Yilan (Elaine) Chen , BFA'25 Death Rehearsal, a traveling exhibition allowing attendees to experience the loss of a loved one through immersive performance. Entering in intimate pairs, visitors soon separate into spaces whose lighting and furnishings encourage the act of facing. Finally, all reunite on a deflating floor, drawn together into a shared resting place. Thesis advisor: Alexander Schweder #prattint2025book #prattint2025bookbfa #pratt_sod #prattshows2025 #PrattGrad25 @prattinstitute @pratt_sod

Hannah Hemmerly, MFA'25 The Language of Home: The Domestic Sphere Through The Lens Of Design Magazines By examining interior design editorial literature from the 20th - 21st century, this thesis examines the representation of domestic design in media and its impact on the meaning of “home.” It advocates a personalized, layered, interior language; the intersections of material culture, media and value systems embedded in domestic objects. Thesis advisor: Nina Freedman #prattint2025book #prattint2025bookmfa #pratt_sod #prattshows2025 #PrattGrad25 @prattinstitute @pratt_sod

Guofang Liao, BFA'25 Bridging Generations In response to the disconnect between generations in Chinatown, this project re-imagines Columbus Park’s pavilion as a cultural hub. By weaving in traditional Chinese practices like matchmaking, storytelling, and skill-sharing, the design fosters inter-generational interaction, strengthens community ties, and creates a contemporary space for shared learning and connection. Thesis advisor: Calvert Wright #prattint2025book #prattint2025bookbfa #pratt_sod #prattshows2025 #PrattGrad25 @prattinstitute @pratt_sod

Beixin Lin, BFA'25 This thesis envisions a Chinese-American fusion restaurant in Long Island City, NYC, as a spatial intervention honoring dual cultural identities. Through symbolic elements and thoughtful spatial planning, it creates a collective “home” that reconnects Chinese Americans with their heritage, invites broader communities to engage, and fosters shared belonging and dialogue. Thesis advisor: Calvert Wright #prattint2025book #prattint2025bookbfa #pratt_sod #prattshows2025 #PrattGrad25 @prattinstitute @pratt_sod

Rachel Park, BFA'25 Order Lab asserts that unwanted belongings stored inertly can have their purposefulness restored by housing them in motion. This redesign of an existing storage facility near Wall Street replaces lockers with conveyors that drift unwanted objects away. Customers can also take and restore desirability into items flowing along this current. Thesis advisor: Alexander Schweder #prattint2025book #prattint2025bookbfa #pratt_sod #prattshows2025 #PrattGrad25 @prattinstitute @pratt_sod

Hanna Zheng, BFA'25 ReStyle Reality This hetero-topic fashion store exists simultaneously in three realities, connecting users at home, in-store, and in virtual spaces through holographic technology. Digital twins enable instant teleportation and trying clothes virtually. The architecture defies physical constraints with floating floors, perspective- shifting mirrors, and voyeuristic level gaps, transforming everyone into both observer and observed while blurring physical-digital boundaries. Thesis advisor: John Nafziger #prattint2025book #prattint2025bookbfa #pratt_sod #prattshows2025 #PrattGrad25 @prattinstitute @pratt_sod

Quanye Zhou, BFA'25 Tuija Community Center In the heartbeat of New York City, where steel and glass tower over stories untold, this design rises as a love letter to the Tujia people of central China, a community carrying mountains in their hands. The timber joints of their ancestral homes, once shaped to cradle valleys and storms, now whisper through this space: a marketplace where hands carve memories into wood, a hall where laughter echoes like rivers in Hunan, and workshops where elders and children stitch time itself. Thesis advisor: John Nafziger #prattint2025book #prattint2025bookbfa #pratt_sod #prattshows2025 #PrattGrad25 @prattinstitute @pratt_sod

Jieqi Chen, BFA'25 Pier 40 Recreating Pier 40 as a cognitive playground, this project explores how everyday acts of play can become powerful tools for mental fitness. Movement, perception, and interaction activate the brain beyond entertainment, re-framing play as an essential practice for sustaining cognitive vitality in daily life. By embedding mental stimulation into spatial experience, the design redefines wellness as a joyful, continuous engagement. Thesis advisor: Calvert Wright #prattint2025book #prattint2025bookbfa #pratt_sod #prattshows2025 #PrattGrad25 @prattinstitute @pratt_sod

Jiawen (Gaven) Yu, MFA’25 SPATIAL COSTUME: Space Meets Body, Body Meets Space This thesis explores identity transformation and empowerment through sensory engagement with space, inspired by mythological feminine villains. Drawing from the performing arts, it proposes that extreme costuming can inform spatial design that interacts with the body to evoke bold personal expression. Thesis advisor: Nina Freedman @ga_xxix #prattint2025book #prattint2025bookmfa #pratt_sod #prattshows2025 #PrattGrad25 @prattinstitute @pratt_sod