Adele Ardrey was raised in the Appalachian Foothills of South-Eastern Ohio. The values ingrained in her during those formative years inevitably shaped her point of view as a designer. While exploring topics for her senior thesis project, her appreciation for traditional crafts, cottage industry work, and the histories of people and places eventually led her to reach out to community-based cultural worker Jess Lamar Reece Holler. Jess is the Program Director of the Marion Voices Folklife + Oral History Program at the Marion County Historical Society & Principal of Caledonia Northern Folk Studios: a cultural art, social justice, & historic preservation capacity-building consultancy based in Caledonia Ohio. After learning that Caledonia Northern Folk Studios was fundraising to rehabilitate their 1897 Temple & Masonic Block Building — as a model community project for historic preservation & grassroots downtown revitalization, Adele saw an opportunity to leverage her thesis project to learn from and contribute to a compelling (& real) cause. Following graduation, Adele will be returning to Columbus to reunite with the inspiring Studio Black Ink team.

My Senior Thesis

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