In today’s busy world filled with fast-pace schedules, computer technology, and reliance on the car, society is steering away from natural places for contemplation and quiet architecture. That is why on the site that was once a parking lot in Grand Haven, MI I have proposed an urban garden that will provide a place for the local inhabitants as well as visitors a place to relax, reflect, and gain a heightened awareness of the cosmetology of the seasons. The garden also provides pavilions to view and reconnect with nature during the cold winter months when one feels like they are isolated to the indoors.

There are four pavilions (one for each season) in each corner of the garden that are tied together by a modern fence that bends and peels away to provide views and entrances to the inside world. The ground plane is composed of a 10’X10’ squares that slightly step up and down to provide opportunities for sitting, stepping, and water collection. Each pavilion is surrounded by a particular plant that provides a certain type of texture, color, and is representative of its season. The plants were also selected on their ability to grow and then disappear according to the time of year, thereby using the natural processes of the plants to change the architecture of the space. Instead of today’s notion of creating architecture and letting the landscape fill in the voids, I wanted to let the landscape create the architecture.