St. Louis Science Center: GROW

Arcturis | St. Louis, Missouri

Architecture

Arcturis, a multi-faceted design company located in St. Louis, Missouri, was the commissioned firm for designing GROW which won an AIA Distinguished Award in 2017. Arcturis reached out and enlisted the Planetariums original architect, Gyo Obata, as a design consultant and partner on the project. The indoor pavilion itself is 5,000 sf and features an open floor plan to accommodate ever-changing exhibits, events, and experiences. The designated spaces for GROW encompass a full acre of indoor and outdoor learning spaces, activities and exhibits.

Theimpressivestructureisasimpleandformalgesture that was imagined in response to the task of creating a modern reflection Midwestern agricultural history. Prior to reading a description on stlouscnr.com, that the glulam structure ‘evokes the simplicity found in the profile of a scythe or a plow’, I had thought the form and structure of the pavilion had perhaps been designed to poetically describe our ’roots’ with the earth given the projects programming. Either way, this project serves as an inspiration to what I hope my own design is able to achieve architecturally and socially.