Weiss/Manfredi
Architecture/Landscape/Urbanism
Olympic Sculpture Park
Seattle, Washington

“The design's vibrant terrain is intended to emphasize and interplay with the things unique to Seattle – rain, mist, reflection – in a series of interconnected precincts.”
Marion Weiss
Weiss/Manfredi

Image courtesy Weiss/Manfredi

The Seattle Art Museum’s Olympic Sculpture Park, situated at Seattle's edge, between the modern cityscape and the natural beauty of Puget Sound and the Olympic Mountains, will transform the waterfront property from a former industrial site into a vibrant green space where people can experience modern and contemporary art beyond the museum's walls.

The design integrates architecture, landscape design and urban infrastructure to unify three separate parcels of land, currently separated by train tracks and roadways, and joins art, city and sound into one continuous landscape.

Photo: arcspace

The top of the park, at the city's edge, features a transparent pavilion that becomes a luminous beacon at night. This pavilion frames views of the sound and the city and is a multiuse setting for exhibitions, lectures, performances and special events

Image courtesy Weiss/Manfredi

A descending “Z” shaped pedestrian path connects the city to the water’s edge, providing a diverse setting for art and linking three archetypal landscapes of the Northwest. These landscapes are: a dense temperate evergreen forest of fir, cedar, ferns and native huckleberry; a transitional forest featuring deciduous trees such as oaks, aspens and maples; and a shoreline garden that features low-lying pines and a series of aquatic terraces with kelp, algae and underwater grasses that form a regenerative landscape for fish.

Image courtesy Seattle Art Museum

Art in the park will fall into three categories: infrastructure projects that will be integrated into the design and construction of the park such as the pedestrian bridges, trellises, benches and walkways; anchor works that serve as points of major interest to draw attention to each precinct of the park; and temporary exhibitions and installations that will take place throughout the park including the pavilion.

Image courtesy Weiss/Manfredi
A glass bridge canopy (Seattle Cloud Cover) by Miami-born Teresita Fernandez

Image courtesy Seattle Art Museum
Seating designed by sculptor Louise Bourgeois.

The shoreline garden's stepped aquatic terraces are revealed and concealed with tidal fluctuations and will support salmon recovery in Elliott Bay.  Native plants will provide an important backdrop for learning about and experiencing the Puget Sound's unique physical environment.

The program will emphasize the park as a dynamic space that changes over time and continues to accommodate approaches to sculpture as the medium continues to evolve.

The first phase of the artistic program also includes Richard Serra’s 75-foot-long Wake (2003), an installation, Seattle Vivarium, by Mark Dion, which comprises a nurse log enclosed in a greenhouse, and photography by Glenn Rudolph.
Several Seattle-area residents have pledged gifts of important examples of modernist sculptures to the park.

Total area: 8.5 acres
Projected opening: Fall 2006

Client: Seattle Art Museum
Lead Designers: Weiss/Manfredi
Architecture/Landscape/Urbanism

Consultant Team:
Structural and Civil Engineering Consultant:
 Magnusson Klemencic Associates
Landscape Architecture Consultant:
 Charles Anderson
 Landscape Architecture
Aquatic Landcape and Aquatic Engineering Consultant:
 Anchor Environmental, Seattle, WA
 WA Mechanical and Electrical Engineering Consultant:
 ABACUS Engineered Systems
Lighting Design Consultant:
 Brandston Partnership Inc.
General Contractor:
 Sellen Construction, Seattle, WA
Geotechnical Engineering Consultant:
 Hart Crowser, Seattle, WA
Environmental Consultant:
 Aspect Consulting, Seattle, WA
Graphics Consultant:
 Pentagram, New York, NY
Security and AV/IT Consultant:
 ARUP, New York, NY
Project Management:
 Barrientos LLC, Seattle, WA

Weiss/Manfredi arcspace features