We broke ground in late October and now we have almost jumped every hurdle in the permitting/licensing race!  In the next few weeks, we shall secure our construction permit and begin on the garden!  It’s been a very long road, but we’ve finally gotten here.  We should have a new garden in the Spring for use of all who are a part of Brackenridge.

Tranquility Garden Groundbreaking Ceremony

 

I am elated to say that we are chugging forward, full steam ahead!  Yes, it seems that it’s been quiet, but we’ve been working like mad people getting this thing pulled together.  Our wonderful clients at Seton and Central Health have been fundraising and assisting in our site development permit process.  We finished the construction documents and they are in the hands of our contractor.  We’re super close to getting our site development permit and getting closer to getting our license agreement approved.  Things are falling into place!

Yesterday, we met on site with our Seton project manager and our General Contractor to discuss the site, procedures and getting started.  We’re hoping for a groundbreaking next month and construction to start soon after that.  Thank you to Chris, Martie, Bob, Greg, Betty, Brad, Dani, Lauren, Brian and the City of Austin for helping getting this pushed forward!  Stay posted for updates and construction progress photos.  Here is our garden:

Graphic by TBG Partners

Resurrection:  refers to the literal coming back to life of the biologicallly dead.  The act of rising from the dead.  A rising again, as from decay, disuse, etc.; revival.

It’s March 1, 2011.  It’s been almost a year since my last post, so I see this as a resurrection.  I was on maternity leave from March to July.  My return back to work in July was a busy one.  It wasn’t until around late 2010 that we got working again on this garden.  So, I consider the garden itself a resurrection….a revival.  There have been some major changes….again.  And they are good.  Here’s what has happened:

Late 2010 -  We were moving forward with the new design of the ICU garden and the rest of the garden.  We had met with Austin Energy and had worked out plans to rework the access drive and utilize some grass paving and really fence off the area around the transformers/vents.  We had our new design and fundraising commenced.  Then we waited. . .

We weren’t approved at that point for site development permit, so we sat tight.  Eight months went by (not sure how that happened, well, I was gone for four of them).  We had a few meetings and fundraising events.  Then in November, we got our contracts in place, and were approved to move forward with the permitting.  We got a site survey and prepared ourselves for the work.  We prepared two more design plans based on some functional comments.

Fast forward to today.  We now have another new plan, but a great one.  We knew that we would have to phase the garden because we were fundraising for our construction costs.  Seton decided that it would be best to concentrate first on the bulk of the garden.  So, we added a door down the hall from the ICU and redesigned the garden for this new entry.  And, it’s amazing.  There’s a new trellis design, two relaxing water features, some nice textual stone paving, the Prelude sculpture (yes, still in the garden plan!) and lots of nice, lush landscaping.  It’s going to be a wonderful garden space for the ICU visitors, hospital visitors and staff as well.  We want to get this built! 

Graphic by TBG Partners

So, it’s the resurrection of our garden.  Kind of fitting since Easter is next month, if you are one of faith.  Sometimes it takes this many steps to get it right.  It reminds me of my daughter learning how to walk.  It’s all stumbles and falls and cries at first, but she gets better.  And she always keeps trying until she gets there.  She’s probably going to be walking in a month…just in time for her first birthday.  And, I bet we’re going to be going to the City for our permitting in the next month.  And construction following in 2011 after that.  It’s time to rise…  Let’s get walking.

Or at least I feel that it has.  30 degree or lower temperatures seem to be gone; the mexican plums and bradford pears are bright white; the redbuds are starting to purple; the long dreary days of winter seem to be melting away.  As far as our project, we have turned a new leaf and are working on the redesign of the courtyard.  We have accepted that we will have to keep the area around the vents including the paved utility laydown area/access drive.  We plan to wall around it with some gates for access and ventilation.  We are focusing our efforts on still creating an intimate garden/patio space for the ICU visitors.  Our inspiration below:

We are working to finalize the new plan and create new marketing graphics for our client to use at their fundraising committee kick-off meeting on the 23rd of March.

I don’t feel defeated; I feel that we had to make a change and a new beginning – just like this spring season.  This garden will still be an oasis in the center of the hospital.  It will still have all the tranquil and healing elements that we initially planned; it will just be arranged a little differently.  I really feel that once you get into the space, it is going to be wonderful.  This graphic below will still be close to the redesigned plan.  Enjoy.

