PAWNEE, OKLAHOMA
Pawnee Nation
2019 Design Competition
First Place Entry
CELEBRATING THE PAST AND THE FUTURE OF THE PAWNEE
In a three-way partnership between the Oklahoma State University School of Architecture, the Association of Tribal Archives, Libraries, and Museums (ATALM), and the Pawnee Museum Design Advisory Committee, nearly four months were spent designing and refining a prototype Cultural Center for the Pawnee Nation.
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For over 30 years, the Pawnee Nation have desired to share their rich history and culture in a state-of-the-art facility that honors their traditional values and that will encourage the cultural development of generations to come. Originally from the plains of Nebraska and Kansas, the Pawnee are a proud nation that continues to honor the memories of their ancestors through ceremonial celebrations, cooking, and song.
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This project brought forth challenges to the design process that had not previously been encountered for academic purposes. Client interaction in the form of participatory design, real-world budget concerns, and cultural sensitivity were just some of the daily considerations that molded the design process through its ever-changing iterations. From initial conceptual dialogue with the Pawnee to the beginning stages of Design Development, these real-world design goals and challenges ultimately created the foundation of what may one day become a legitimate facility in Pawnee, Oklahoma.
This project was conceptually driven by a fascinating observation about the construction methods and design of the traditional Pawnee Earth Lodge. When considering the limited availability of natural structural materials on the plains of the western United States, it becomes clear that the Pawnee Earth Lodge was designed for load path efficiency. In order to shelter multiple families within one lodge, gravity loads were deflected to the outside, which, in turn, resulted in a regular gathering space for eating and socializing directly in the center of every dwelling.
The take-away observation: The Pawnee community exists in the very center of its Earth Lodges as a result of historical material availability and efficient load dispersion.
From this, a design philosophy emerges with one major goal in mind. In order to maintain the historical, sovereign identity of the Pawnee while simultaneously perpetuating its future, the facility that houses the culture and traditions must always reflect inwards to the centralized heart of the Pawnee Nation. After months of design and consultation by the Pawnee, the resulting Cultural Center serves to preserve the remnants of the Pawnee past while, most importantly, creating a dedicated space for the Pawnee community to remember, celebrate, and develop together.
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The two major wings of the Pawnee Nation Cultural Center are dedicated to each of these purposes. The northern half of the building is equipped with a full-sized gallery and exhibition space for artifacts and art to be repatriated and properly archived or displayed. The southern half of the building, on the other hand, hosts spaces for the present day Pawnee to engage in everyday life as a community. Multi-purpose spaces can accommodate dance classes or graduation parties. A research library can provided a quite haven for the community's academic pursuits or merely a tranquil destination for learning about the community's past.
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Ultimately, while the facility is open to tourism and the education of all in the ways of the Pawnee, its purest purpose is to create a home for the community and the identity of the Pawnee Nation as they have been, as they are, and as they will be for generations to come.
The Pawnee Cultural Center will be located near the Pawnee Indian Health Center, north of Highway 64.
The building is located close to the existing road and Health Center for ease of utility access. This leaves plenty of site space for adequate parking, bus drop-off, and even bison pastures.
The Cultural Center is designed with construction phasing in mind. The repeated, radial angles and shapes of the building's footprint allow for easy and inexpensive sequential construction.
The building is surrounded by a screen of vertical wood louvers for passive solar penetration control. The louvers are uniquely angled on each side of the open octagon for optimal sun angle response.
Tall spaces surrounding an open-air courtyard allow for plenty of natural daylight and also humble visitors to realize that they are only one small part of a much larger identity and community.
The vertical louver system that surrounds the building allows for indirect daylight illumination inside of the spaces. It also emulates the outermost layer of thin logs that lie just beneath the exterior layers of earth in a traditional Earth Lodge.
A visitor's approach is flanked on either side by rows of Pawnee blue corn, a revered element of Pawnee culture and tradition.
The open-air courtyard invites all visitors to look above their everyday plain of existence and witness the vastness of Father Sky. One is also exposed to the heavy timber skeleton that supports the Cultural Center in the same way that logs supported the traditional Earth Lodge structures.
