The Shirley Chisholm Leisure Center in the East Flatbush area of Brooklyn is public architecture at its finest. The new facility named after the first Black woman elected to Congress was created by Studio Gang, and backed by the New york city City Department of Style and Building And Construction (DDC) and Parks Department.
A voluminous public swimming pool chamber with fish tummy beams made of mass wood imported from Austria– the natatorium– is evocative of expressive wood ceilings by Alvar Aalto. Arched clerestories that perambulate the brick exterior hearken to the postmodern monumentality of Louis Kahn. Light dapples the water through the high-performance glazing.
Look closely and, emblazoned onto glass interior partitions, are small flowers influenced by lapel pins from Chisholm’s 1972 innovative U.S. presidential campaign, when she ended up being the very first Black lady to run for the Oval Workplace. Splashes of tangerine orange and powder blue illuminate the concrete walls and corrugated metal decking– a little paint goes a long method here.
Facade engineers at Thornton Tomasetti opted for brick-faced architectural precast panels that were upraised off-site.(Alexander Severin )A sculptural facade that culminates at a pinnacle, fronting a pedestrian plaza to the structure’s west, responds to the multivalent context– instantly surrounding the center are a large public park, low- and high-rise housing, and a public school. The designers had fun with this one, and it shows.