Governor’s Island // New York // Diller Scofidio + Renfro, West 8 & Rogers Marvel
The 172-acre parcel that is ‘Governor’s Island‘, has been on a part of New York city for much of its 400-year history, acting as a private outpost for government, military and coast guard installations. Situated between the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, downtown Manhattan and Brooklyn, New York, plans for work on the island will include a mix of natural and man made landscapes.
The new ‘Governor’s Island’ is a collaboration between Diller Scofidio + Renfro, West 8 landscape architects and Rogers Marvel architects. Its design uses the manmade topography of lower Manhattan as a starting point, and sees the island’s southern tip transformed into an artifical landscape, which includes habitable mountains constructed from reclaimed materials from existing governor’s island buildings. The new topography approaches the western edge of the island, transforming into EPDM (a type of propylene rubber) covered greenhouse structures will serve as botanical and aquatic research centers. There will also be aquariums and restaurants which will examine the flora and fauna of the site, with particular focus on the fish of the Hudson estuary.
The following text is from West 8:
‘Imagine an extraordinary new public park that embraces all New York Harbor, its ecology, its history, its culture, its magnificent beauty. Surrounded by water, steeped in the natural and cultural history of the estuary, Governors Island will re-emerge as the next great ‘world park’: an icon for the city, a beacon in the harbor. West 8 proposed an extensive and coherent design for this 2nd park for New York.’
The forms of the off-shore structures will emerge from the water like large, floating bubbles, and move with the tides and adjust to the water’s rising sea levels. There is the ‘Oyster Restaurant’ which is a large, inflated sphere, that will be located directly across the harbor from the Statue of Liberty, and anchored by a man made oyster reef. The restaurant will focus on the ecology of the area, and will serve food from the local Hudson river and surrounding harbor.
More information about Governor’s Island: www.govisland.com.
Further information about the history of Governor’s Island: www.west8.nl.
Keep up the good work.
I’m impressed, I must say. Really hardly ever do I encounter a blog that’s both educative and entertaining, and let me inform you, you have got hit the nail on the head. Your thought is excellent; the issue is something that not enough people are talking intelligently about. I’m very pleased that I stumbled throughout this in my seek for something referring to this.