional process allows us to operate under four central concepts: The architectonics of scale, the architect as collaborator, the architect as community builder, and design through research.
 

SLOWS 2 Go / detroit mi

Slows To Go is the carry-out version of Slows Barbecue, one of the most successful and trendy restaurants in the city of Detroit. Located on the Cass Corridor in Mid-town, the 2000 sq ft public lobby and carry-out counter is accompanied by a 4000 sq ft commercial catering kitchen and commissary, all housed within a renovated one story limestone and brick structure built in 1926. All of the wood utilized in the interior finish and entry vestibule was harvested from a condemned structure not far from the site. While the exterior of the project strictly adheres to national preservation standards – allowing it to receive federal historic tax-credits – the interior provides a strikingly contemporary and vibrant atmosphere that is more revealing of the attitudes of both client and clientele.

 

roosevelt park / detroit mi

(in collaboration with tadd heidgerken, architect)
The vision for Roosevelt Park, in the Corktown neighborhood of Detroit, is one that would transform a blighted city property into a sustainable public space providing a range of amenities to serve the local neighborhood on a daily basis, as well as offer a regional attraction by hosting planned musical, cultural, gastronomic, and athletic events. The designers seek to leverage and coordinate disparate volunteering and funding efforts that are abundant throughout the city. On a pro-bono basis, and with the direction of local non-profits and community members, the designers propose an open framework intended to evolve as community interaction with the park defines its program. This framework can be defined as an organizational system within which a series of incremental community-based programmatic interventions are deployed over a number of years. While the city government is unable to give financial support, they both approved and encouraged the initiative, as it dovetails into the Parks and Recreation Department’s mission. In an effort to develop a comprehensive program for the park ‘master plan’ that balances these desires, a constant dialogue with the community is maintained through planned civic events and the documentation and publication of the design process. The ‘Master Plan’, as such, does not take the form of an explicit document, to be executed over a set period of time, according to a linear sequence of construction benchmarks. The design instead consists of an adaptable, narrative, non-linear phasing plan that reacts to this framework. The four overlapping phases of the park’s development- Revealing Program, Demarcation, Claiming Community Territory, and Suturing- all represent specific land-use and construction strategies that will facilitate the insertion of park elements on a seasonal, annual, and permanent basis. Some of these programmatic elements include an amphitheater, skate plaza, and athletic courts. Each of these overarching principles will interact to create a public amenity that can attract visitors from all over the metro-region, while simultaneously empowering the local community to take control of their urban space Temporary landscape interventions have been built by community volunteers that serve as both a fund-raising tool and a prelude to the future permanent park.