Canvasback Care Facility
Fall ‘21 | Critic: David Costanza and Leslie Lok | In Collaboration with Allie DeVarona
The Canvasback Care Facility was designed to rehabilitate the canvasback duck, a species with a migratory period in upper New York that is especially aggressive towards humans. The facility was designed with a nested system of arches at varied heights. A pinching language was established with the shifting of arches in elevation and the pinching of the arrayed arches in plan. This language is again carried out in the net over the aviary, with openings of various sizes meant to allow native birds in while keeping the rehabilitated birds in. The resulting triangular voids provided an opportunity for infill with varying opacities, allowing for conditioned and unconditioned space determined based on program. Staff spaces are concentrated on the Northern end and public spaces are on the South. The space between the two smallest arches is activated as a public circulation corridor that permits visual access to the ducks without physical interaction. The use of nested and pinched arches generated a system of spatial and programmatic distinction that preserves human comfort and the safety of the canvasback duck.