SPANNING Between Structure and Nature

Abstract

The design project, a new student union building for the Virginia Tech campus is a 420-foot-long structure spanning from earth to water. Along a steel-glass bridge, three simple volumes play together to achieve the functions of the student union. There is an order among Nature, Architecture, and People in this project. Simple geometric forms and the elegant structure interact with nature to achieve the order. People animate the serenity and become the core of the poetic environment. The building is also a spanning between the past and the future. Imagining that many years later, when graduates of Virginia Tech sit on the balcony of the bridge with their family, recalling memorable events that happened near the duck pond, the building presents not only a spanning between structure and nature, but also an expression of human place, which I believe architecture should be.