it’s a pleasure to be part of this
year’s TEDx utk today I’m here to tell
you a little bit about a very special
place my role in helping make that place
in reality and how that place has
impacted so many people that have come
to visit it so everyone has a particular
relationship with this day I was living
and working in Manhattan at the time and
I remember exactly what I was wearing I
was wearing raspberry colored crop pants
and a black shirt and I was on my way to
meet my boss at the time at a job site
and I had stopped on the corner of 5th
Avenue and 14th Street and I witnessed
the explosion in the South Tower
and this is after I was trying to
process what had happened in the first
Tower and while I and all of us had
never experienced anything like this
before
deep down I seen I felt like we were
living through something a significant
moment in history so New York City had
lost all cellphone contact the subways
had shut down and so the information I
was learning was coming from word on the
streets and people were huddled around
open car doors listening to the radio
they were gathered in front of
electronic store windows watching live
news coverage of what was happening just
a dozen or so blocks downtown and amidst
the disbelief and the confusion and the
sorrow and intermittent military planes
flying overhead the word on the street
was that the Pentagon had just been hit
so this news elevated the utter
significance of what was likely playing
out around us
the year that followed was intense it
was very scary and it was tremendously
sad especially for those of us who were
living in Manhattan at the time as I and
Keith kaseman my husband and partner
were and like so many others we wanted
to contribute something positive to
during these times that were so
incredibly unsettling so in June of 2002
we learned that the Pentagon memorial
was the first of the three sites that
was going to have a design competition
and since Keith and I had just graduated
from architecture school we felt maybe
this is the forum into which we could
contribute an idea however brief it
would be about towards a conversation
that would be had about how to remember
these people who had lost their lives
that tragic day and the due date for
that competition was September 11 2002
so this was our competition entry board
the competition was a 100% anonymous it
was free to enter and it was open to
absolutely anybody and what struck us
most was a statement that was written by
a core group of family members who lost
loved ones at the Pentagon and they
charged us to create a place that would
make you think but not tell you what to
think or how to feel and this really
resonated with us because there was no
one way to remember that day and what it
meant was that individual thought and
reflection and remembrance was paramount
to the mission of this place how do you
make a place that is infinitely
interpretable and is unlike anything
you’ve ever experienced before so there
were over 1,200 entries we were one of
six finalists and then ultimately
unanimously selected as the winner
so it took us six years to go from this
to this so for a quick orientation the
memorial is a two acre park located
directly in front of the side of the
building that was hit by American
Airlines flight 77 and this is really
rare in the context of memorials of
Washington DC most if not all of them
are depicting and dedicated to an event
that happened somewhere else in the
world the building was completely
restored by the one-year anniversary of
the tax this showed our resolve and our
resilience but it also erased the
evidence of what happened that day and
what happened to the individuals that
lost their lives and this charred piece
of limestone was the only indicator and
it was located at the point of impact on
the building which you can see here in
this little circle that little dark spot
is that charred piece of limestone this
part of the building is completely
inaccessible to the public especially
when you’re now in a new world of
heightened security awareness warning
levels and preparedness so it was
incredibly important to the families
that the memorials serve as a way to
tell the story and really as a reminder
to generations to come of what happened
here that day so we were able to create
on a memorial that is open to the public
24/7 only about a hundred yards from
that charred stone so a quick overview
and how the memorial is organized if you
haven’t been there it’s organized along
a timeline each one of these lines
corresponds to a year of birth so the
youngest victim was three years old so
she was born in 1990
eight and the eldest victim was 70 born
in 1930 and as you can see the there’s a
big gap here so there were five children
involved in this tragedy and this gap
indicates that there were no victims
between the ages of 11 and 21 so the
park is intent its intent is to give
hints and clues about what happened that
day and who’s remembered here the age
lines are parallel with the trajectory
that flight 77 took into the building so
as a visitor you’re immediately oriented
to the events that were unfolding that
morning and then as you see through the
distribution that this is really just a
sampling of everyday life these people
were at work or they were traveling and
they’re now forever remembered here
together it took us two years to
assemble our core team only a sampling
of which is represented here and as you
can see they came from all corners of
our country and it took two more years
and countless super-technical design
adjustments to figure out exactly how we
were going to make these highly
customized memorial unit benches made of
stainless steel
granite precast concrete light and water
new productions new production
techniques were developed by our
incredible team to carry all of this out
and to really make it look easy and then
it took two more years to make
everything and install it on-site so if
you would entertain this for a second
and for the super geeks out there I’ll
breeze through a sampling of some of the
behind the scenes work that went on to
make this happen this is the sand cast
mold that would cast to stainless steel
pieces at a time
