Exploring The Understory — a space for curiosity
What if a library had a basement—not just physically, but philosophically? Or even metaphorically? What if that space wasn’t about productivity or academic performance, but about discovery, drift, and depth?
I’ve been working on a new thought experiment called The Understory. It’s not a plan or a model—it’s a provocation. A kind of fictional manifesto. A proposal wrapped in narrative, about what libraries could become if we paused to reflect on what we’ve lost—or perhaps what we’re losing.
It asks: what’s disappearing, socially and culturally, as we’ve focused on making everything more findable, usable, and streamlined? In our pursuit of access and efficiency, what happened to the friction of the unexpected—the jolt of discovery? As information formats and interfaces have evolved to optimize for speed, convenience, and engagement metrics, have we flattened the very texture that once made learning, art, and culture feel alive, surprising, and deeply human?
I’ve played a role in designing and advocating for learning commons models, and I still believe deeply in their value. But lately, I’ve been reflecting on the current moment. In our pursuit of openness and functionality, have we unintentionally lost something textured, communal, rebellious, and quietly generative? Have our polished spaces, in striving to be welcoming, user-centered, and efficient, erased a sense of mystery and intellectual intrigue?
The Understory emerged as a response to these questions—a way of imagining what might live beneath the surface of our current designs, waiting to be found.
This piece is a reflection on that missing layer—on curiosity, presence, and the need for spaces that invite slowness, creativity, and self-directed inquiry. I consider it an art project.
You can read it here:
On the Craft
I’m trying to document and share more about the creative process. This is a look behind the scenes.
I wasn’t planning to write The Understory. It emerged suddenly—part reflection on the current political climate, part nostalgia for coming of age in the early ’90s, just before the web took over and Nirvana broke through. That stretch between 1992 and 2025 feels like a cultural flip: we’ve gained so much in terms of access, but we’ve also lost something—texture, friction, surprise—in how information, art, and ideas are produced, discovered, and shared.
These bifocal thoughts had been swirling in my head, and one Friday evening I started writing. I kept typing late into the night. The next morning, I was up before sunrise, at it again. Before I knew it, the weekend had passed, and a draft had emerged—written in a kind of creative haze. Writers sometimes talk about the muse or the spirit that moves through you in the creative act. This felt like that. Urgent. I knew if I didn’t get it out that weekend, the moment would vanish.
I sent that draft to my friend Tara, who always reviews my initial versions with challenging marginalia. While she was engaging with the text, I worked on the appendix. The following weekend, I edited and designed the document you see here. I taught myself Canva, trying to create a layout that captured the tone I felt while writing. I used Midjourney to help with visuals. I had intended to use my own photos from years of exploring nature and architecture, but they didn’t quite fit the mood.
I shared a visual draft with Tara and with my friend Kimberly, who’s a legit designer. Kimberly encouraged me to be more provocative with the visuals; Tara nudged me deeper into the metaphor of the understory foliage. Their feedback helped shape the final version.
Essentially, this piece came together over two weekends. It was mentally draining, but I’m happy with the result. More than anything, though, I’m grateful for the creative experience itself. Yes, there’s a PDF and a concept—but what mattered most was the act of making it: the writing, the design, the immersion.
I’m trying to let myself work this way more often. For years, I’ve labored over ideas slowly—letting them simmer, build, and circle for months, sometimes years. But recently, I’ve been experimenting with spontaneity—challenging myself to start and finish projects within days. There’s something raw and powerful in that kind of immediacy.
And as I get older, I feel a growing desire to share more—quickly, fully, and across a wider range of formats.
This isn’t a polished essay or a research article. It’s not a program statement, assessment, or new model. It’s a vibe, a gesture, a narrative offering. A work-in-progress that I found necessary to share. As I said, it’s an art project.
Oh, and I also made a Spotify playlist—because sometimes you need a soundtrack.
One Last Thing
I grew up in a city with a surprising number of small, independent bookshops. I remember my senior year of high school, discovering Camus’ The Stranger in one of them. The cover was strange—almost unsettling. It had these eerie, clown-like faces that had nothing to do with the plot but captured a mood I couldn’t forget. That paperback lingered in my room for months before I opened it—not for school, but because I felt compelled. I didn’t fully understand the novel, but it opened something in me: absurdism, existentialism—the idea that stories could be disorienting and meaningful at the same time.
Years later, I saw a reissue of The Stranger with a minimalist white cover—clean, geometric, modern. It’s elegant in its own way, I guess, but it doesn’t haunt. It doesn’t provoke. That original version pulled me in with its weirdness, its refusal to explain itself. It felt like an artifact from another world. The newer one feels more like a product. Interchangeable with any other book. The difference says something about how design, even at the level of a book cover, reflects cultural shifts—toward clarity, toward polish, away from friction and ambiguity.
1970’s vs 2000’s
I tried to channel that spirit in The Understory, especially through some of the avant-garde spatial designs. They’re not meant to be models, or even something to literally build. They’re prompts—meant to stir a feeling, to disrupt expectations, to challenge the status quo just a bit.
Perhaps this is also a quiet commentary on the flattening of the library commons. Increasingly, the designs and spaces—once distinctive, even a little strange—now feel somewhat interchangeable. More product than artifact. That’s not a criticism—we do what we can to build, renovate, and move our programs forward. But I suppose I miss the sense of artistry from those earlier days.
Bonus image that didn’t make it into the paper, but still, lovely.
After reading The Stranger I remember talking with a friend who was deep into the Beat poets at the time, while I was wandering into existential theatre and fiction. We spent hours walking downtown, sharing ideas, chasing tangents, and surprising each other. I left those conversations feeling energized, curious, and oddly hopeful. (I could never get into the Beats though.)
That’s part of what I’m trying to honor with The Understory. Not just the content or the concept, but the experience—the spark of creative discovery. The feeling of being changed by a book, a space, or a conversation. I don’t want people to lose that.
In higher ed and librarianship, most of what we write is meant to prove something, critique something, or outline a new initiative. It’s often about making a case—for or against AI, advocating for open research practices, arguing for a new service model, or experimenting with a certain pedagogical framework. And that work matters.
But with The Understory, I wanted to do something different. To blur the lines between essay and narrative, between a provocation and a possibility. To create something that doesn’t fit neatly into any category. Something that honors the creative impulse itself and hopefully challenges you a bit.
