Glenn McKerracher

This design research project frames a Social Factory within the centre of Cumbernauld, removing centralised identity and facilitating the production of a generic mental state within its boundary wall as an industrialisation of the central plane. The productive output of the factory aligns with the three influences of the generic self; the mental, the built and the technological. Generic thought produced via an Edu Factory, generic buildings produced from a Typology Factory and surveillance capitalism generated within a Data Factory. These three lines of production combine to form a Social Factory.

The condemned town centre of Cumbernauld will form the backdrop to provoke the questions set out within the project, an initial laboratory with intentions of further expansion to every large town and city within the central belt. An inhabited wall acts as a boundary to retain the functions of the Social Factory within the generic city centre, sharpening the distinction between factory and society. This serves as a tangible manifestation of societal industrialization, encapsulating the intertwined influences of social dynamics, the built environment, and technological advancements on contemporary urban experiences.