Baton Rouge Cimetière, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, 1997
W. Jude LeBlanc, in association with Brian D. Andrews (Andrews/LeBlanc)
… what in an ancient Spanish church, may be seen written near the steep entrance to a little subterraneous crypt …
"Wouldst thou pass this lowly door?
Go and angels greet thee there;
For by this their sacred stair
To descend is still to soar.
Bid a measured silence keep
What thy thoughts be telling o'er;
Sink to rise with wider sweep
To the heaven of thy rest,
For he climbs the heavens best
Who would touch the deepest deep"
from, Interpretations of Poetry and Religion,
by George Santayana
RED STICK--Site, Program, and Prudent Land Use. The Louisiana city, Baton Rouge, (French for "red stick"), was named by the French explorer, Sieur d'Iberville. The name refers to a pole, which separated the hunting grounds of two Native American tribes, the Bayagoulas and the Oumas. The blood of animal slaughters reddened this thirty-foot pole. It is thought to have been a boundary marker and a ceremonial artifact.
The site for this program, a Catholic cemetery, is an abandoned concrete loading platform located near the Huey P. Long Bridge, at the Mississippi River, in Baton Rouge. A bridge from the levee, that protects the city, accesses the platform.
The choice of site addresses the issue of land consumption. From Japan to Italy to the US, alternatives to land-intensive burial practices are being considered. Located at the undulating seam between land and water, this platform offers such an option. In addition to conserving land, making a cemetery on this platform would not adversely affect this wetland environment.
This program for a Catholic Parish includes a church, a crematorium, and a cemetery. Ground planes and relative height are themes introduced by the site--"…he climbs the heavens best/Who would touch the deepest deep…"
The program is disposed in relation to the elevational tension between the ground plane and the existing higher platform. Upon arrival, one moves up to the level of the platform at the location of the man-made levee. A bridge leads across to the cemetery, to the level of the dead. The open-air crypt is located at this level and provides a porous foundation for the church.
One ascends to the level of the church. From this level one may survey the cemetery platform, enter the church proper, access the upper portion of the mausoleum wall, or proceed to the crematorium chapel. The baptistery is located at this level, suspended above the river. Below the platform is the furnace for the crematorium and the suspended cage of the Tomb of the Unknowns. The bell tower provides the best plan view of the local compound as well as a privileged view back to the city. The bell tower is a vertical ruler, which connects all of the levels of the project with the sky and the changing level of the water.
Making cemeteries to house bodies above ground is not a new idea in southern Louisiana. A high water table and wet soil made the practice of above ground burial a practical necessity. New Orleans is famous for particularly striking cemeteries, which are like diminutive cities. Such cemeteries are found not only in New Orleans, but also in many towns and cities across the southern portion of the state.
Up close, haptic experience of the site would reveal comparisons to urban spatial aggregations. The long view from the bridge would offer an unusual bird's eye view, very similar to a roof plan rendering. One would enter the city of the red stick over this new small city in red, perceived through perspective at the small size of a map.
RED CEMETERY--Concrete, Steel, Earth, Iron Oxide and Blood. The existing steel bridge leads to a horizontal platform of poured-in-place concrete. We propose to resurface the platform with a new pour of concrete and to build essentially all elements of corten steel--a steel that oxidizes to a point, and then essentially seals itself against further corrosion. Most elements will be sheathed in corten steel with the exception of the common grave, the crematorium chapel, the roof of the church and the sacristy. These elements will be clad in copper, left to turn to a blue-green patina over time.
Red clay--ADAMAH--is given its pigment by a high incidence of iron oxide. It is the oxidation of iron that gives rust as well as blood its red coloration.
In traditional cemeteries the dead are placed below the ground, in the red earth. In this cemetery the dead are placed above the level of the ground within red planes of upright steel.
"When there was as yet no shrub of the field upon the earth, and as yet no grasses of the field had sprouted, because Yaweh had not sent rain upon the earth, and there was no man to till the soil, but a flow up from the ground and watered the whole surface of the earth, then Yaweh molded Adam from the earth's dust (adamah), and blew into the nostrils the breath of life, and Adam became a living being."
From The Book of J
ARCHITECTURE
Casita Garcia
Ellis House
Twentieth Century
Veterans Memorial
Iceland House
Baton Rouge Cimetiere
Two More Scupper Houses
Dogtrot Scupper House
Shotgun Scupper House
Wall-Highway
Wall-Mask
Wall-Perimeter
Public Space In
The New American City
Free Bridge
Goldstein Studio
Another Glass House Competition
Louisiana House
Origlio/Vanderbilt Condominium
