by: Jessica Sheridan Assoc. AIA LEED AP
National September 11 Memorial.
Jessica Sheridan
After logging on within the first hour that the reservation system went live and finding the first date available wasn’t until October, my timeslot finally arrived to visit the National September 11 Memorial. At the end of my afternoon I left with mixed feelings about different aspects of the plaza, but I have to withhold full judgment until the vision is fully complete.
After entering the plaza from the southwest corner, the approach to the pools was surreal, with the neatly manicured strips of grass and regularly-planted trees straight ahead and the large HVAC plants to my left and construction to the right. Perhaps because I have witnessed the large hole in the ground at the site for so many years, when I got to the first pool, where the south tower stood, my first impression was that it was smaller than I expected. However, walking around the first pool took quite some time and through the journey itself the enormity of their size really solidified for me.
My biggest criticism of the memorial is that, with the sound of the waterfalls and the flow of water into the center of the pools, my eye was really drawn away from the names of the victims. The pools are so large that the human scale is diminished, and the only thing that drew my focus to the victims and their names were small, pink origami cranes wedged into the engravings and dots of water where visitors had reached into the pool and left their mark next to their loved ones (truly touching and intimate). Also, I had expected to see the sky and surrounding buildings reflected at the basin of the pools, which I thought would be poetic, but because the stone is so dark and the water is constantly moving, all I saw was water moving from the perimeter into a dark void. I had trouble connecting to the meaning behind it.
One of the most successful structures on the plaza is Snøhetta’s Memorial Museum Pavilion. I think it really anchors the two pools on the site and with the angled glazing it reflects both the pools and the surrounding buildings, including 1 WTC, in a way that makes you see both in a different light.
I look forward to revisiting the site as construction continues at different times of the year. It will be interesting to see how the other buildings will reframe the pools as they grow from the ground. Until complete the site will remain in flux, but that should give us all time to adjust to its new future.