Rosales + Partners, with ARUP, winners of several design competitions for bridges, including the Woodrow Wilson Memorial Bridge in Washington, DC (COMPETITIONS, Vol. 9, #3), recently won a lighting competition for the Harvard Bridge in Boston. Historic bridges have occasionally undergone facelifts, and this is no exception. However, the fact that it turned out to be a competition was one.
In the words of the authors, this was their winning approach to the project:
“The lighting design of the Harvard Bridge considers three primary factors that weigh prominently on the architectural lighting proposal. First is the bridge as an existinghistoric structure; its shape and form serve as the basis upon which our ideas are generated. The second factor is the specific place of the bridge; the connection between Boston and Cambridge, the numerous visual experiences for joggers and pedestrians as well as vehicular passengers and boaters, and the inherent history and traditions associated with the bridge all play a part in the design approach. The third factor is the responsibility of designing for a landmark structure, to create an elegant visual icon that has the ability to redefine its presence during select events and holidays.
The specific elements of the lighting design are proposed to accentuate and enhance the experience of the bridge, in the following elegantly responsive gestures:
-On the bridge’s walking surface, the tradition of the Smoot measurement system, which was started in 1958 is embraced in the lighting design approach. The Smoot lighting, small, blue accent elements along the sidewalks, pays tribute to the history and traditions of the Smoot (5’-7”) measurement system, by emitting a band of light at every 10 Smoots (55.8’), a dimension which traditionally is highlighted by MIT students. In addition, we propose to use white, reflective paint to mark the 10 Smoot dimension. This sidewalk enhancement will help animate the walking experience between Boston and Cambridge while also celebrating a distinct character-defining component of the bridge.
-The pole lighting along the bridge, which illuminates the roadway and adjacent sidewalks, is proposed to be refitted with all new LED light sources and relocated to correspond to every 30 Smoots (167.5’). The improved light poles will be placed in pairs in an orderly pattern instead of the current staggered arrangement. These new light sources are proposed with full cut-off optical design, which eliminates wasted light to the night sky, while enhancing the visual experience on the bridge, in particular better illuminating the sidewalks with a lower pedestrian-level fixture. The proposed design for the roadway poles is visually consistent with the historically inspired roadway light poles used on the bridge approaches on both sides of the river.
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Before (left) and after (right)
The remaining light gestures serve to accentuate the shape and form of the historic bridge as perceived from afar along the river shorelines. The historic granite stone piers supporting the bridge are illuminated with a soft glow of warm white light from concealed light sources safely mounted to the underside of the bridge deck. The reflected light in the water adds visual dimension to the stone piers, creating a greater sense of verticality. The steel structure of the bridge, consisting of arched I-beams is illuminated with linear LED sources, to create a soft wash of crisp white light along the length of the bridge. The reflected glow of this soft line of light complements the warm reflection of the pier lighting. Finally, blue glowing accents are placed at the ends of the bridge’s cantilevered steel beams embracing the visual rhythm of the bridge structure and providing a nautical appearance.
-The bridge pier lighting, as well as the linear accent lighting is proposed to illuminate the bridge with white light for the majority of the year, to create an elegant visual icon for the community. However, on special occasions, such as holidays or significant achievements by local sports teams, the lighting has the ability to change color in tribute to the celebration. The Smoot lighting on the sidewalks could also be programmed to allow for visual movement along the entire bridge. For example they could be turned on in sequence starting on the Boston side where the Smoot measurements traditionally start at 10 Smoot (55.8’) intervals until reaching the “364.4 Smoots plus or minus one ear” on the Cambridge side.
-The energy requirement for illuminating the longest bridge to span the Charles River is not an insignificant amount, and it is our intent to illuminate each aspect of the bridge with the most responsive piece of lighting equipment to achieve the design aims.
-By selecting exclusively LED sources for the lighting equipment, the luminous output of all lighting equipment can be adjusted in the field, to provide the right amount of light without over-lighting any element. By dimming the lighting in this manner, it is our expectation that all accent lighting will operate at only a 60-70% output, thus conserving energy, and extending the operational lifetime of the equipment. Many of the LED fixtures included in this design have operational lives exceeding 100,000 hours, and the dimming can extend this further.”
