The New School campus is scattered among ten blocks across Lower Manhattan where the street and avenue grid imposed on Manhattan Island in 1811 marches north. The grid was a pragmatic decision to parcel the island into rectangular units that could be sold for commercial and residential development. Through the architecture of any urban block, especially in a dense and dynamic city such as New York, we can witness centuries of social, natural and technological change. The New School itself has built a campus over the last century within ten blocks in Lower Manhattan, often adapting older commercial structures. This seminar, through archival and field work, investigates the architecture, social life, and ecology of common Lower Manhattan blocks. The past serves as a blueprint for future social and ecological adaptation and change. Common is used to mean both “ordinary”, but also what we share “in common”. The seminar assumes that the study of the common architecture, social life, and ecology of the block as a whole is better situated to address issues such as pandemics, equity, and climate resilience than individual buildings bounded by property. Rather than locked in 19th century Victorian cells, the course asks you to imagine a more open and common future based on our common past.