Mission: Parking as Art P


BY RAND ELLIOT


ARKING GARAGES PROVIDE A perfunctory purpose in today’s corpo- rate environment. The requirement is simple. We have people,


we have cars; and we need to put them away temporarily. End of story? Not exactly.


We all use parking garages and


agree thatmost experiences are less than great. For many, garages have been dismissed as only necessary in our work-a-day world. Elliott + Associates has set


about to reinvent the parking garage experience.Happily,we had the per- fect client in Chesapeake Energy and its CEO,AubreyMcClendon. The reinvention began with


renaming the place a “car park” and envisioning a place to store cars.The goal was simply to acknowledge the typical reaction to most parking garage experiences. Patrons general- ly describe themas dark, dirty, low, confusing and oil-spotted – a place no one really wants to be. With a focus on functionality,


safety and compatibility with the Oklahoma City campus, the new Chesapeake Car Parkmakes a posi-


22


The center atriumat the Chesapeake Car Park allows sunlight to flood the interior of the garage and provides a colorful view for parkers.


MARCH 2009 • PARKING TODAY • www.parkingtoday.com


tive statement about the corporation itself and the value it places on the quality of the campus environment. The building covers a city block and stores 791 vehicles.


With such a large scale, the architects skinned the structure in 3/8”-wide stainless steel mesh. The mesh chosenwas LARGOWEAVE 2022, a design wiremeshmanufac- tured by Haver&Boecker and sup- plied byW.S. Tyler. The 25% open weave allows air movement as required by code and responds to the light in Oklahoma. With 300 sun-days per year,


the reflective quality of the mesh allows the surface to “dissolve” into the sky from reflections. The edges disappear and the surface provides a daily report on the ever-changing weather.At sunset, the western ele- vation captures the magic moment when the yellow becomes orange and finally becomes purple just before black. A unique feature of the exteri-


or is the aluminum outriggers on the east and south elevations. These 4’ extensions create changing linear shadows that artistically hint of the contents. The linear shadow becomes the same line as the park- ing stripe hidden inside. In an effort to “connect” the Car Park to the existing campus


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