The updating and modernization of Chicago’s O’Hare Airport has been well overdue. Aside from occasional problems caused by Chicago’s winter storms, congestion at the airport has led air travelers to avoid the airport when catching a connecting flight is on the agenda. So Chicago, noted for its modern architecture and the home of several high-profile architecture firms, decided to turn to an invited competition for a solution to these issues.
Competitions in Chicago in the recent past have been anything but encouraging, especially when transparency is an issue. During the competition for the Obama Center on the South Side, the Obama Foundation, which was responsible for the administration of that “competition,” was anything but a model of transparency; and to this day, none of the finalist designs, other than that of the winner, have seen the light of day. In the case of the O’Hare project, videos submitted by the five finalists teams were on public display, and the public was even asked to vote for their favorite.
Form and Dichroic Light Scott Hall at Carnegie Mellon University Michelle LaFoe and Isaac Campbell OFFICE 52 Architecture Forward by Cesar Pelli, FAIA Introduction by Michael J. Crosbie, FAIA Leete”s Island Books, Maine USA Hard cover; 96 pages in color ISBN 9780918172709
In his introduction to Form and Dichroic LIght, Michael Crosbie never mentions the term, “wild card,” to describe Office 52’s participation in the invited competition for the Carnegie Mellon Engineering Building. The four finalists, picked from a list of 17 firms, also included three household names: ZGF, Wilson, and BCJ (Bohlin Cywinski, Jackson). So what possible chance could a firm, which had just recently opened a small office in Portland, Oregon, have against a competition lineup of this magnitude? But as OFFICE 52 Principal, Isaac Campbell explained, as a small firm, “we were quite nimble,” and the $50,000 stipend the firms all received to produce a design could allow OFFICE 52 more time to undertake the research involved than might be the case with a larger office, where a cost controller is constantly focusing on the operation.
In these times when political emotions run high and gun violence is the norm, not the exception; and when emotions no longer are held in check, but encouraged by our leaders, minorities become easy targets for those who adhere to ideologies based primarily on exclusivity and hate.
The LGBT community has long been the target of various segments of our society; but the massacre that took place at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, a favorite hangout for gays, elevated this phenomenon to a new level. After an event that claimed the lives of 49 victims, injured 68 others, and left hundreds permanently traumatized, it should come as no surprise that a memorial to this tragedy has been front and center in the minds of the community ever since. Because the very nature of this event has drawn nationwide attention, the community wanted to get it right. So it was only logical that they would turn to a competition as the most viable vehicle for arriving at a solution for the design of a memorial, as well as a museum. For this, the onePULSE Foundation was formed, to memorialize this tragedy and “ensure that Pulse”s legacy of love, acceptance and hope will never be lost.”
As part of a policy to relocate archives of local interest outside of major Bavarian cities, a competition was staged for the design of a new archive in Kitzingen, 12 miles from the provincial capital city of Würzburg, Germany. The competition was open to qualified teams in the EU, with 25 firms identified to take part in a competition. Since five firms were preinvited, 20 openings were available for the 79 applicants that vied for participation in the competition. In the end, 23 firms submitted designs for the final adjudication process.
In July 2019 the Vilnius Concert Hall competition jury began its deliberations to identify a suitable design for this major performing arts project. As one might have anticipated, two of thejurors on the seven member panel, Ole Gustavsen (Snohetta) and Andreas Cukrowicz (Nachbaur Architekten) had won high profile competitions for similar music center projects—in Oslo and Munich.The jury was confronted with a formidable task, as the competition, organized according to UIA regulations and anonymous in its format, had attracted 248 entries from around the world. For this one-stage competition, the organizers listed the following evaluation criteria, whereby the order of the criteria was not to reflect any priority:
Memorials to commemorate atrocities committed by the Nazis during World War II have taken many forms. Holocaust museums such as the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. by Pei Cobb Freed or the Jewish Museum in Berlin by Daniel Libeskind, all endeavor to paint a broad picture, including narratives covering most of the major events and sites. Former concentration camps such as Auschwitz, Dachau, Theresienstadt and Buchenwald have been frequent tour destinations. In the case of Buchenwald, the local city of Weimar has placed pictures of “Witnesses” throughout the downtown area as a reminder of the Nazi legacy.
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