MA Design Research social media editor Jenny Morris spoke with Shanghai-based writer and D-CRIT alum Sarah Cox (class of 2011) for our Alumni Spotlight series. Sarah launched and wrote for Curbed Detroit for many years and now publishes a newsletter, The XOXOCOX.
What drove you to apply to D-Crit in the first place?
I have an undergraduate degree in architecture, but I was really not a practicing architect for any period after that. I was interested in D-Crit for the writing experience. It was topically aligned with what I was doing at the time and ended up leading to some interesting opportunities that put me in Detroit for about eight years after that.
How has your experience in the program affected your work since?
The nice part about the environment was being in a small studio. It was very collaborative and you knew the other people in the program really well. I went to a very big university for undergrad where you just didn’t know anybody. The most helpful thing I got out of it was the connections to faculty, which led to employment opportunities afterwards.
Was there content within the curriculum that you felt was specifically impactful for you?
Just generating so much writing in a short period of time. As things evolved, I didn’t end up writing about design as much as real estate, but there was sort of a pathway there. The idea that you can take a course and feel like an expert on something you didn’t know very much about 12 weeks earlier was helpful.
And what led you to Detroit specifically?
During the summer, I ended up going to Detroit and decided I wanted to use that for my thesis. I’d always been interested in real estate and after the financial crisis there was a lot of foreclosure. There was talk about rebuilding cities and urbanism, but I think a lot of it just missed the deep levels of poverty. You can talk about urbanism as much as you want, but you kind of have to solve poverty first. And so, I had this lens of looking at urbanism and design, but I think it ended up becoming much more about power and money, who controls real estate and finances, and how that affects what cities end up looking like.
How did that interest then turn into Curbed Detroit?
I was very focused on what was going on in this very misunderstood market. Detroit has such a strange relationship with its surrounding suburbs and the rest of the country as well. It’s interesting talking about this in 2021, because I don’t even know if I had the opportunity now, if I would do something like that, because so much of what I think Detroit media has tried to highlight in the last few years is Black people telling Black stories. It’s an 80% Black city and it’s important to give Detroiters and Black people the opportunity to control and participate in the narrative.
And now you’re in Shanghai?
My husband took a position in Shanghai. We’d been here for a month and people started to talk about Wuhan. We were like, “Oh, that’s weird. Where is Wuhan?” It was very confusing. At first it felt isolated, and then it was all of China. It’s an interesting cultural moment in China because no one can really visit. You’re either here or you’re not. And once you’re here, you kind of can’t leave.
How does this all tie in with your newsletter The XOXOCOX?
I am interested, I guess in a similar way to Detroit, how China is being portrayed to outsiders. No one can visit so I feel like these stories about what’s happening in China have a lot more weight when you can’t see a place in person.
Can you give an example of the content you are featuring in your newsletter?
The story I most recently sent out was about Chinese adoption. The U.S. used to be the biggest adopter of Chinese babies. Part of that was the one child policy until 2015. You could only have one child in China. Babies were abandoned or taken to orphanages, and then ultimately many were adopted by U.S. families. One of the effects of COVID is the borders are closed; so these foreigners that, in a normal situation, would fly in and pick up their adopted Chinese baby can’t get in. China’s huge international adoption industry has been completely paused. No one can adopt a Chinese child from outside of China right now.
Lastly, what advice would you offer the current crop of D-Crit students about to head out into the world?
The more you write — even stuff that you’re not really proud of or that doesn’t seem worthy — the better writer you will become. It’s about the opportunity to have deadlines, get feedback and generate more material in a very short amount of time, in a way that I otherwise wouldn’t have had. There’s also the pressure of feeling like, “Oh, my peers are going to read this.” It’s a collaborative environment where you get encouraging but helpful feedback.
Practice, practice, practice! Thank you, Sarah!
About SVA MA Design Research, Writing and Criticism
The SVA MA in Design Research, Writing and Criticism is a one-year, intensive MA program well suited to the circumstances of established professionals, in addition to graduates wishing to continue their studies at an advanced level. In providing the research tools and journalistic techniques for researching, analyzing, and critically interpreting design, the program amply prepares its graduates for future-facing careers in research-driven design practices and institutions, in journalism and publishing, or for continued studies in a design-related subject.
We are now accepting applications on a rolling basis. Successful candidates will be granted significant scholarships. Apply here.
Please contact us for more information at designresearch@sva.edu.
