Oh, to be a kid again! Brooklyn’s own design and fabrication practice, Tri-Lox, has installed an interactive sculptural playscape named NEST at Brooklyn Children’s Museum (BCM) in Crown Heights. The installation was inspired by nests created by the baya weaver bird, with NEST being constructed from reclaimed New York City water tower wood that’s been woven into a climbable exterior, hammock area, and creative interior space. The underlying idea for the dynamic rooftop space being that there is no dictated use for each area, instead fostering free play and exploration.

?In exploring the museum?s educational collection, we came upon a series of incredible bird nests and let them inspire our design,? said Alexander Bender, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Tri-Lox. ?One nest in particular, made by the baya weaver bird, offers an intricately woven form with rooms, tunnels, and multiple entries. This concept was then transformed into a climbable playscape that retains the natural materiality of the nest and tells a story of an iconic design within our vertical urban habitat ? the NYC rooftop wood water tower. We quite literally brought the water tower back to the rooftop with this project,? says Bender, ?it just had to be turned into a giant nest first.?
NEST, with a footprint of 1,800 square feet, is now the rooftop’s focal point, giving urban children of various ages and stages a new shared community place to play, climb, and explore.

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