The Critical Zones studio looks back 450 million years ago to the formation of a geological fault now barely visible, which today separates two distinct regions: the Scottish Highlands and the Lowlands. The Highland Boundary Fault is a complex structure, it evidences deep geological time spans and is a physical record of environmental and climate change. Journeying through time, we collectively investigated the geodiversity of the Highland Boundary Fault zone. Written in the rocks, landforms and soils, are stories of ancient collisions and eruptions, changing climates, how ecologies have evolved and how water and ice have continuously sculpted landscapes to the present day.

Taking into account social and environmental fractures, points of tension and upheaval, interdimensional readings made from within the fault zone enabled students to define their own zones in need of critical attention, care and action.