Drop City is a legendary microcommunity, it is a model, and, ultimately, an abandoned project. Drop City fascinates me and endearingly it reminds me of where I live. It started in a frenzy, it attracted famous artists and musicians, but after its height slowly fell into decay. After five years, it was abandoned, but many of the original structures remain today.
Fueled by thoughts of the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Vietnam War, Drop City flourished. Domes were built for domestic purposes – a kitchen, living quarters, a theater – out of recycled products (for which they won the Buckminster Fuller’s Dymaxion award). Ideas thrived – reuse and solar power, drone and early electronic music, creative community. Many “happenings” happened.
Located in Southern Colorado, early in its history this “intentional community” was a close relation to utopia. Anyone and everyone was welcome, forever free and open. It was naive, but worked for a time.
“How do they survive?”
“They just do. Go live there a while and see for yourself.”
“Anybody can just go live there?”
“Anybody. Drop City is Utopia.”
“Don’t believe it,” Frinki said.
“I don’t believe it. Nobody believes in Utopia any more. At least not in Colorado.”
“Okay, it isn’t Utopia,” Kugo said. “Utopia’s got rules. Drop City doesn’t have any rules.”
“Up is down and down is up. Isn’t that right, Kugo? And the tooth fairy leaves Thai sticks under everybody’s pillow.”
But with notoriety comes problems. The founders, the original artists, eventually got burned out and moved onto other projects. People eventually began coming to Drop City not to contribute, but to take away, looking for fulfillment. The land was sold, most of the domes dismantled, but the model continues.
These structures – community, openness, cultural cannibalism – persist into our present. Can projects or ideas persist beyond its founding generation? Should they?