BentBlind

Built on a seasonal flood plain, under the canopy of a large sycamore grove, BentBlind is designed as a multi-generational bird blind and resting station along an accessible, compressed-earth trail overlooking the Pomperaug River. The project is sited within the 660-acre Bent of the River National Audubon Center, located in Southbury, Connecticut, a rural town with the state’s most concentrated senior population.  Acting as both a marker and a gateway at a point where the trail turns away from the river, the project provides both sheltered seating and framed views across the river. A collection of 8” x 8” cruciform columns made of American cypress are carefully placed and modulated to form seating, frame views, define the pathway, and mark the trail.  It is the third research-design-build project completed by North Studio at Wesleyan University.

An accumulation of columnar landscape components partially protected by a space-frame canopy clad in engineered sailcloth, BentBlind is an intentional “ruination” of a series of modernist architectural tropes (rusticated Miesian columns rendered in rough-cut cypress, discontinuous and fragmentary space frames, and indeterminate interiority).  Collectively, these components act as a built analog, in miniature, for the large sycamore grove in which they are arranged, while their layered vertical striation creates a moiré interference pattern as visual camouflage for bird watching.