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This book is dedicated to a wonderful educator and friend, Lisa Arnett,

my mother Mary Southwell

and all additional inspirational women in my life.

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Megan Culp Master of Architecture Graduate Student Fall 2014 to Spring 2015 Ball State University College of Architecture and Planning Major Advisor Minor Advisor

Janice Shimizu-Coggeshall Pamela Harwood

Content 7 ............................................................................................................................................ Abstract 11 .............................................................................................................. Final Project Proposal 15 ............................................................................................................................ Methodologies 17 .......................................................................................................................................... Interview Literature Review

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Programmatic Design

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Design Strategy Precedents

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Site Research and Documentation

46 ................................................................................................... Site Inventory and Analysis 54 ..................................................................................................................................

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Usergroups

Materiality Examination

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Design Concept

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...................................................................................................................................... Ascension

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....................................................................................................................................... Edgeness

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....................................................................................................................................... Focal Lens

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...................................................................................................................................... Conclusion

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.................................................................................................................................. Bibliography 5

Abstract Architecture has the ability to accentuate the human experience and direct the perception of our human condition to new agendas. Such a design opportunity exists in conversations today about how the youngest generation is becoming disconnected with the complexity of human-kind’s dependency on our natural environment. Robert Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods, narrates the current situation of children’s nature-deficit disorder and how the built environment is severely lacking a crucial perception of place in nature. Architects can engage this problem and help children’s interactions with nature contribute to the larger dialogue about sustainability and reframing the conversation in a more approachable, tangible and exciting manner.

this suspended space in the junction of earth and sky at the horizon. This reflectance increases our awareness of the value of the earth and also the value of our perception of the celestial sphere and the stories it has to offer in the context of the universe.

An investigation is merited to learn how architecture can accentuate and frame our perception of our position in the world. As humans, we are creatures of the earth but our minds desire to dwell of a larger contextual situation and the applicability of the celestial sphere to our condition. Anyone who has looked up at night and witnessed the band of the Milky Way splayed across the sky can attest to the momentous re-contextualization of their own selfawareness. Architecture can create this moment of pause, allowing us to breathe and reflect internally in

By utilizing architecture as a nature-play landscape suspended in the natural horizon between the vastness of the sky and the foundation of the earth, we create a specific location with the capacity to pass down principles of stewardship. These architectural forms can be refined to specific outdoor activities of discovery and classroom discussions in order to reinstate an important relationship between children and nature, along with a renewed curiosity for individuals engaged in the choreography of teaching through the lens of this tool.

In regards to architecture, the terrestrial and celestial sphere collide in what we perceive as our horizon. This is the datum to which all program rises and falls into place and time. Spaces that blend the celestial and terrestrial sphere should celebrate a multi-sensory journey with a choreographed experience moving across land and looking not only at nature up close at the micro scale, but also to the distance at the macro scale and with borrowed landscapes.

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Image from History of Information.com

Astronomer Camille Flammarion’s L’atmosphère: météorologie populaire serves as an important artifact in man’s preoccupation with exploring the earth’s horizon and relationship beween earth and sky.

An inscription underneath the image tells the story of the man pictured.

A missionary of the Middle Ages

tells that he had found the point where the sky and the Earth touch 9

Final Project Proposal Design Critera

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his proposal will provide a play landscape that is suspended in a natural horizon between the vastness of the sky and foundation of the earth. This venue will celebrate the human experience of exploring our perception of meaning to what connects us to the earth and to the sky.

The venue will have a specific interest in prompting natureplay activities for children. This intention allows the program to facilitate the discovery and practice of imagination in children while curbing the side effects of Richard Louv’s “nature-deficit disorder” diagnosis on today’s children.

By guiding the young generation in this manner, all visitors, regardless of age, will benefit from the therapeutic qualities of nature, along with instilling a renewed awareness of the earth’s preciousness.

Qualities that this proposal will take into design must involve providing opportunities for an encompassing and engaging interaction with nature, utilizing the five senses of touch, taste, sound, sight, and smell. Concentrated transitions and contrasts of light and darkness will help facilitate a narrative throughout the venue pertaining to the ebb and flow of nature’s cyclical behavior. This can be accomplished through a gradient of permeability of the building’s envelope in response to the site’s location to the four cardinal directions.

architectural framing. Capturing a view of the sky that might frame the migratory patterns of birds would instill a sense of passing of time throughout the year. Choosing flowering plants or trees that blossom incrementally and individually from one another will promise the landscape will be constantly renewed and blossoming.

This proposal will provide a play landscape that is suspended in a natural horizon between the vastness of the sky and foundation of the earth... ...It will celebrate the human experience of exploring our perception of what connects us to the earth and to the sky.

Finally, emphasizing the design to the celebration of the topographical horizon will activate one’s sense of relation to the earth and sky simultaneously. This is the origin from which any architecturally significant moves will be grounded upon. One’s awareness to the horizon line will provide a constant medium to which all activities will relate. Precedent studies highlight examples of successful architectural strategies that celebrate the horizon line as an integral part of an architect’s design.

The materiality will include tangible materials common to the human scale, such as stone and wood, along with the possibility of durable textiles as a way to activate the perception of air and wind to facilitate transitioning to the sky.

To ensure that returning users are exposed to a new experience upon every visit, specific detail will be paid to capturing the complex changes of nature during four seasonal changes. In this way, a large variety of natural cycles will be easily distinguishable through means of

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Ground Condition The blending of landscape and architectural form is essential for any successful architectural project. At minimum, the site in the immediate proximity to an installation should blend and synchronize so the two are co-dependent and seamless. This establishes credibility and dignity to the form. Otherwise, the building will be read by user groups as intrusive, foreign, and unresponsive to their needs and the context of the property that is bestowed to the developer/architect.

This is not to say that the architectural form or style must match the immediate context of nearby or regional buildings, but it must at least engage the ground plane of the site that it has been bestowed. To provide anything less is a breach of trust between the user group/community and the developer/architect.

Materiality The materiality of any building should magnify and celebrate local materials, whenever it is practical to the budget and program. The current generation, specifically millennials, find themselves in a wide-spread identity crisis, with no social movement or significant unifying crisis that they are willing to solve outright as a whole.

