Tod Williams and Billie Tsien have been selected to build the new skating rink and outdoor center in Prospect Park. NY Times
New Ice Skating Rinks for Prospect Park

The Prospect Park Alliance has selected Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects to design the Lakeside Center, a 38,000-square-foot recreation building and two ice skating rinks totaling 35,000 square feet. The center will include a cafe, gift shop, lockers, space to rent skates and an area to rent pedal boats on the nearby lake. Construction is scheduled to begin in 2008 and be completed in 2010 on a site currently used for parking and storage. After the new center opens, the Kate Wollman Rink — opened in 1961 and used by more than 100,000 visitors from November to March — and its 15,000-square-foot building will be demolished. The landscape architect Christian Zimmerman will oversee the restoration of the present rink’s site to reflect the original landscape designs of Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux. The selection of the architects was announced at a news conference in Brooklyn by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg; the City Council speaker, Christine C. Quinn; and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, who have each allocated $7.5 million toward the estimated $39 million cost. Representative Anthony D. Weiner and former Representative Major R. Owens secured nearly $1 million in federal financing. The rest is to come from private donors. In an interview, Ms. Tsien and Mr. Williams, whose works include the American Folk Art Museum in Manhattan, said they hoped to design the rink to accommodate other uses during the off-season and to be ecologically sensitive. “Rinks inherently in this climate are not necessarily good for this environment, but the mayor and the park are absolutely committed to making this a green rink,” Mr. Williams said. One of the rinks will be partly enclosed but naturally ventilated, he said. SEWELL CHAN