Together with urban life expert Jan Gehl, BIG&#;s strategy was to create a framework for maximum amount of life with the minimum amount of built substance. The harbor bath zig-zags gently into the island, extends all the way out into the harbor pool and back again. The swimmers can enjoy the circular diving pool, a children’s pool, the m long lap pool or one of the two saunas that are tucked underneath the public boardwalk which doubles as a viewing platform who those who prefer to stay dry.

Like a seismic fault line, the architectural crusts of planet earth are lifted and mingled to form an underlying continuous space of caves and niches, lookouts and overhangs. Rather than a single perimeter delineating an interior and an exterior, the façade is conceived as a sinuous membrane meandering across the site, delineating interior spaces and exterior gardens in a seamless continuum oscillating between the city and the park.

The Shriver Program providing special education for students aged to occupies two floors of the building accessible from the ground floor, and has specialized spaces dedicated to support APS’ Functional Life Skills program as well as privacy and ease of accessibility; the gymnasium, courtyard, occupational physical therapy suite, and sensory cottage are designed to aid in sensory processing.

The equilateral triangular footprint creates a building with no ends, only three faces perceived as free standing two-dimensional surfaces. The conference center and lobby is sunken into the landscape, leaving the hotel building in a small oasis of Swedish forest in an airport city of parking lots and infrastructure. In the center of the building a series of executive meeting rooms hang inside a hexagonal atrium, creating a kaleidoscopic view from the lobby to the sky.

The new Kimball Art Center will replace the existing Kimball building which is a horse stable, turned car repair shop, turned museum. In designing the winning proposal, BIG asked &#; could the iconic Silver King Mining Coalition Building which the city lost in a fire be revived in the design for the new institution Could the new Kimball Art Center tell the story of the past while still looking to the future