By infusing local materials that are native to a project site, architects can assist in this issue by providing inspiring spaces that remind user groups of their geographical origins and quickly initiates conversations from foreign locations outside the local network.

Some of these conversations are born out of architectural historianism and exist from celebrating the existing architecture of the past, such as downtown revitalization programs, but a more influential power would be to source the tactile materials of local quarries, sustained forests,

and other resources of a region into the tectonics of today’s built environment to identify a specific period in our time of being more sustainably conscious.

Native materiality also embodies one of many answers to help curb the ill-effects that have arrive in our world today borne out of degradational choices of the past; pollution, foreign imports, suburban sprawl, dependence on fossil fuels, and car-oriented urban planning.

These and many more, including climate change, all make up a unifying issue that today’s generations will need to solve or suffer underneath in the coming decades. Architecture can become a learning tool in this process and the artifacts that it leaves behind in the built environment will be a statement to this generation’s efforts to find answers.

Duality of Light and Dark Since this project is emphasizing nighttime sky exploration, it is only accurate to specify it will be designed with consciousness of light pollution; both emitted upwards from the site and also parallel to the ground plane. As should be true with any architectural form, regardless of its’ location in urban or rural context, a building should emit the smallest amount of visible light possible for evening programmatic requirements.

Designers, developers, and city planners should adopt the requirements of the International Dark-Sky Association Program Criteria as a guide to designing buildings that want to be conscious of their light pollution emission. While not every project will be suited to meet all requirements for a completely complacent project, there are methods that surpass the efficiency of the current typical apathetic move of specifying correct luminaire shades on a site’s out-lying parking lamp posts.

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Methodologies Methodologies implemented to procure the proper credibility to the final project proposal will involve interpretive-historical research and qualitative research. The former consists of components of a literature review casting a wide net over topics such as narrative architecture, components of childhood behavior, nature play, and aspects of astronomy’s culture, both scientific and amateur astronomers.

The latter, qualitative research, will involve producing original information through precise selection and contact with individuals of both the educational and science fields.

A primary informant will be Professor Ronald Kaitchuck, Director of the Ball State University Observatory and Planetarium.

According to Architectural Research Methods by Linda Groat, “qualitative research deals in the interpretation of contemporary situations,” (Groat, 88). In this way, the researcher becomes the tool or ruler upon which the existing conditions of a situation are measured.

Along with interviews, qualitative research will be gathered using observational techniques; recording first-hand how children interact with nature-play environments at a venue utilized by the Head Start Center in Muncie, Indiana.

Thick description of phenomenon between nature and humans will capture small, hidden truths about how impressionable both forms are upon one another. This will be conducted through material studies exposed to long periods of exterior conditions and documenting the weathering of a material’s aesthetic qualities.

Observational research will be conducted while assisting at the Indiana Academy Archi-works workshop in Muncie, Indiana. The program provides a one-week workshop with children from grades kindergarten to sixth grade. In this workshop children are exposed to methods in which architects create drawings and models for the design of buildings. The workshop will also facilitate studentled projects in which each child has a chance at learning the techniques of drawing and interpreting spaces first-hand as they produce presentation materials narrating their own solutions to design problems.

Using the framework of this workshop, children’s solutions to a specific design challenge will be documented and interpreted as a primary source of explaining how children perceive spaces that they deem acceptable of “play”. The program for which they will be asked to design will be sited at Heekin Park in Muncie, Indiana. The design criteria will ask the child-designer to make an intervention that will create a renewed activation of an exterior space. Their response will be an altruistic perception of what a child deems as spatial qualities that create a sense of “play” activities.

Observing and documenting the work produced by the Indiana Academy workshop will facilitate a rich understanding of how children think of themselves in relation to nature. Example findings might show that children hate to get dirty from dirt or perhaps it will show that children enjoy a hierarchy of spaces at different heights at which to observe the world from up above like an adult. Such conclusions will help inform the design of an appropriate play landscape.

Simulation activity with children to test the effectiveness of design of Nature Play Pavilion at Muncie, Indiana’s Head Start Program in 2014.

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2014 Opening Program at Charles Brown Planetarium Ball State University

Interview with Ball State University Observatory Director, Ronald Kaitchuck The goal of the interview with Professor Ronald Kaitchuck was to gain a working insight into the basic necessities and functions to running a public observatory, specifically one in the Midwest. His involvement with Ball State University’s Cooper Science building is substantially divided among procuring materials for the planetarium, hosting community star-gazing events using the facility’s observatory equipment, and administering to local chapters of amateur astronomers. Along with these consistent projects, Professor Kaitchuck is a large contributor to the ongoing expansion of astronomy research and opportunities for science majors to connect with remote observatories around the world.

Since his appointment as Director, Kaitchuck has been greatly involved with the proposal and implementation of a new planetarium facility and subsequent program that would expand the dialogue between Ball State Science majors and the surrounding Muncie community. The Charles Brown Planetarium has doubled the capacity of the former facility and opened new possibilities for educational involvement with students and children.

Such insightful detail to the operations of a public observatory is precisely applicable to a study of natureplay with emphasis on celestial education. Evident from his observations hosting community star-gazing events with local family and their children, Kaitchuck is a firm believer that the most appropriate built environment for children to learn about astronomy is a planetarium. He suggests that there is a stark contrast between an enclosed, controlled interior and an exposed, open-air observatory. “A combination of uncontrolled things keeps parents from bringing their children; inadequate heating, the time of night, and dirty floors,” explained Kaitchuck. “When you have an outside area that has a roof that retracts, cobwebs and dust and bugs start to settle on the floor and the parents worry about their kids sitting and playing around on the dirty floors.”

Regardless of these undesirable conditions, Kaitchuck admits clean planetariums cannot compete with outside observatories, no matter how sophisticated projection technology becomes. Exposure to direct naked-eye viewing of stars and celestial objects can establish a profound wonder and curiosity about our universe. “[Planetariums] do not interest the public as much. They want to look at it with their own eye,” said Kaitchuck. “They don’t want to see a screen. They have the internet to do that. That’s ho-hum. They really do want to look through an eyepiece. If you ask them that, they will say no, but I know better.”

