In light of several factors — an ailing global economy and the United States’ less-than-stellar reputation with the rest of the world, for starters — the U.S. Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale this year (opening August 29) has taken a decidedly different approach than in years past. Called “Spontaneous Interventions: Design Actions for the Common Good,” it eschews the model of exhibiting a handful of grandiose, starchitect-designed wonders, and has instead opted for a more democratic presentation: 124 projects by self-empowered citizens whom you’ve likely never heard of, who take it upon themselves to alter their built environment to serve their communities’ immediate needs. It was only fitting, then, that the Pavilion’s layout would try to follow suit.

This year’s design, a collaborative effort between commissioner and curator Cathy Lang Ho, Brooklyn-based architectural firm Freecell, and Berkeley, California-based graphic designers MAD, aims to actively engage its viewers by taking a similarly democratic tone. A kinetic installation of 124 banners, each bearing an image and description of the urban architectural projects being presented, hangs from the ceiling of the galleries. In the empowering spirit of the exhibition, viewers are meant to reach up, pull them down, and interact with them on their own level.

“We’re asking the participants to do something, to change something about this gallery,” Freecell designer John Hartmann told ARTINFO.  “In our minds, historic halls and castles always hung these flags out of reach. The point of the exhibition is that so many people invent or alter the urbanscape with their hands, without sponsorship.” As Ho requested, the walls of the four galleries of the American Pavilion will be free of clutter — the exhibition takes place mainly on the ceiling and on the ground. Below, a MAD-designed graphic timeline lines the floor: In 1792, the U.S. dollar was introduced; 1852 marks the birth of the modern elevator. The graphic marks milestones in civil rights, mechanical inventions, politics, transportation, and communication that fueled the rise of the American city.

Outside, as a welcome respite from the text-heavy, conceptually weighty exhibition, Brooklyn’s Interboro architects will provide Commonplace, an outdoor living room for viewers to rest their weary heels. Playing on the Biennale’s “Common Ground” theme, Interboro designed a raised, outdoor living room (a concept they’re familiar with, having installed a similar hip outdoor hangout for MoMA PS1’s 2011 Warm-Up courtyard) that riffs on the idea of the ‘70s conversation pit — as well as Venice’s annual high tides.

In Venice each year, the water rises, and city’s solution is to install a simple system of metal tables with wooden planks that citizens cross without getting their feet wet, according to Interboro principal Tobias Armborst. “We saw that system and thought it was a really easy way to create a platform,” he told ARTINFO, and so the firm borrowed that infrastructure for the show. They’ll fill the pit it forms with retro-orange cubes, firm enough for sitting, but light enough for architecturally-inclined children to use as building blocks (see the image above). At the end of the exhibition, the city plans to pack up all the parts and put them to their own use, giving the blocks to the Italian children in Venice’s playgrounds. 

The Venice Architectural Biennale runs from August 29 through November 25.