Landmark project narrowed to 3 choices
The quest to create a new landmark structure in downtown San Jose reached a major milestone Friday night when three designs were revealed as the finalists during a virtual event that included some surprises of its own.
But perhaps the biggest surprise is how much each of the finalists captures the innovative, imaginative and fun spirit of this place where we live.
“They’re really different in their vision, their inspiration,” said Jon Ball, a retired executive with construction firm Hensel Phelps who is chairman of the Urban Confluence Silicon Valley board and served on the 14-person jury. “All three have a certain elegance and poetry.”
Here are the final three, as chosen from 963 submissions by a jury of artists, architects, civic leaders and environmentalists. (More information is available at urbanconfluencesiliconvalley.org).
• “Nebula Tower,” designed by Quinrong Liu and Ruize Li, a 180-foot-high framework cube that includes a negative space representing the San Jose Light Tower, a symbol that has been the city’s phantom icon for more than a century. The tower can be illuminated at night in a variety of patterns.
• “Breeze of Innovation,” by Fer Jerez and Belen Perez de Juan of SMAR Architecture Studio, uses 500 lithe, white rods that move gently in the wind and represent Silicon Valley’s innovative companies. It, too, includes a reference to the Light
Tower — a conical void within the rods in the same dimensions as the original structure.
• “Welcome to Wonderland,” created by Rish Saito, is something else entirely. A riff on “Alice in Wonderland” with a ribbon of artificial flora finished in white plaster that “grows” out of a 700-footlong container. At night, projection mapping turns the structure into a vibrant, colorful display that people can walk through. The point, Saito says, is to honor the imagination that drives Silicon Valley.
Urban Confluence Silicon Valley grew out of a desire to replicate the iconography of the San Jose Light Tower, a 207-foothigh structure made of iron pipe and hoops that was erected on Santa Clara Street in 1881 and stood until 1915 when the weakening tower collapsed on itself after a storm.
But realizing there was little appetite for a replica — a half-size version already exists at History Park on Senter Road — the worldwide ideas competition was opened to any design that would represent the spirit of San Jose and Silicon Valley.
“Even though we were originally inspired by the Light Tower, we were in no way prescriptive about that,” Ball said. “As it turns out, the non-local jurors were the ones very much fascinated by the idea of an homage to the old tower. For me, that was a big surprise.”
The jury, which included people as far as the East Coast and Europe, met virtually for two days in early August. A rigorous discussion took place once the submissions were narrowed down to about a dozen, and jurors began jockeying for their favorites. Interestingly, none of the finalists was among the 47 submissions recommended by a larger Community Competition Panel that met in July.
Friday night’s online reveal party was intended not only to unveil the finalists, but to also get the community — and potential donors — excited about the project. While the cost of the final selection won’t be known for months, Urban Confluence Silicon Valley knows it has a fundraising challenge ahead.
During the online event, Phil Boyce of the Valley Foundation pledged $100,000 to the project, and Adobe Systems — the largest tech company with a downtown San Jose headquarters — served as the virtual event’s presenting sponsor and has promised $150,000.
Steve Borkenhagen, executive director of Urban Confluence Silicon Valley, said the group has received key backing from the San Jose City Council, as well as other community groups.
“Our relationship with the city couldn’t be better,” Borkenhagen said. “One reason we’ve gotten to this point is that our board — Jon Ball, Christine Davis and myself — have been constantly communicating with our stakeholders, including the Sharks, Little
Italy, the Guadalupe River Park Conservancy, the Sierra Club, and the city’s park’s department. Outreach has been the key to our success.”
Each designer will get a $150,000 stipend to develop the concepts into workable plans over the next few months, and a final selection will be made by the same jury in the first part of 2021. The city has approved placing the project in the Arena Green portion of the Guadalupe River Park — a section divided by the confluence of the Guadalupe River and Los Gatos Creek.
Groundbreaking is expected to take place in 2022, and when the landmark structure — which Borkenhagen says will be entirely privately financed — is completed, it will be given to the city of San Jose as a gift.
“The park will continue to be accessible to the public,” he said. “We’re not taking anything away from it.”
No matter what design is built, Ball says, the global nature of the submissions is something that San Jose can be proud of.
“The fact that we are in San Jose, the urban core of Silicon Valley,” he said, “and have something unique here in the world with our history was something very appealing and somewhat romantic for the jurors.”