The complexities of proper site conditions for observatories plagues Ball State’s facilities similar to all other telescopes situated in an urban surrounding. Professor Kaitchuck and his peers are in constant negotiation with the university over curbing nearby light pollution, which exponentially harms the quality of the star-gazing experience. Overall, these requests were met, including lamp shades for pedestrian lighting and setting a nearby tennis court’s lights on timers. “If I could push anything next, it would be the nearby hospital’s parking garage with unshielded lights. I groan when I see these things; it’s a lot of wasted energy that’s going up into the sky,” added Kaitchuck.

Architects are familiar with such a utilitarian program as a parking garage needing adequate lighting for security purposes and allowing users to feel safe in areas that are not patrolled by good willed citizens at night. In the context of providing suitable astronomical viewing areas, this issue should be handled with delicacy and satisfy both user-groups.

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Inspire Academy Architecture Workshop Muncie, IN Discoveries were made while working with students from the Inspire Academy Charter School located in Muncie, Indiana. These children were voluntarily signed up for a one-week workshop pertaining to learning about architecture and design. Students ranged from third to sixth grade students, offering a wide swatch of age-groups and perspectives.

There was three basic lesson plans for the week in order to conjure up discussions on the profession of architecture and how architects design successful spaces. The first day, the discussion pertaining to the history of masks from around the world, focusing on how humans embody individuality in a mask’s design along with the use of a multitude of materials, textures and colors. The activity pertained to the students using a paper plate as a base and then cutting, folding, taping, and adorning the plate with the design of their choosing. The children were encouraged to draw or plan their design beforehand on one piece of grid paper at 1:1 scale.

The students who followed this instruction spent quite a long time detailing this drawing, attempting to draw it completely and accurately down to the specific feather or bead that was to be adhered. During the construction phase, every student exhibited an almost obsessive behavior in attaining perfection; if one cut or fold was not perfect, they deemed their plate useless, discarded it and wanted to start anew, regardless of the time limit.

A few students were dismayed from the beginning and were reluctant to complete any sort of a mask at all, even though a multitude of print out examples of masks from around the world were provided along with sustained encouragement.

Upon presenting the masks to a nearby classroom of their peers, many were shy about speaking verbally, but seemed more comfortable wearing the masks in a performative manner dancing around the room, relieved by their anonymous quality.

The second activity involved quick lessons about architecture through time. The instructors would administer a quick lesson via pictures on a slide show with facts about ancient buildings, followed

by Middle Ages and finally modern skyscrapers. They would discuss the purpose behind specific architectural traits, such as why the Great Wall of China has towers intermittently or what purpose is behind the pyramids’ tunnels and passageways built inside. The students would then be given instructions on how to construct each landmark out of legos, followed by the finished lego project being placed on a master plan map of Heekin Park, a prelude into the third project.

The third activity was a catalyst for the students’ final opportunity to become designers. Intentions were to observe how they perceive exterior space, what activities they enjoyed most that would activate their desire for play or exploration, and what sort of design strategies they created to encapsulate those activities as a built environment or interface. Heekin Park is a fifty-seven acre city park that sits adjacent to the Inspire Academy school property. The students frequently use the park for recreation and recess, and are thus somewhat familiar with its parameters and history.

Findings The majority of design decisions were made with a master plan by seven students and three instructors. One holistic discussion was made concerning the program and sectioning off of parcels of land, each with its own basis of activity.

Activities included ice skating, horseback riding, traditional recreation activities such as basketball, tennis and soccer, skiing, sledding, swimming in a pond, walking along a cultural trail, climbing in a treehouse, walking down a shallow stream, star-gazing from a tall point, learning about nature and wildlife, and a few more less specific activities pertaining to exploring the park through unscripted means.

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Students were enthusiastic about sharing stories pertaining to experiences from family vacations and the range of programmatic activities that engaged them most with nature. One student talked about the phenomenology of climbing a lighthouse; the small spiral staircase, the enclosure of the inside and the suspense of ascending to the top without any sort of view outside to sense how high you were located.

When describing the view from the top, many students added to the story their own memories of what they saw at the tops of lighthouses; ocean, boats, birds, and objects on the ground.

The discussion then went on to demand a lighthouse be placed in Heekin park and the students were adamant that at the top they would be able to see their homes, trains, downtown, trees, their school, other children playing, and an abundance of other landmarks familiar to them. This led into a discussion about geocaching; a methodical game of treasure hunting over large expanses of land.

The students seemed to express that this network of spaces above the park should be somewhat exclusive to specific clubs of people with their own interests and should be accessed by a series of ladders and one large monolithic ramp, for those who would not want to climb such a ladder.

One student expressed her fear of heights and requested that activities be kept on the ground, so a small pond was added at the center of the area that was the terminus of a stream. Here, stepping stones would be placed in shallow water so children could explore the water.

The main takeaway from the students’ input participating in the workshop is a number of qualities that they would require from their desired play spaces: Transitions from the ground plane to an elevated height requires an engaging activity such as climbing a ladder or ascending a narrow staircase.

When asked if they ever go outside to star-gaze, only one student confirmed that they have partaken in this activity, but all confirmed that they would desire to star-gaze someday and agreed that it would be most appropriate to do so at a high point, like their favored lighthouse.

One precedent project that was provided to stimulate conversations about the design of Heekin Park was a series of tree houses.

Suspense from the visual disconnection to the ground when ascending creates curiosity

The students were adamant to include tree houses in the design and wanted them to be linked above the ground by a series of bridges to create this smaller sub-community amongst the trees. Activities in these tree houses included star-gazing, fashion design studios, art studios, writing, reading, and a science lab.

Connections between elevated areas can be made by suspended bridges to create a sense of exclusivity from the ground

When viewing the landscape from a high point, specific far away and close landmarks keep the attention of the visitor engaged There should be a multitude of activities; some at ground level for those who do not enjoy high areas

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N

umerous publications and resources are available for persons inquiring about the current affiliation of children and nature. For the purpose of this project, literature pertaining to theatrical architectural design was an applicable starting point due to children’s ability to selfimpose imaginative qualities on the spaces in which they play.

