International competition for a park in a suburb of Vancouver, Canada. The plot – neighbouring an ecological community – is partially flooded throughout the rainy season. The project explores the contradictions between destruction and construction, and was conceived as a huge “pluviometer” (see sketches, last line). Crossing the site, interconnected pools works as storm water retention and shall reflect the rhythm of natural phenomena, such as water precipitation, evaporation and infiltration. The destruction process resulted from the construction of the pluviometer has conceptualized the occupation of the remaining area: spread all over the site, several boxes were designed after the readings of natural phenomena – solar light, wind, rain, etc – and shall be built with timber made from the destroyed trees.
Some excerpts of the project description:
Undo
> With the precision and correctness of a surgical act, a hard structure strange to the environment is inserted to establish a new water management;
> This intervention is documented and recorded to define the criteria of the following phase (redo).
Such an intervention begins with the excavation of a 350m long water collector that crosses the park longitudinally. It is a linear device that stores and improves water quality on site, keeping groundwater levels and controlling flash floods in the southern end of the park.
The final goal of this hydraulic organisation is to turn a landscape axis into an “inclusive pluviometer” which is also a sequence of ramps and stairs, incorporating the amphitheatre, a series of slopes, ponds and an underground structure that adapt themselves to the existent topography.
The radicalism of this surgery is what we called the ‘undo operation’. We undo the exiting natural elements along the axis, removing and displacing several layers of earth together with dozens of existent trees.
Redo
> The catalogued and removed elements are replaced according to their ecological significance on the site;
> After a momentary disturbance, a new balance is achieved through the transformative forces of nature enabled by the undo-redo cycle; by the accurate guidance of the displacement and replacement operations.
This same displaced matter, ungracefully removed to open up the field for the water collector, becomes the raw material of the ‘redo’ operation.
Sixteen spread wooden boxes will work like the receivers of all the displaced elements: earth and wood will be replaced here, configuring different elements for play and playing with the very changes which altered the initial equilibrium of the site.
Biologist and geologist consultants will help decide the best way to relocate the removed elements.