The Landscape

The proposed South Wing and East Tower additions to Campbell Hall serve as challenging catalysts for reconnecting the School of Architecture to its larger context. Warren T. Byrd, Jr. is articulating a vision for a series of new and adapted landscapes for Campbell Hall: a sequence of passages and places that give long neglected aspects of the Architecture School a greater presence within the University community.

The landscape proposal has three distinct, interrelated precincts - the Passage, the Traverse and the South Slope. While each of these landscapes has a unique character, all establish continuity within the project and in relation to the larger setting. They express regional and local hydrology, geology, and ecology. They create corridors of movement and occupiable places of gathering and repose that mediate between the interior and exterior of Campbell Hall. The three precincts are described in a progression from east to west.

The Passage

The Passage provides a direct connection from Rugby Road to the Architecture School. Bracketed by the University Art Museum and the fraternity to the north, the proposal preserves what is best about the existing landscape while introducing new walls, generous steps, and plantings that reinforce the new alignment between Rugby Road and the East Tower.

The Traverse

The Traverse negotiates over twenty feet of topographic change in the complex and difficult landscape enfolding the new East Tower. This is a landscape that honors the East Tower in simple austere surfaces of stone floorings, concrete and stone ramps, and plantings of species that recall a primordial order. At the north edge of Carr’s Hill, high retaining walls are staggered back from the parking court and East Tower to create pedestrian access to the third and fourth floors of Campbell Hall and to the landscapes beyond. Upper and lower terraces create linear rooms that provide seating, shade, and a repository for student constructs. At the uppermost terrace, an allee of native trees spatially connects the University Art Museum with Campbell Hall and the South Wing.

The South Slope

The introduction of the South Wing affords the School an opportunity to redress a long neglected landscape. Parallel to the new addition, a series of stepped and ramped transitions alternate with work terraces, demonstration gardens, and outdoor classrooms that emerge directly from jury and studio spaces on the second and third floors. Throughout this linear landscape, the course of stormwater is expressed through narrow rills, drains, and weirs. Plants, pavement, and wall materials will be selected to echo the natural and modified infrastructure that characterizes Piedmont Virginia, in particular its xeric to mesic to hydric cross-section.