In Narrative Architecture, by Nigel Coates, methods of creating and analyzing existing and conceptually designed spaces are discussed with a specific lens applied to uncover architectural techniques in creating a narrative quality to the building or site. This applies to nature-play and child interaction because my initial conjecture of how children perceive spaces involves thick narrative qualities weaved into the self-written stories of their imagination.

They impose their own tales and quests upon the spaces in which they play in, regardless of their intended program or use dictated by adults.

Coates also discusses how the importance of context in a child’s early years sets them up for a specific paradigm of understanding the world around them and maneuvering its’ obstacles. “Most people agree that their earliest memories stem from around the age of four, and might recall a context, a situation. In growing up, you learn to measure your own body against the world, and to learn by constantly testing and measuring,” says Coates (Coates, 34).

This notion runs parallel with Ronald Kaitchuck’s insight pertaining to children’s willingness to participate during group activities and question portions of his community events at the Ball State University planetarium and observatory. “Third, fourth and fifth grades respond best and then it changes. People get older, more self-centered and self-conscious. They worry about how they are accepted by the crowd and they don’t want to sound like a dummy or a geek,” Kaitchuck explains. “When they’re young they

don’t care about that. They are honest and their reactions to things are refreshing.” Without diving far into the complexities of childhood psychology, it is most important with this information to extract that there is a specific age threshold at which children change from active to passive observers. The former is the target audience for interactive nature-play design.

To offer further insight behind the impressionable eyes of a child, Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods, gives a thorough documentation of what he terms “nature-deficit disorder” (Louv, 8).

This term is not a sanctioned medical diagnosis, but conjures up similar reactions to a malady that one would experience that causes suffering from symptoms or a diminished quality of life. Many factors cause nature-deficit disorder, and require discussion to understand how this proposal can overcome and provide a cure. The following sub-topics are reflections on his novel as a primary source of research.

Technology as Interference Much of the literature pertaining to children’s play elaborates on the complexities of technology. The children of today have spent the vast majority of their lives implementing the devices and gadgets that thread technology into every corner of our lives. Today’s children are more familiar with the intricacies of social media and synthetically replicated environments as means to exist and break down their understanding of their place within their niche of the world. This is no conscious decision of their own, but their evolution to make do with what is given to them. As anonymous forces of society push the implementation of technology further, there is a drastic cut back of fundamental interactions between human to nature.

Literature Review Fluidity of Imagination Resources point out that there is a basic attitude that is severely missing in how we program our children to play.

When a child is using nature as a plays cape, there are no automatic actors or props in which to react and use.

Instead of constant conversation and stimulation from vast networks supported by technology and media, a child begins to interact with imaginary characters that are borne from the movement of their own shadow or a swale of windswept leaves. Instead of a plastic, battery-operated replica toy car that one can ride within to play, a child finds means of transporting their imaginary story along by stacking rocks and outlining the body of a space ship. They begin to utilize the materials around them which open up vast directions of play.

When a play scape is confiscated of man-made items that trigger instant meaning to what an object is meant to be without deviation, their imagination is expanded upon and can progress through a series of interactions with artifacts of nature. This means that the children can impression their own qualities and traits upon what objects or surroundings they deem fit for the narrative of their play.

Even our narrative of imagination changes and expands in opportunity when one is allowed to explore nature-play.

As observed by Louv, “supposedly, we’ve been everywhere and done everything and we know all about it. Yet the more we know, superficially, the less we penetrate, vertically, “(Louv, 60). “It’s all very well skimming across the surface of the ocean and saying you know everything o the sea.”

Louv’s observation is that, since we have a vast network of information available to us, we search for the quick answers to our questions and disregard our depth of field.

containing and restraining a child’s imagination. Instead of capping a child’s imagination with quick, artificial means of exploration, we should be encouraging them to create their own vessel in which to contain their imagination. Nature is the most accommodating and forgiving medium on which children can imprint their own values of play and imagination. By observing how children utilize nature-play, we can begin to regeneration our depth of field as adults.

Testing Limits Richard Louv spends a great portion of his material analyzing existing playscapes and parental involvement. The cities and suburbs of America will occasionally offer pockets of nature in small, ¼ acre backyards and grassy areas leftover here and there where kids makeshift into their playgrounds between property lines.

In these communities, on rare occasions when kids are allowed outside to play, there is the phenomenon of voluntary “eyes on the street” occurring. The audience is not of concerned parents keeping tabs on their neighbor’s children. Usually, the audience is disgruntled patrons of the community who see letting these children roam free in the habitat of the public space as a huge liability.

As designers, we must understand current parental etiquette as an involved and intensely focused relationship. Louv suggests that many factors contribute to parents’ doubtfulness of letting their children roam beyond their immediate reach, mostly factors concerning crime (Louv, 24).

In the context of children’s play, this is reflected as a metaphor. Imagination has a fluid quality and takes the form of the vessel in which it is contained within. Our current playscapes are metaphorically growing smaller in volume,

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Programmatic Design Providing a holistic experience with terrestrial and celestial nature requires a thorough inventory of specific activities.

Each of these interactions, whether via natural or manmade interfaces, takes place at different distances from one’s tangible reach. Exploring the complexities of agriculture or gardening supplies an interaction with soils, mud, worms, roots, irrigation, and small wildlife. These are all qualities “underfoot” or tangible in the first-person experience with one’s hands. Wind, trees and canopy cover, patterns of clouds and sky phenomenon are all compositions seen at far distances. Observing shadows, sun paths, stars, and smoke from fire all happen in the overhead plane.

“Peripheral” activities are intended to be phenomenon or recognized patterns and behaviors of nature that are not always immediately recognizable, but take a moderate effort of investigation. Understanding the sleep cycles of wildlife and humans, food chains, the route of hydrology, and the slow terrain-forming force of geology are all observed in our peripheral, but not comprehended without a conscious reflection and patient observation.

Each of these activities, while assigned to the specific scales of interaction previously discussed, also resides in a particular framework of inter-connectivity. While an argument can be made that each activity is inter-related to one another, only a dozen particular connections will be focused upon; an example being the relationship between shelter, observation of the sun path, and sleep cycles of wildlife and humans.

