Fall 2016
Professor: Ángel Martínez García-Posada
The site is in downtown Ithaca at a primary intersection between diverse urban, semi-urban, and geological conditions. The population is composed of both a transient and permanent residents: students from Cornell University and Ithaca College who reside during specific months out of the year, and the citizens who live within Ithaca year round. The Aquatics Center should be accessible and flexible for its unique site location, relationship to nature and geology, as well as the population.
The stepping landscape design conception is composed of a field which acts as a primary mode of circulation for the roof and consequently a logic for the program and circulation below. Using Peter Zumthor’s Bath House as inspiration for the design, there are apparent relational qualities such as roof openings and wall alignments which create specific atmospheric lighting that is in correlation with the program. The roof circulation is inverse from the ground circulation to provide juxtaposing foot traffic as well as the opportunity to place strategic moments of void within the roof. The structural interior reinforces the idea of an excavated slope through the application of inhabitable walls that hold programmatic functions. The design in its entirety establishes an interactive and natural response to this partially excavated site; allowing one to circulate through the location in a way which pays homage to the once sloped environment.