the pouring of the molten steel which it
was always really awesome to see and
like the birth of many things it was
really messy at first this was really
cool that the stainless steel alloy that
we used it had to be reheated to 2400
degrees Fahrenheit and then quickly
cooled and this process allowed the
molecules within the stainless steel
alloy to freeze into a configuration for
maximum corrosion resistance because we
didn’t want anything to happen to the
stainless steel throughout all the
varying weather conditions and even with
so many computer-controlled machinery
that was that we were working with it
really came down to a deep care and
knowledge of true craft masters who
poured their heart and soul into making
each one of these memorial units perfect
for instance this is a Buse if Yi is the
best metal polisher that as far as we’re
concerned and he just so happens to be
just an incredibly generous and kind
person
so in all there were lots and lots of
steps to achieve a highly finished and
timeless quality all in again in a way
to make it seem easy and straightforward
for in the end these were the people
that we were working so hard for each
one of these people lost either a spouse
or a sibling and this was the first
prototype bench installed and the first
set of smiling faces that were evidence
enough for us to know that every step
along the way had been an incredible
honor for us and well worth all the hard
work
so meanwhile in parallel the site was
being prepared for the installation of
the memorial unit components these are
foundation units the concrete water the
basins coming in followed by the age
lines putting in and the planting soil
and then finally the trees being put in
shortly before we dedicated the park and
here are a few other design details that
help tell the story of that day this is
what we call the zero line and it is a
demarcation between the present which is
life since 9/11 and the past which was
life leading up to that tragic moment
and the ground cover changes from
hardscaping to crushed gravel so as you
enter the park you as a visitor hear
your own footsteps so the police has an
emphasis on life while we remember those
that we lost the memorial units are
oriented in two different directions and
that’s to say who was in the building at
the time that they died and who was
onboard flight 77 the names are engraved
at the very end of the cantilever so if
you read the name and the building is in
the background of your view they were in
the building there were 125 individuals
conversely like this one over here when
you read the name and the sky is in the
background
they were aboard the plane again hints
and clues about who was remembered here
there were really beautiful moments
about how the surrounding environment
was captured in the curves of the
stainless steel bringing essentially the
sunset down into the pools of water and
how almost by magic the stainless steel
appears to float effortlessly above the
water surface that was a really
difficult detail to pull off again part
of the way of making it look easy
and the birds ears are noted along the
perimeter bench and they serve as a
terminus to the age lines that score and
across the entire width of the site so
everything was in place all we needed
were people this is the evening before
the dedication of the memorial on the
seventh anniversary the opening day was
probably one of the most emotionally
charged days of my life
over 16,000 people attended the
dedication ceremony and seeing the
smiles on the family’s faces family
members who had not returned to the site
since the day they lost their loved one
and knowing that we played this role in
helping turn a place of such tragedy and
sorrow into one of peace and solace and
reflection and my face hurt from the
rollercoaster of emotions that it
displayed over the course of that day
there were family reunions and quiet
reflections and playful and innocent
interactions and now the park just
simply exists for all visitors to come
and experience and engage in a way that
works and feels right for them some
wonderful surprises are these dynamic
reflections that happen when the Sun is
at high noon and new traditions of
remembrance again it was amazing to see
how people felt the water was almost
and little three-year-old Dana
Falkenberg her her bench is the first
one you encounter when you enter the
park and it causes a moment of pause to
realize that she and her eight-year-old
sister and their two parents were all
lost here that day so it’s a place that
whose Beauty changes across the course
so this image always brings the story
full circle back for me when Keith and I
started designing this memorial we asked
ourselves how do we create a peaceful
and contemplative place for say a mom
and her two kids to come and remember
their dad so this this image tells me
that perhaps we achieved that in some
way and really to just know that this
place exists it’s been almost it’s been
open for almost 10 years and that it has
impacted in some small way the hundreds
and thousands of people who have come
there so far and they can tell us what
is important to them and what they walk
away from when after visiting and so to
wrap up I’d like to share an experience
of our own son Oscar who’s here today
who visited the memorial for the first
time when he was almost four years old
Keith took him to DC for a boy’s weekend
and when they were heading to the
memorial Keith didn’t prepare Oscar he
didn’t lay down any ground rules instead
he said you do what you want when you’re
there you know this is a place for you
to explore and to engage and completely
unprompted he discovered on his own some
of the special features we had hoped
only the design connoisseurs would
notice and of course as any almost
four-year-old would find fun and
so this is the video of Oscars first
so we just hope that for this generation
that lived through this horrible day for
the generations that will only learn
about it in the history books that this
memorial will serve as a place for
individual thought and reflection
laughter and tears and that it’s
memories will live on in the footsteps
of all of those visitors thank you [Applause]