While the act of story-telling is a catalyst borne from traditional ideologies concerning the hearth and fire, story-telling is also borne from multi-generational interaction and the discussion of the stars in the night sky. There are all mediums at which story-telling takes place at different scales. These and other connected relationships produce a starting point for the programmatic design of the site.

The following images are conceptual studies pertaining to instinctive human perceptions of the horizon concerning program and natural cycles.

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C E L E S T I A L

VISIBLE HORIZON

L IA R ST E RR E T

M U N D I

A X I S

R H Y T H

M

P E R I P H E R A L

C I R C A D I A N

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HUMAN IMMORTALITY WH ATS BEYOND

ROTATION

C E L E S T I A L

FLIGHT

A X I S

TACTILITY MATERIALS PHOTOSYNTHESIS

SOIL

AL RI T S RE R TE

EROSION

VISIBLE HORIZON

GEOLOGY

DAY

GARDEN

EARTH

S U N R I S E

FINGERPRINT

SKY

M U N D I

METEOROLOGY

DAY

CLOUD STRATA

FIRE

QUIET

SLEEP

BEACON STORIES

SHELTER

SHADOWS

GEN ER AT ION S

ROOTS WILDLIFE

S U N S E T

W I N D

FOOD

COOLTH

P E R I P H E R A L

CONSTELLATIONS PLANES C I R C COLOR A D I A N R H SOLAR Y T H M L U N A R

NIGHT

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Horizon as Design Strategy Our perceived horizon is a symbolic metaphor to describe our proximity to the surface of the earth. We live in an infinitesimally narrow membrane of the globe that is perfect for the development of human life compared to any other known planet in the galaxy. This is our poetic habitat that seems to visually continue endlessly as an optical illusion.

This envelope encases us in a delicate ecosystem of checks and balances that are dissected in the studies of evolution, extinction, and climate change.

Additionally, our perceived horizon is a literal reference to the dynamic backdrop of everyday events. Our biological understanding of our relationship and proximity to our horizon line is our basic navigational tool to inform our posture and method of movement towards whichever direction our senses deem as “up�.

Our internal twenty-four hour clock is attuned to our perception of the horizon; we would not know when to rest or wake without visual cues of the rising or setting sun.

Architects are disciplined in ways to design phenomological responses from people in spaces. The proposal will offer answers on how to reacquaint a person with the horizon in ways they have not encountered and how to bring it to the forefront of their realtime perception in this specific location. The outcome will provide a thoughtful experience with the horizon as a person’s self-perception is anchored into a more universal citizenship. Worries of your personal conditions fall away as you become open and aware of the earth beneath your feet.

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Seascapes - Hiroshi Sugimoto

Horizon as Design Strategy Our fasination with the horizon compels us to find way to commicate how it appears in our own perception. This is most easily done in images, as seen in photographer Hiroshi Sugimoto’s documented series, Seascapes (Brougher, 1993).

His work condenses a series of pristine panoramic photos into one rolling comparison of how vague or evident the horizon can appear across a landscape.

Even when situated at such a polarized vista as the ocean’s edge, moisture in the atmosphere blurs a razor-thin edge where earth and sky touch.

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Photos by Charles Barclay Architects, 2008

Kielder Observatory

Charles Barclay Architects The Kielder Observatory is a successful unconventional destination that celebrates scenic natural surroundings while providing basic functionalities of public star-gazing events.

It utilizes a “warm” and “cold” room for the acclimation of star-gazers to exterior temperature drops while using the telescopic equipment. This solves a few limitations of star-gazing in open-air observatories, in reference to Ball State University’s Observatory Director, Ronald Kaitchuck’s reservations on successfulness of open-air observatories with children due to temperature swings and exposure, it is possible with a ride range of indoor-outdoor places to gather.

“The observatory accommodation was arranged sequentially as a series of event spaces, creating a ‘promenade architecturale’ and the possibility of having a number of separate groups on the observatory at the same time.

The sequence starts with the covered entrance area with a bench seat and astronomer’s notice board, and an opening that acts as the only window in the building. From here you enter the warm room, illuminated by roof lights, where side lectures can be held or astronomers can conduct all-night vigils using computers to control the Meade telescope in the small turret next door.

Double doors lead from the warm room to the gangway and then to the observation deck between the turrets. You descend a ramp to the entrance to the Pulsar turret where the elegant Pulsar 20 inch telescope is gradually revealed as you ascend a second, spiral ramp to the raised observation floor,” (Europaconcorsi.com, Kielder Observatory).

APERTURE

RADIAL ASCENTION

HEARTH

LONGITUDINAL VISTA

FRAMED SCALE

PILOTIS

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Photos by J. Turrell, 2010

Roden Crater

James Turrell – Flagstaff, Arizona Roden Crater is an ongoing immersive art piece that utilizes the remnants of an inactive volcanoe. This project has been the work of artist James Turrell and intended upon completion to be a naked eye observatory. According to information from the Skystone Foundation, a partner in the project, this piece was meant to achieve celestial harmony between the sky and viewers from the earth (Skystone Foundation, 2010). As so eloquently put by James Turrell, “I wanted an area where you had a sense of standing on the planet; an area like the Grand Canyon where you could feel geologic time,” (Skystone Foundation, 2010).

By completely removing one from our anchoring perception of a horizon line, we are without our familiar subconscious terrestrial compass that constantly aligns our relation of our bodies to the earth’s surface. It is as if gravity has become unplugged, and we are moving through space itself. This leaves an unencumbered state for our sensory perception to become aware of echoed sounds and slight gradients of light along the chambers.

This was a stark intention of Turrell; “I wanted it to make you feel [the sun] physically, almost as if you could taste it,” (Skystone Foundation, 2010). On a larger scale, his grand preoccupation was with the crater’s accentuation of light to “connect us with a personal This built environment is entirely immersive, as felt by a visitor search for mankind’s place in the universe.” The radiance and as they enter the subterranean pathway that weaves through luminosity itself emitted from the stars in the night sky are intended to become as imprinted in one’s mind and as familiar as it is to stare the crater. The path opens up to specific rooms framing into the open flames of a fire. phenomena of the sky, such as the solar and lunar paths that light up the space due to contrasting light captured by the eye and material of the interior environment. Additionally, a visitor experiences disorientation as your perception of a horizon is removed and skewed until one emerges at the summit of the crater.

