solar field house by zellnerplus


american firm zellnerplus were awarded 2nd prize for the fort tilden field house located
on a former military site in new york.





salt fields and salt pyramids
the architects see this project as instrument for the exploration of the nebulous edge between
what is nominally termed landscape urbanism and a more economical means of strategically
managing resources by providing a viable, if unusual, means of designing a land-machine for
ecological conservation. our land-machine consists of a series of ocean water intake
and irrigation channels, beachwells, water tables or ponds and artificially assembled sand dunes.
the scheme proposes a series of desalination fields powered by a vast solar field mounted on
an approximately 225,000 square foot canopy. the energy source, would be renewable thereby
eliminating harmful greenhouse gas emissions. salt gathered from the desalination process would
be stored on the site in the form of a series of pyramidal land forms, available for distribution
to greater new york and the eastern seaboard during the de-icing season, thereby replacing mined
salt sources.



field house = solar field canopy


their proposal envisions a mat-like structure supporting a 225,000 square foot solar canopy.
this flying carpet like structure rises above the ground plane to a height of eighty feet over
the proposed playing fields. the flying mat-structure, which is approximately twenty feet thick
across its surface, is fully inhabitable. it contains a gymnasium, private viewing boxes for
the stadium, a sports bar and restaurant, a café, meeting rooms, locker rooms, an observation
deck, a sports lounge and suspending seating above the tennis and basketball courts which are
embedded in two 20,000 square foot legs that hold up the entire mat-structure.

our architectural and urban landscape strategies aim to move this site from its current
status as somewhat peripheral to being something akin to an ecological framework that
will help focus and amplify the site’s public role within long island and greater new york’s
urban fabric. no longer relegated to its status as an a decommissioned military installation,
we imagine a renewed role for fort tilden as productive landscape- one that is opened
and activated by its sports and desalination fields. - zellnerplus

aerial view



the structure of the house



floor plan