Working with NBBJ, Seattle TLS designed a one block campus for a downtown campus of the University of Idaho. Both the placement and the design of the campus buildings are directed by a series of spatial “vectors.” These vectors are visually aligned with features of the city including the state capitol, research hospital, sports stadium, river system, foothills, and an historic street being revived as a spine for new development. In this way, the dominant architecture of the site takes its shape and direction from these critical connections off-site. Sitting atop a parking podium 15 feet above the street, the central plaza has commanding views in five different directions down the “vectors”. The design of the central plaza makes a fountain out of the entire surface of the plaza using a “water network” within stainless steel trench grates that can be walked across at any point.
The network will carry water from a variety of sources. First, it will serve as a collection device for storm runoff on the plaza and from the building roofs directing this water to a series of stepping bio-filtration ponds. During the cold dry winter, the network will carry warm geothermal water (which is an effluent from the interior heating system) through the channels, creating a steamy, moist environment in the plaza. In consideration of summer heat, the channels will be equipped with misting nozzles, generating intersecting lines of fog to cool the air and create a glowing network of mist at night.