F O C US E D / S O L I T A R Y

KINETIC FRAMING

SUB-TERRANIAN

EXCAVATION

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Photos by Diller Scofidio + Renfro

Blur Building Diller Scofidio + Renfro - Switzerland This temporary installation is a peculiar architectural type because it suspends the visitor in a physical atmosphere of synthetically circulated fog.

In this way, the project is theatrical and provides a canvas on which the visitor can impose their own unique narrative while moving curiously through the space. One unique quality of viewing the piece from far approach is that particular site wind conditions varied from day to day, morphing the soft membrane of smoke that enveloped the structure.

Nigel Coates describes the Blur Building as exhibiting a binary narrative, a design strategy that fuses an object or situation with a parallel identity provided from the imagination of the user, (Coates, 2012). The designers simply provided the structure (platform) and medium (fog) and the user provides their interpretation of the space as “a natural phenonemon, captured; like being suspended inside a cloud.”

FEATHER

PIXELIZATION

From day to day, it could be viewed as a billowing stagnant cell or a skeletal frame being stripped of its camouflage as the wind wisps the fog up and away from the point of origin. The main access point leads one across a bridge above water.

As one approaches the threshold into the fog, the path’s vanishing point disappears and one is left to navigate solely on their perception of their immediate vicinity to the ground plane.

Once inside, a visitor’s vision becomes completely encompassed by the fog and figures of people become pixelated. Upon exit, one emerges from the fog and creates a temporary hole in the blurred membrane of the cloud.

As the fog wisps behind the figure’s movement, it envelopes the gap torn open by the person and the form once again appears as a seamless monumental cloud.

AMBIGUITY

MEMBRANE

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Photo by RO & AD Architects, 2014

Moses Bridge

RO&AD Architecten – Fort De Reoovere, Netherlands The Moses Bridge is a blatant architectural intervention providing a unique passage across a historical mote near Fort de Roovere in the Netherlands. Due to its sharp boldness into the landscape, the bridge is navigated more as a ditch framed on both sides by water edged up to the top of the retaining wall holding back hydrostatic pressure.

In this way, the architecture becomes less precious because it is not protected, but produces a perception of humility to unyielding natural elements; a quality seen in resilience design that accepts the ideology that architecture will never overcome nature, but must be adaptable.

RO&AD intended for the user to experience the phenomenon of a force parting a body of water and then passing through it safely. The structure itself is engineered to be sacrificial if and when the water level rises above the sidewalls.

A user descends a wood-trimmed staircase to pass undisturbed across the water. Due to the vicinity of the surface of the water to the path walls, one can touch the water and view it from an intimate perspective at eye level. The bravery of the design to expose users to a central location in the midpoint of a body of water creates a perception of vulnerability.

ASCEND/DESCEND

SACRIFICIAL

VULNERABILITY

LANDSCAPE HEALS

SLICE

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The Sun Dagger Photos by National Geographic and Rick Holtzin

Chaco Canyon - The Sun Dagger Anasazi Civilization

The sun dagger at Chaco canyon is an example of successful human ingenuity in capturing the rhythm of nature under a lens. This site is an exemplary example of archeoastronomy. Rolf Sinclair, author of The Nature of Archaeoastronomy, suggests that the best definition of this anthropological work is “the study of how people in the past have understood the phenomena in the sky, how they used these phenomena and what role the sky played in their cultures,”(2005).

A small engraving has been found located behind a rock formation, one that exhibits an accurate mapping of lunar path and solar equinox events.

The site is at a remote location at the foot of Fajada Butte in New Mexico. This area was once home to the Anasazi people who built a civilization preoccupied with the comprehension of the sky and the celestial objects that crossed their horizons.

Regardless of how the Anasazi people erected this artifact, it is a preserved fingerprint in built form to our human heritage’s ability to create monumental tools with the hopes of graphing, charting, and predicting the overwhelming scale of our world and its role in the universe.

KINETIC TOOL

The vertical rock slabs that are aligned perfectly with the face of the butte allow a precise sliver of sunlight to penetrate through the composition and wash over the engraving of an elliptical spiral pattern. Through this articulation, the sun dagger calendar still performs with little to no error.

SUSPENSION

RESILIENT BOUNDARY

SUMMER SUN SPRING/FALL SUN WINTER SUN

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Brown County State Park

Site Research + Documentation The utilization of light pollution maps starts to reveal specific pockets of terrain in the U.S. that would be suitable for both naked-eye observation and instrumental technical telescope observation of the night sky.

Criteria for investigation includes:

Choosing a site based on these criteria, while also triangulating a location with suitable distance from large urban areas, suggests that the area of Brown County State Park near Nashville, Indiana would provide the best opportunity to investigate. Centered between Bloomington and Columbus, Indiana, Brown County State Park is located at a reasonable traveling distance from the state’s moderately dense cities. Additionally, Brown County State Park is within a one hour drive from the state’s capitol, Indianapolis.

Accessibility for motorists; navigating Brown County State Park for visitors is best accomplished by motor vehicle, while trails are best suited for long-term camp site dwellers

Moderately flat portion of grade upon which to build accessible threshold to a structure for all physical-ability user types

Vegetative screening for protection from high winds at the park’s higher altitude than surrounding topography Wide vista opening towards undulating topography beyond

Juxtaposition near accessible cross-section of forestry density for exploration and learning; grasslands, underbrush, shrub, subWithin the areas of Brown County State Park, specific parcels canopy trees, canopy trees of land can be argued as most suitable for the project.

Central location to walking and bike trails for way-finding

Brown County State Park Vista Looking East 45

NORTH GATE COVERED BRIDGE

ABE MARTIN LODGE WEST GATE

FIRE TOWER

PRIMARY SITE

NATURE CENTER

SATELLITE OBSERVATORIES

HOHEN POINT

Site Analysis Brown County State Park is navigated predominately by vehicular traffic. At the master plan scale, there are particular nodes that should be considered in the context of this project as landmarks. The North Gate Covered Bridge is an emblem to the park and the primary threshold from highway 46.