Graphic by TBG Partners

Life wouldn’t be worth living without challenges, right?  Some of you may laugh and think, man, it sure would be easier to coast through life…uneventful and predictable.  Well, I think you don’t grow as a person unless you’re really confronted with challenges.  So, where am I going with this?  In the past month, we have been challenged on our tranquility garden site.  We discovered that the vents that existed outside our ICU “front” doors were actually owned by the City and that they must remain “as-is”.  Not only that, but there was an underground vault that housed several transformers that powered the entire hospital.  We couldn’t alter the paving around the vent area and we must retain vehicular access to them.  And not just any vehicle, but a crane truck that weighs 73,400 pounds when lifting a transformer into the vault.  Yeah, take a moment and let that marinate.

Photo by TBG Partners

Photo by TBG Partners

So, herein lies our challenge.  How do we design our garden around this existing element that needs to stay?  Well, we’re going to do the best design that we can to minimize the appearance and effect on our garden.  We’re still going to give the ICU visitors a space where they can decompress.  We just are really going to have to get creative to do this.  Our MEP and the City have been great to work with so far to try and get to the bottom of what is needed for this area – so thank you guys!  We’re probably going to have to incorporate walls and gates and screen planting and change our sight lines and pathways.  Stay tuned for our redesigned garden plan!

We’ve been through several renditions of the plan after meetings with the owner’s focus group.  We got so much great feedback that really helped formulate the design.  The information they provided was really powerful as far as how important this space really is.  We’re presenting our final SD plan tomorrow and I hope to post it after that.  Comments from the prior meeting that really stood out for me were:

• The main users of this garden are going to come from the ICU (intensive care unit) waiting room.  When a patient dies or if there is an unexpected tragedy, the families congregate in the hallway to get away from others in the room.  They really needed a space to move them outside the doors to “process” what is happening or what just happened.  They need something private, yet close; shaded, inviting and enveloping.
• Brack is the regional trauma center; level 2 in the Southwest US.  They get the most severe in 11 counties.  Trauma is 60% of the population.  The big difference is what happens here is that these people weren’t planning on coming here.  These are life changing, family changing events. – this statement really hit me hard. 
• Just as the events are tragic for the families, they are just as stressful for the staff (doctors and nurses) attending to these patients.  They need a separate space to be able to decompress.  These caregivers are under extreme stress and need to be able to be by themselves. 
• The space needs to be both quiet and restorative.  Shade is critical in this area!
• It is a new requirement in ICU patient rooms to have one window to see the changing of time. 
• We are trying to find the balance between open space and private space.  We will provide outdoor gathering and eating areas as well as meditiation “rooms”.

Photo by TBG Partners

Our principal in charge told us a great story about our future healing garden space.  Back in the late 90s, after the construction of the new portion of the building to the east, Brian was out on site assessing everything for the design of the children’s garden.  He remembers it being sometime in the summer and needless to say it was pretty hot.  He happened to notice a mother who had taken her child out to the barren courtyard under one of the two remaining trees on the site.  He marveled at that moment and how a tree and green grass and shade could coax those two of out the hospital.  I think that goes to show just how powerful green grass and green trees can be.  As luck would have it, I actually found a photo of the moment in our archived files of the old project.  That little child looks to be barefoot and tromping around in the grass.  I’m sure this was a relaxing moment for the two of them.  Imagine how a beautiful new garden in this space is going to be?

Graphic courtesy of TBG Partners

We were charged with creating a schematic design for the 125 birthday celebration where they would announce the tranquility garden as the “birthday present”.  We had about 2-3 weeks to come up with a design for the event.  Below is the initial concept.  We are currently working on a new rendition of the plan after meetings with an owner focus group to discuss what was wanted and needed.

Graphic courtesy of TBG Partners

Please join us for our journey on the design and implementation of the Tranquility Garden at the University Medical Center Brackenridge, a Seton Family of Hospitals in Austin, Texas.  I am going to invite you to read though our process and experience the birth of a healing garden. 

About one month ago, we were contacted by the hospital to design a tranquility garden for an open courtyard space.  What is interesting is that this was initially the site of the old Children’s Hospital of Austin.  Back in 2000 or so, TBG had worked on a design for a children’s garden in this space.  (I actually got to be a part of this project when I started back in April of 2000).  We had issued construction drawings on September 10, 2001 (the day before 9-11).  Soon after that, a decision was announced that the Children’s Hospital would be moving and they were to build a brand new facility at our Mueller redevelopment.  As upset as we were, we found ourselves overwhelmingly lucky to be selected to be the landscape architect for the new Children’s Hospital.  This hospital has gone on to become the first LEED Platinum hospital in the world.

So now, we are charged with designing a healing garden to serve the associates of the hospital and the patients and family at UMC Brack and their Intensive Care Unit.  We are thrilled to have the opportunity to work on this space again and to create such an important and special place for all the users.

The space is quite dreadful as it exists now.  I think it just makes for an even better “reveal” at the end – what a blank canvas!