Carr Square Castle is a proposal for urban and civic transformation at the former Pruitt Igoe site in St. Louis, Missouri. The project consists of an informal landscape of berms punctuated by a central chapel. The entry is a long sequence, culiminating as one ascends while curling up and into the chapel.
The berms foster an informal and unconventional topography, which uses debris found on site from the demolition of Pruitt Igoe buildings and construction material that has been illegally dumped there since as fill material. The berm garden is organized such that entering the chapel one moves through two meadows before descending into an outer forecourt.
By descending into the ground the chapel appears to be supported by the berms, amplifying the mass of the chapel as a spatial threshold. The prolonged entry to the chapel continues as one re-ascends into an inner court, framing the St. Louis Arch in the distance.
By descending into the ground the chapel appears to be supported by the berms, amplifying the mass of the chapel as a spatial threshold. The prolonged entry to the chapel continues as one re-ascends into an inner court, framing the St. Louis Arch in the distance.
