Archinect - News

Studio Gang, SCAPE complete work on transformative $61 million Tom Lee Park in Memphis

2023-11-06T15:35:00-05:00

Studio Gang and SCAPE have shared new photos following the completion of work on their $61 million Tom Lee Park redevelopment project in Memphis, Tennessee.

The 31-acre riverfront space puts Memphis squarely in league with a host of contemporary restorative urban green space projects slated for other major American cities, including San Francisco's new Presidio Tunnel Tops and the partially completed Freshkills Park in Staten Island.

Its ecological restoration work and accessibility to the residents of one of the city’s most impoverished neighborhoods make it an instant industry standard-bearer. The project creates a connection between downtown and the Mississippi River, also providing new ADA-approved access at three different points for the first time.

Image © Tom Harris

Studio head Jeanne Gang says: “Insights and input from the Memphis community were essential to this project from the very beginning, to make sure the park’s programming reflects how Memphians from across the city ...

Watershed moments: Derek Hoeferlin on managing 21st-century waterways

2021-06-14T14:38:00-04:00

From headwaters near Salem, Missouri, the Meramec River snakes 218 free-flowing miles, through 14 counties and scores of towns, skirting St. Louis before emptying into the mighty Mississippi.

Derek Hoeferlin grew up outside St. Louis, on a wooded hill close to the Meramec. As he commuted to school along Interstate 44, he’d cross the river and its sprawling floodplain twice or more each day.

“It’s always mesmerized me,” Hoeferlin recalls. “Something about its meandering made me daydream. Rivers don’t give a damn about north or south, east or west — or interstates for that matter. Water flows where water wants to flow.”

Today Hoeferlin is a licensed architect and chair of both landscape architecture and urban design programs in the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts. In many ways, rivers have become his life’s work. But the daydreams are tempered by a growing sense of urgency.

“Too often, architects are responding to emergencies,” he adds. “It’s triage work. But we need to be m...

Studio Gang and SCAPE partner for Memphis riverfront park

2020-05-27T16:33:00-04:00

A proposal for the Memphis River Parks Partnership's Studio Gang- and SCAPE-designed waterfront park in Memphis has taken a step forward as the firms present their latest visions for the 30-acre project site.

Site plan.

Following years of design and community engagement, the semi-final design of Tom Lee Park includes a collection of discretely programmed landscaped areas designed alternately to accommodate human needs alongside those of the mighty Mississippi River.

The park's central gathering areas.

The northernmost section of the park connects to Memphis's Beale Street and to a forthcoming downtown art museum, while central portions are geared more toward neighboring community use.

An interior view of the Civic Canopy.

Here, a "Civic Canopy" offers a large, flat expanse for public gatherings and events. A central forested overlook provides shade as well as a promontory from which to see the river and the city in an adjacent area .

View of the nature overlook zone at the southern ...

Studio Gang releases design for Memphis Riverfront Concept

2017-07-18T19:19:00-04:00

Shaped from survey responses from over 4,500 Memphians at multiple public events, The Memphis Riverfront Concept proposes to transform six miles and five distinct zones of the historic and culturally significant part of the city.

Many of the Concept’s proposed uses, from an iconic adventure playground to a special outlook where people can listen to live music at sunset, come directly from community members’ suggestions.

With hopes of increasing the riverfront’s use, vibrancy, and economic potential, the project seeks to foster civic pride, restore natural conditions and the native ecology, and connect various assets along the river.

The Concept focuses on showing how five zones—the Fourth Bluff, Mud Island, Tom Lee Park, MLK Park, and Greenbelt Park—can leverage their particular strengths to become distinctive places offering activities and experiences that appeal to people of all generations, incomes, races, and backgrounds.

Elevating visitors above the river in Greenbelt Park,...

The architect who wants New Orleans learn a lesson or two from Amsterdam

2015-09-03T14:54:00-04:00

David Waggonner is an urban and environmental architect. Since Hurricane Katrina decimated his city, he’s been focusing on urban stormwater management, mapping out designs for New Orleans that would mimic the way Dutch cities like Amsterdam and Rotterdam deal with water. In the Netherlands, people “invite water into the city,” meaning water is visible everywhere. [...] “In New Orleans, we’ve hidden and squandered the asset.”

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SCAPE with Rogers Marvel named Water Works park designers

2013-07-09T17:40:00-04:00

SCAPE and Rogers Marvel will shape one of the most dynamic destinations on the Mississippi River, the Minneapolis Parks Foundation and Minneapolis Park & Recreation Board announced today. The team was selected to create a schematic design for Water Works, a Minneapolis Park Board-owned riverfront district including the former Fuji Ya restaurant site and centered on St. Anthony Falls, the only true waterfall on the Mississippi River – “America’s fourth coast.”

Previously: Minneapolis’ Water Works Competition Shortlists West 8, SCAPE, Gustafson Guthrie Nicol

Minneapolis’ Water Works Competition Shortlists West 8, SCAPE, Gustafson Guthrie Nicol

2013-06-13T18:03:00-04:00

The Minneapolis Parks Foundation has announced a shortlist of three award-winning design teams for the schematic design project Water Works: A Next Generation Park on Minneapolis’ Central Riverfront. The teams are Gustafson Guthrie Nicol with VJAA and Interboro (Seattle/Minneapolis/New York); SCAPE with Rogers Marvel (New York); and Team West 8 (Rotterdam/New York).