East Side Recreation Center

In collaboration with

Jen Maigret, former partner of MAde Studio

Client & Co-sponsor

Washtenaw County Parks & Recreation Department

Co-sponsor

Taubman College of Architecture & Urban Planning,

OVPR (Office of the Vice President for Research)

Date

May 2012- December 2012

Main Collaborator / Design Team

PLY Architecture, Craig Borum, principal),, Caighley MacKellar

Engineer

SDI Structures

Design Assistants

Catherine Baldwin, Leigh Davis, Kathryn Dreitzler, Geoffrey Salvatore, Catherine Truong

Awards

2013 Michigan AIA Honor Award, Unbuilt Category

EASTSIDE RECREATION CENTER presents an interdisciplinary urban design for a mixed-use, recreation center on a site on the Huron River, immediately adjacent to downtown Ypsilanti. The recreational center is an architectural extension of a riverfront tree canopy that establishes continuity between a municipal park system, conceptualized by the Olmstead Brothers, a regional green network and the historical downtown. The ground is a constructed landscape that generously accommodates the recreational programs while the floating canopy roof above defines and connects the spaces underneath. These spatial strategies promote social interaction, transparency to the city and a connection to the Border to Border Trail. In these ways, the Eastside Recreation Center is positioned at the heart of a valuable confluence and is both a catalyst for urban revitalization, and an opportunity to showcase sustainable approaches to the redevelopment of a mixed use, postindustrial, river front property.