Tidal Materialities: Place through Time and Making An Exploration of Coastal Wrack as a Regenerative Architectural Material in Atlantic Canada
This thesis explores washed-ashore seaweed as a regenerative material for architectural thinking and making in Atlantic Canada. Situated within growing concerns about climate change, material extraction, and the environmental impacts of construction, the research asks how coastal wrack might be understood not as waste, but as a material with spatial, ecological, and cultural potential. Through field encounters along Atlantic shorelines, hands-on material exploration, and reflections on locality, the study examines seaweed’s changing qualities across conditions of tide, weather, and decay. These investigations are grounded in direct observation and low-energy making processes, revealing seaweed as a material that takes form through exposure, duration, and locality. Rather than seeking full standardization, the thesis works with variability as a design condition. The resulting design responses translate these material findings into architectural propositions that foreground care, temporality, and alternative approaches to regenerative material practice.
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