Uploaded April 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Meet “Making Home—Smithsonian Design Triennial” participant La Vaughn Belle, a multidisciplinary artist whose work focuses on the often-forgotten colonial narratives embedded in the architecture and material culture of contemporary society.
For the entryway to the museum, Belle designed “The House That Freedoms Built,” three structures inspired by the shapes of 18th-century houses built by formerly enslaved people who negotiated their freedom and were allowed to settle in Christiansted, Saint Croix.
The architectural embellishment known as fretwork adorning each structure is a nod to homes in the town of Frederiksted. The community was the site of the 1878 Fireburn rebellion, an important labor revolt that resulted in much of the town being destroyed. Residents added these fretwork designs to their houses during Frederiksted’s reconstruction.
Belle’s work is on view in “Making Home” at Cooper Hewitt through August 2025.
Meet “Making Home—Smithsonian Design Triennial” participant La Vaughn Belle, a multidisciplinary artist whose work focuses on the often-forgotten colonial narratives embedded in the architecture and material culture of contemporary society.
For the entryway to the museum, Belle designed “The House That Freedoms Built,” three structures inspired by the shapes of 18th-century houses built by formerly enslaved people who negotiated their freedom and were allowed to settle in Christiansted, Saint Croix.
The architectural embellishment known as fretwork adorning each structure is a nod to homes in the town of Frederiksted. The community was the site of the 1878 Fireburn rebellion, an important labor revolt that resulted in much of the town being destroyed. Residents added these fretwork designs to their houses during Frederiksted’s reconstruction.
Belle’s work is on view in “Making Home” at Cooper Hewitt through August 2025.
