VisionDivision Enlists State Tree for a Social Statement

Leave it to VisionDivision to create architecture “about” the idea of building out of wood.

People have made buildings of wood for so long that we hardly think about the trees that spend sometimes hundreds of years manufacturing that wood for us.

The Virginia B. Fairbanks Art & Nature Park celebrates one particular species: the yellow poplar that is Indiana’s state tree.

The Swedish studio was commissioned by the Indianapolis Museum of Art, to design a concession stand for the Virginia B. Fairbanks Art & Nature Park, utilising the total potential of the tree, branches and all.

The idea was to use the tree “as gently as possible so that the source of what we harvest is displayed in a pure, pedagogic and respectful way—respectful to both the source itself and to everyone visiting the building.”

After peeling it off, the bark – which can last up to 80 years – were sterilized and kept in climate-controlled storage for future needs as shingles.

The tree is barely touched, but used as support for the swings, and as pillars and studs for the kiosk, and swings, benches and tables.

For the visionary Swedish firm, the project is fairly typical of their imaginative, and sometime completely crazy design ideas we have covered. Search VisionDivision at the top of this page, you’ll see what I mean. My favourite is the crawfish mansion.

The tree is allowed to provide the shape of the project, as if it grew for the purpose of supporting a row of swings for the children of Indiana to play on.