The Winning Vision of Seattle's Future

The Urban Intervention design competition last spring called upon mulitidisciplinary design teams from around to world to suggest a replacement for Memorial Stadium in the Seattle Center. Read all about it at The Next Fifty and Arch Daily. 

AIA Seattle, the Seattle Center, and a generous donor put on this competition in the altruistic hopes of inspiring conversation about the role of public space in the next 50 years and along the way, getting dozens of "bold" ideas for Seattle. Here is the winning idea, "[In] Closure" by ABF.

As a person who likes thinking about the impact design can have on my city, here's my take:

The best thing about this design is that it puts a forest in Central Seattle. Being surrounded by extreme verdance is the only way for me to reconcile the constant Northwest drizzle.  

Screenshot from [In] Closure

The worst thing about this design is also the forest. This is exactly the kind of place my mother taught me NOT to go at night! There's a reason we have bonfires at the beach: visibility! 

There is something about the shelter of trees that attracts stoners. Have you ever wondered why at Folklife they rope off the area under the two large trees by the fountain?  Because growing up at Folklife, "by the trees" was synonymous with a sea of people smoking pot.  Now that marijuana is legal in Washington, by planting a whole forest, the Seattle Center would really be asking to create one big drug den that could either be really awesome or incredibly sketchy (see People's Park). 

Screenshot from [In] Closure

My personal favorite individual idea from the proposal is the people-powered track that produces electricity as part of its carbon neutral goal.  This is a concrete example of the way this proposal is all about interaction of the park with the community, which is what I think a 21st century public space should do.

Screenshot from [In] Closure

Here's what the professional panel that chose the winner had to say about it:

"The only guarantee of the future is change. In-Closure addressed the state of constant change by proposing a replicable and organic system that can grow and evolve, that doesn’t equate innovation with solely technology, and recognizes that ecological resilience at its heart comes from the community itself.” (ArchDaily) Well said, professionals.