Following the decline of the Catskills resorts, there was an abundance of extremely cheap and unused land in the Catskills Mountains which in the 1970s were bought by the Orthodox Jewish community of New York City as summer holiday homes. For 10 weeks each year, 100 000 Orthodox Jews migrate upstate to South Fallsburg which has a population of 2000.
Although they are an isolated community and do not intervene with the local affairs, there is a deep rooted tension between the Orthodox Jews and the existing community of South Fallsburg because they do not contribute to the local economy and are exempt from paying property taxes under the pretext that they live on religious grounds.
The project aims to redesign the holiday experience of the rapidly expanding Orthodox Jewish community in such a way as to reduce the tension between them and the local community. The drastic expansion and contraction of the town occurs in the 10 weeks the exisiting community moves out of town, having rented their property to the Orthodox Jews. In these 10 weeks, South Fallsburg is transformed at three levels: the scale of the existing bungalow communities through a prototype of a new bungalow colony; the scale of smaller clusters of buildings that are dispersed across the landscape; and the town scale of South Fallsburg, which transforms into an event town.
By the end of the 10 weeks, the town shrinks back into its original empty state, except for a facility, the swimming pool, for the residents of South Fallsburg to enjoy before winter.
