Mason News  Sept. 9, 2013 by Buzz McClain

There’s nothing random about Exploratory Hall.

In fact, the operative word during its five years of renovation and development was “intentionality.” The layout, the fixtures, the furnishings, the flooring, the lighting and even the wood panel in one of the three-story atriums are all intentional by design. The building, which was formerly known as Science and Tech II, is rich with subtle details that enrich the collaboration between student to professor, and student to student, while surrounding them with symbols of science.

In Exploratory Hall’s tile floor, the circles represent splashes of water droplets, the squiggles are the outline of a double helix, and the Fibonacci spiral shows up cutting through it all. The “Periodic Tables” provide a visual pun. Photo by Alexis Glenn

Take a look at that wood panel. It looks like a series of small squares offset with larger squares, and for some designers, that would be decorative enough for a wall hanging. But Exploratory Hall’s panel depicts the geometric derivation of theFibonacci spiral, in which each subsequent number is the sum of the previous two. While STEM aficionados might recognize it, others will need ...

Charles Jencks

Charles Alexander Jencks (born 21 June 1939) is an American architectural theorist, landscape architect and designer. His books on the history and criticism of Modernismand Postmodernism are widely read in architectural circles. Jencks now lives in Scotland where he designs landscape sculpture and writes on cosmogenic art.[1]

Garden of Cosmic Speculation

Open to the public only one day a year, the Garden of Cosmic Speculation takes science and maths as its inspiration. Quite simply, there isn’t another garden like it in the world.

Northumberlandia, the Lady of the North: A supine land goddess makes her debut Washington Post Friday Nov. 23, 2012 

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Jencks notes that humans have been “speculating on cosmic events and existence for at least 80,000 years.” But only in recent decades have we come to understand the science of its origins and workings. This has led to a shift in our consciousness that he explores in his work.

“We are living in a new paradigm. We now know the universe back to the beginning; we know so many things that upset the modernist Newtonian worldview,” he said. Jencks and other contemporary artists — Maya Lin, for example ...