Sunday, September 19, 2010

Gas Works Park





Yesterday I went to Gas Works Park, located in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle. Gas Works may not be the most beautiful park I’ve ever seen (that would be Vigeland Park in Oslo, Norway), but it certainly is the funkiest. It’s located on the former site of the Seattle Gas Light Company's gasification plant, and much of the old industrial architecture still remains as part of the park in the form of ruins or a renovated children’s play area. The park is situated on Lake Union, and it offers great views of the city skyline and the Olympic Mountains (when the weather is clear). I loved the odd contrast of old, austere industrial structures with peaceful sounds of water and birds (and the not-so-peaceful seaplane or two). Those old structures could be viewed as ugly reminders of man’s destruction of the natural environment, but instead they managed to seem like organic parts of the landscape, grown out of the earth itself, and imbuing the place with an eerie, almost haunted atmosphere. It would be a great place for Halloween scare-fests. Or weddings, apparently, as I saw a wedding party, dressed to the absolute nines, traipsing through the muddy ground.

Gas Works is a place of contrasts: it manages to be both somber and lighthearted at the same time; it quietly flaunts both natural and manmade beauty in a way that enhances all elements; it serves as a reminder of the city’s industrial past while also revealing the changing uses and symbolisms of things over time (ie., drab old gas industry trappings are now a colorful children’s playground); and it blurs traditional ideas of beauty and ugliness in order to show that the park can be considered both beautiful and ugly at the same time. It’s the most existential, philosophical park I’ve ever seen.

And to top it all off – or should I say take it all off – it’s also the place where those Solstice Cyclists finish their annual nude bike ride. Now that would be a study in contrasts…

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Onie's gettin' out-and-about. Great description of the park. M

Anonymous said...

Love your tidbits of info and love your writings. Mama

Anonymous said...

We love it so! :)

Kristen said...

Thanks for the encouraging feedback everyone! I'm glad you all love it so!

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