The Abe Martin Lodge is a catalyst for hospitality in the region and hosts visitors from across the Midwest. The Nature Center is located south of Weed Patch Hill and houses multiple exhibits to educate visitors on the historical geological, wildlife and landscape background of the park.

As one traverses the central vehicular pathway, they will approach Hohen Point; a particular point of interest for local amateur astronomers due to its’ southern panoramic view to the sky and severe alienation from campgrounds and other buildings.

The West Gate offers a secondary entrance into the park and facilitates a predominant traffic flow of mobile campers. The entire site is weaved with valleys that fill as creeks during rainy seasons.

There are two moderately sized lakes that are magnets for visitors and are situated low in valleys with no advantageous view to the sky.

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To Entry on Highway 46

Site Inventory + Analysis Upon visiting numerous locations across the park, one particular summit satisfied all site criteria. Located at Weed Patch Hill, this parcel of land is also serendipitously the third highest elevation in Indiana at 1,058 ft.

Located roughly ten minutes via vehicle from the Park’s North Gatehouse access from highway 46, this area has one of the few largest parcels of level ground. In addition to its vehicular accessibility, the area itself serves as a central node to five trails.

Jimmy Eagleman, Brown County’s Interpretive Naturalist, contributed to the knowledge of the site by explaining the complexities of the current wildflower restoration project started in 2014 and extending into spring 2015. The project consists of replanting native wildflower and grassland plants over 8.7 acres of open land.

The project is an attempt to reintroduce native wildflowers such as milk weed and painted sedge for visitors to explore as a precolonialization landscape of Indiana.

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Site Inventory + Analysis The main motor path around Brown County has multiple vista points in which to stop and overlook the rolling landscape. Some vistas offer a full one hundren and eighty degree panoramic view of the horizon framed by trees and cascading hillsides.

Weed Patch Hill is effectively the highest point in the park and also the region. One specific vista at this point has a wide view of the Southeastern landscape; perfect for observiing celestrial phenomenom.

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Shale, Sandstone, Limestone Limestone, Dolomite Limestone

Brown County Black Shale Shale, Siltstone, Rockford Limestone

mesto Shale Li

Limestone,Dolomite Limestone, Dolomite, Siltstone, Shale

ne

t e, Limes Dolomit ne Sandsto

one,

e, ne, Shal Sandsto e Dolomit

Geology map from The National Heritage of Indiana, Indiana Geological Survey (8)

Site Research + Documentation As a state, Indiana is famous for natural limestone. The Natural Heritage of Indiana by Marion Jackson narrates a wide array of information on the geology of the Brown County’s region, called the Brown County Hills Section.

Looking at historical geological time reveals that the Wisconsinian glacier ice sheets that covered a large portion of the state only encroached along the northern border of Brown County, leaving the park mostly untouched. This is why today it is a destination to see the “most deeply dissected topography, with the region’s highest hills, deepest ravines, and steepest slopes,” (Jackson, 167).

The proposed site sits at a summit that provides a contrast between the drastic undulating topography and a flat peak upon which to propose a built installation. This area’s reputation precedes it in Jackson’s writing; “most of the ridges and hills bear steep slopes all the way to their narrow, rounded crests, but a few of the more massive ridges are topped by level flat areas, the most notable example being Weed Patch Hill in the center of Brown County State Park,” (168).

The surrounding topography that encapsulates Weed Patch Hill is weaved by small seasonal streams and rough hiking trails navigating the steep slopes. Traversing these trails requires a certain amount of skill and awareness of your position in relation to ridges. Jackson elaborates, “over the ages, the shale, siltstone, and sandstone bedrock of this region has been deeply eroded or dissected, to form a complex of steep, V-shaped valleys and ravines which separate prominent ridges and hills, or “knobs,” (168).

Buried underneath meters of earth are stratified layers of geological time, laying mostly undisturbed from large-scale ecological events.

“Indiana’s bedrock has been tilted only slightly since it was formed.

None has been overturned, therefore at any location, the rocks are youngest on the surface and become progressively older with depth,” (Jackson, 7).

The composition for Brown County is primarily Borden Group Rockford Limestone, shale and siltstone, yet visitors remain mostly unaware of their presence because of their undisturbed nature in location to the top soil. This creates a design opportunity to bring samples of these stone types to the surface to enrich the textures and tones of Weed Patch Hill.

This creates a design opportunity to utilize a unique vantage point in the park along with using the familiarity of the area as a landmark, both at the local and regional scale.

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Usergroups

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WEATHERED

BLACK

BLACK

OAK

OAK

SHAGBARK

HICKORY

CHESTNUT

OAK

AMERICAN

SYCAMORE

YELLOW

POPLAR

PAINTED

SEDGE

Materiality Examination To supplement the nature-play activities involving the tactility of natural materials found around the park, new materials introduced through this project to the site should celebrate the same natural and organic textures. Architectural forms that serve as an interface or a faรงade offer a perfect design opportunity to use Indiana native materials such as lumber from native trees and portions of Rockford limestone.

Five specific wood types that were considered were shagbark hickory, chestnut oak, American sycamore, yellow poplar, and black oak. The latter, black oak, has the best qualities to serve as a long-term, low maintenance exterior sheathing. As a building material, it is easy to manipulate, has a hard grain and performs strongly along with providing a satisfactory finish at a moderate price (Wood Database, 2015).

Compared to the previous four native woods, it falls into a moderate category of rot resistance, providing a steady

level of decay as a desired aesthetic. All exterior materials should be finished in a way that will allow their natural patina or decay to show over time. This quality will allow the observation of the passing of time and how it erodes natural materials and morphs them into different colors and textures.

Local Indiana Rockford limestone is a beneficial building material to be used in the form of gabion baskets. These masses can be used to define exterior space and boundaries for learning areas along with retaining walls for subterranean level changes. Native slate material offers a unique sheathing form that sheds a colorful residue over time.

Wildflowers are abundant in Brown County State Park, specifically painted sedge grass, which is only uniquely found in this region.

