Reporting & photos by Ray Hu

Core77 is pleased to partner with Windows Phone to bring you a series of photo diaries this summer. Based on the theme of Reinvention, we're looking to capture the fleeting moments and highlight the often-overlooked facets of the world around us through the lens of the Nokia Lumia 928, especially in the low-light settings in which its camera excels. (All photos were taken with the Nokia Lumia 928 smartphone and are published without postproduction unless otherwise noted.)

It's beginning to look a lot like summer here in the New York—tourists and residents alike were certainly glad that the weather held up for Memorial Day after a freakishly cold start to last weekend. The holiday weekend also marks the beginning of the first beach season since Superstorm Sandy slammed the East Coast and ravaged much of the coastline where so many of us have fond memories of halcyon summers past. Indeed, the city has been making a concerted effort to restore the beloved recreational areas in the months since the hurricane struck last fall, and the New York Times recently chronicled the recovery effort in anticipation of the official reopening of Rockaway Beach.

MoMAPS1's VW Dome 2, a temporary event space across the street from the beach, will be open until June 30.

I'd been riding to Jamaica Bay / Rockaway Peninsula throughout the winter, and although the recovery process had started shortly after Sandy struck in late October, it was obvious that signs of devastation would persist for months, if not years (even now, front lawns across the peninsula are covered with a dusting of sand; ruins of now-demolished buildings are a blight on the main drag). I chanced upon the surreal transitional landscape at one point in the dead of the winter, but the area remains a work in progress—back in January, the Times noted that: "Parks officials caution that coming back from Hurricane Sandy is a marathon, not a sprint, and they vow that summer will arrive, as always, in the Rockaways. 'People will be able to use the beach,' Veronica White, the parks commissioner, said on a recent visit to the battered boardwalk. 'It won't be what it was or what it will be. But it will be pretty and safe.'"

I confirmed White's prognostication last weekend, when the pleasant weather all but demanded a bicycle ride. Although I mostly intended on conducting a bit of reconnaissance for future weekend excursions (and treat myself to a delicious pescado taco), I was pleasantly surprised to stumble upon a pair of newly-built pre-fab structures, adjacent to a freshly laid section of boardwalk. The ocean side of Shore Front Parkway has been a liminal construction zone since the storm, but these structures were so new that a Parks Department employee was on duty in lieu of lifeguards.

I doubt that the security guard would have been able to elaborate on the curious-looking twin edification, but it turns out that I had spoken to Brooklyn's Garrison Architects about their ambitious project just a few weeks prior, at the BKLYN Designs show. The pair of buildings at the end of Beach 96th St are the first two of 37 "permanent, steel-framed, modular structures," which will be distributed across the beaches of the Rockaways, Coney Island and Staten Island this summer. "Each structure will be elevated above grade to resist destruction by future storms."In order to meet such an aggressive design and construction schedule, the buildings and their components are designed as a system of modular elements. Both the modular chassis and the elements installed within and upon it are systematized, similar to the component approach of an automobile.

Prefabrication precluded potential weather delays and allowed the structures to be constructed concurrently with on-site foundation work.

Although I'd seen the balsa wood model on display at St. Ann's Warehouse, I find that maquettes, renderings, poster presentations, etc., inevitably look and feel hypothetical, so I was excited both to see the modules in real life and to have a cameraphone on hand to capture them against the picturesque backdrop of sea and sky.

The building down the way is rather more, um, functional.

Hopefully I'll be documenting more seaside revelry next time I head out there—I was disappointed to learn that Fort Tilden would not be reopening this summer, but I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of Rockaway peninsula improving over the next few weeks and months. And while I couldn't have asked for a nicer weather during my preliminary beach outing, the Lumia 928's camera is reportedly unmatched in low-light settings. We'll be putting it to test over the course of the summer, so stay tuned for more.

Answer the question "How will you reinvent yourself this summer?" and you could win $5,000: as part of the ongoing Reinvention series, Nokia Lumia 928 offers a chance to win a $5,000 Grand Prize. Enter the contest simply by commenting in the reply window below. Additionally, ten random winners will receive a Nokia Lumia 928 Phone per the rules of the sweepstakes.

Comment today as the sweeps ends on August 29th, 2013. You can view the sweepstakes details here.