What do Pigs, Fish and Humans Have in Common? Millet.
Academic (GSAPP)
CORE I - Fall 2025
Project Duration: 4 Weeks
Instructor: Andrea Chiney (A+A+A)
Location: Christopher St Pier, NYC
Project Type: Agroecology / Food Futures
01 Diagram of Building Systems for Resource Capture and Distribution (Left) and Axonometric of Design on Site (Right)
How can we re-imagine the uses of NYC's piers as spaces of food production?
As agriculture remains heavily reliant on climate, the challenges posed by climate change and rising sea levels leave global food systems increasingly vulnerable.
By harnessing the interdependent relationships between millet, pigs, fish, and humans, it creates a cyclical, self-sustaining system, paving the way for future food security. This proposal envisions a floating farm that reintroduces farming to urban waterfronts, centred on millet—a climate-resilient crop.
02
Mutually Beneficial relationship Diagram between Pigs, Fish, Humans and Millet
As I developed my research I came across a symbiotic relationship which my ancestors found between millet and pigs that have been practiced for more than 5000 years which fed societies in Northern China and contributed to their development.
So my proposal is an architectural translation of this network of relationships between human and non-humans in this ecosystem: including pigs, fish, plankton, birds and most importantly millet. This network is self-sustaining and renewable, with the feeding of millet crop residue to pigs and the fertilisation of millet fields with pig waste. Millet residue can be used to fertilise the fish ponds, which when it decomposes creates nutrients for plankton which serve as food for fish. The millet is food for humans and birds.
03 Section Through Proposal
04 Render of Pig’s Feeding Columns
05 Render of Second Floor: Pig’s Garden
06 Render of Millet Farm
07 Floor Plans
08 Initial Design Concept Sketches