Milkweed is also encouraged to grow because of its ability to attract butterfly insects. These and other prairie plants should complement any installment onto the landscape (INPAWS).

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Site Inventory + Analysis Choreographing a series of nodes throughout the landscape of Weed Patch Hill required numerous studies in plan. The site is meant to be navigated from multiple directions, with no one defined path prescribed. A visitor approaches the site via vehicular circulation and will have the opportunity to park at one of two destinations.

From here, the visitor will leave their vehicle and traverse the master plan on lightly inscribed pathways; paths that are conscious of their footprint through the delicate wildflower landscape. The circulation provides multiple paths, ranging from short distance 0.2 miles to one complete mile to circumnavigate the entirety of Weed Patch Hill.

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Design Concept The final proposal is a series of delicate installations on Weed Path Hill that choreographs a child’s movement through three main concepts; all exploring one’s peception of the horizon.

ASCENSION

LEAVING THE GROUND, TAKING FLIGHT

EDGENESS

OF THE GROUND, CAMOUFLAGE, BELOW

FOCAL LENS

BORROWED LANDSCAPES, MICRO/MACRO

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ASCENSION

LEAVING THE GROUND, TAKING FLIGHT As one begins to walk on the path, they enter underneath the tree canopy. As they come to this installation, they begin a slight ascension into the tree canopy. Their perception of movement starts out slow, pauses at the top to look out onto the canopy from above, and speeds up drastically when they descend on a slide.

ASCEND

DESCEND

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Circulation diagram showing the progressive slowing down and speeding up of the children circumnavigating the installation

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ASCENSION

LEAVING THE GROUND, TAKING FLIGHT The following images proceed through a series of experiential graphics to show the movement of people through the architectural design. The section cut provides an unrolled narrative of the experience in relation to the dashed datum representing the horizon in the peripheral of the user.

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ASCENSION

LEAVING THE GROUND, TAKING FLIGHT

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ASCENSION

LEAVING THE GROUND, TAKING FLIGHT

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To facilitate Nature Play activities, an outside classroom is centrally located in the piece, encouraging children to explore the understory of the canopy and retrieve items to bring back and dissect and discuss.

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EDGENESS

OF THE GROUND, CAMOUFLAGE, BELOW From the canopy, one emerges onto the wildflower prairie of on the summit of Weed Patch Hill. There is a large portion of aggregated fallen logs positioned here that had been cleared from hiking trails underneath the canopy. This camouflage quality is utilized here to create a subterranean descended pathway.

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EDGENESS

OF THE GROUND, CAMOUFLAGE, BELOW Upon descending into the piece, the walls depict the stratification of soils throughout time, opening up the discussion of horizons in the context of not only space but also chronological time of the site.

The construction of such a massive landscape depression is facilitated by a series of rammed earth wall sections. The ramp approaches the deepest point slowly at a 1/20 slope.

1/20 sl ope over 120 feet run

R a mmed Ea rt h Wall C ons t ruct ion Dusty # 1 1 grave l Contains limestone Compacts with weathering and walking

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EDGENESS

OF THE GROUND, CAMOUFLAGE, BELOW Underneath at the lowest point, a canopy shades you from the sun, creating perpendicular shadows on the ground plane. The area allows for children to gather and bring back pieces of wood or building materials from the forest and construct a leaned den, inviting a tactile experience; biomimicry of birds making a nest or prairie dogs burrowing.

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PEEL

ARRAY / FOLD

EXHIBIT

FOCAL LENS

BORROWED LANDSCAPES, MICRO/MACRO When walking in the void of the wildflower prairie, the site’s horizontality starts to emphasize the celestial sphere. The initial intention was to design a planetarium, but when the form of a traditional planetarium is turned inside out, the architectural form engages the celestial sphere in a more profound way.

The lens intended to capture the concept of borrowed landscapes; framing a horizon that is in the distance in a way that is unavoidably inseparable from the architecture. This move introduces the phenomenon of simultaneous exploration of the micro and macro scale of the celestial and terrestrial sphere.

BEND / THEORY OF RELATIVITY

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VERTICAL CUTS

HORIZONTAL CUTS

FOCAL LENS

BORROWED LANDSCAPES, MICRO/MACRO This cylindrical, suspended form became the dominant architectural strategy. Drawing off of an upward celestial emphasis as a lens, the installation is approached with subterranean suspense as seen at Roden Crater.

By entering underground, one experiences a thick contrast of light and darkness, while also becoming desensitized to their perception of the horizon and then reoriented to a synthetic horizon by the whirling forms of the architecture.

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FOCAL LENS

BORROWED LANDSCAPES, MICRO/MACRO Navigating the outer perimeter requires negotiating ones’ way through a ground plane labyrinth of a similar oval impression as the built form. The duality of nighttime activation provides a venue for naked-eye and amateur star gazers, a fire pit for multigenerational story sharing, and an overall center for the ignition of curiosity and search for knowledge.

The permeability of the oval form facilitates a dynamic display of shadows across the ground plane. This phenomenon is a catalyst for the story-telling of Plato’s allegory of the Cave; a philosophical parable pertaining to the source of all knowledge for mankind. Student-led theatrics and story-telling are also facilitated by an outdoor stage along the south side.

All installations are meant to be experienced in reverse as well as from north to south. There is no terminus but an ever-evolving choreography of movement.

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Conclusions My significant take-aways from my thesis were learning how to facilitate curiosity, free-movement, and framing borrowed landscapes in a site.

Moments of discovery for myself that will stay with me are investigating a site’s potential in a multitude of dimensions beyond the here and now; seasonal changes, how materials weather, and how the architecture can choreograph something new upon every return to the side by the same individual.

Large scope, the methods at which I reached these designs will remain applicable; such as dissecting precedent studies, participant- observation with user groups, and the trained instinct to return to the site multiple times.

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Time and the bell have buried the day, the black cloud carries the sun away.

Will the sunflower turn to us, will the clematis Stray down, bend to us; tendril and spray Clutch and cling?

Chill Fingers of yew be curled Down on us? After the kingfisher’s wing Has answered light to light, and is silent, the light is still At the still point of the turning world.

Photo by ESO/S. Brunier

-The Four Quartets T.S. Eliot

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