Marine Hall Gardens is nearing completion, so we went up Wednesday night to test the lights and ……yes they worked! [including Disco Ball for event nights]

‘“Travellers, there is no path, paths are made by walking”
Antonio Machado

The sensitive design of The Garden of Reflection at the Bishop’s Palace, Wells is intended as an extension of the current atmosphere found within the estate. The gardens have been carefully designed to augment the sense of peace and tranquility and instil a feeling of calm to those who visit it.

The process

Masterplan

Poustinia
The calm centre of the garden and a place for reflection will be a Poustinia. A Poustinia is a small room where one goes to pray alone in the presence of God.
“To go into the poustinia means to listen to God. It means entering into kenosis – the emptying of oneself.” (C. Doherty, 1975)

The design for the Poustinia, within the Garden of Reflection, has evolved to become a simple and contemporary structure. It will provide the function of a traditional Poustinia but it has been designed to respond to its context to enhance the contemplative experience.

The proposed Poustinia is constructed from white cast stone with a polished finish and an etched curved glass surround, creating an envelope in which to relax and contemplate the surroundings. The glass structure will capture the changing landscape, reflecting the passing clouds and moving foliage, mirroring the light and dark sequences, creating a different experience for the visitor with each visit.

Woodland Underplanting
Native forbs, ferns and grasses. Desire lines created by visitors to Sanctuary space.

Prairie Planting
Lush perennials form blocks of strong colour. The formation of the blocks takes inspiration from the stained glass windows in the Bishop’s Palace.

The arrangement of the planting in bold en masse patterns mimics the colours and shapes of the stained glass window in the Bishop’s Palace, creating a direct relationship between hard and soft and new and old elements within the Palace grounds.

The colourful planting will bring seasonal interest and provide a haven for birds, bees and butterflies.

Elsewhere, Birch trees create a striking setting for the Poustinia. The delicate foliage will cast gentle shadows over the Poustinia to arouse emotions and create a changing experience.

The planting has been developed alongside garden staff and will consist mostly of native trees, Taxus baccata (yew) hedges, native but garden-worthy perennials, and herbaceous perennials and grasses in a prairie mix.

Worcester city orchard is a landscape art work commissioned by the University of Worcester, created by Sans façon and BCA Landscape in collaboration with Landscape Architect Becky Sobell.

Worcester city orchard is a new orchard in the heart of the city. Continuing the tradition of fruit growing long established in Worcestershire, this new space also alludes to the former infirmary and the gardens in which medicinal and edible plants were grown.

Key to this art project is the creation of an unexpected productive landscape accessible to anyone in the city, transforming the traditional expectation of a University campus. Worcester city orchard becomes a social space for the city, part of the University and open and welcoming for the citizens and visitors.

The creation of an art landscape of this scale and prominence in a city is rare in Britain, one that provides a seasonal offering to its university students and citizens alike is rarer still. In the creation of Worcester city orchard, Worcester becomes the home of a significant public art landscape that celebrates its heritage and provides a unique public space.

 The Orchard may also become an ideal example and laboratory for some of the University departments (For example the National Pollen and Aerobiology Research Unit ), but also for the local schools to present the values of bio diversity, for other commissioned art interventions, for organisations working to promote Orchards in the region, and for the city to celebrate its cultivation heritage through festivals and celebrations (for instance at harvest time, Applefest, Full Bloom, etc).

Josh Ritter – Love Is Making Its Way Back Home from Josh Ritter on Vimeo.

We Love this new video from the great Josh Ritter. It would be amazing to animate a new project like this!

Video produced by Erez Horovitz of Prominent Figures.

The stop-motion animation for “Love Is Making Its Way Back Home” uses photographs culled from over 12,000 pieces of construction paper to animate a nighttime drive. A team of nearly twenty artists, editors, directors and product assistants ushered the video into being. The group started with storyboarding and computer animation before converting the digital graphics to paper cutouts (frame by frame), photographing those 12,000 cutouts and then stitching them together into four minutes of paper animation. As production designer Sam Cohen said, “We had to determine ahead of time which images to cut as positives or negatives, how to anchor the cutouts to the paper frame that surrounds it so the pieces wouldn’t fall out, as well as a host of other problems. It was definitely the most labor intensive video we’ve been a part of.”

Marine Hall Gardens was looking great in the sunshine yesterday. Miami eat your heart out. The art deco style is coming together and planting will take place as soon as this ‘slight chill’ passes.

Little Bear lost in the woods…

The stats:

Best jumper – Ben Green

Most guilty pleasure songs guessed – Steve Dunne

Worst song – Josh Woods without a doubt. ‘You’re a Pink Toothbrush’

Looking hairy the next day – James Watts

Too many great Secret Santa presents to choose the best!

Finished bronze central piece – SKY!

A sneak peek at the bronze centre piece mould for the sea circle at Marine Hall Gardens, Fleetwood. This will be set into a 5m diameter terrazzo circle.

Sky mould.

The first Pre-cast Terrazzo Unit image arrived today from Toffolo’s in Hull – we love it. This is from SKY - the first of two 5 metere dia. Terrazzo carpets we have been designing and detailing with Smiling Wolf and Lesley Fallais.

More to follow – when we get piccies!

Here we go – UPDATE!

Draco

Cephus

Andy’s heading to Cardiff for the RSAW [Royal Society of Architects in Wales] autumn/winter conference on Friday Dec 9th where he will be a speaker at ‘Practice Makes Perfect. He will be  examining the complex process of design and how ideas follow many paths before finding their resting place [on the ground or sometimes in the bin]. Using completed case studies, work currently under construction and on the drawing board – he will examine how collective notions of  identity are notoriously tricky to pin down.

Here’s a link for more info.

Emblem of my [our] work @ Cube Gallery.

BCA Landscape and Hope University have had a very successful year rewarded again for Angel Field last night at the Landscape Institute Awards. We came top of the  catagory “Design Under One Hectare” .

Angel Field has picked up a total of 4 awards this year and has been the location of many outdoor events and ceremonies. [The awards: Roses Award, Civic Trust Award, Landscape Institute Award & we're still chuffed about our Ibstock brick from RIBA Red Rose for Project of the Year] Well done to all involved.

The team – We-ef and BCAL

Tim Smit at the awards.