PERRY WORLD HOUSE | University of Pennsylvania

Plants, paving and topography create a habitable, socially activated public space that draws on the regular constituencies of the dining hall, food trucks and adjacent residential population, while attracting visitors from across the campus and throughout the neighborhood.  As such, the landscape provides an opportunity to extend the mission of the World House beyond the limits of its walls and to engage a larger community.  The manipulation of topography with a low groundcover planting provides enclosure and separation from 38th Street and provide a harmonious ground plane from which the building rises. A serpentine wood bench meets the stair at the western foot of the 38th Street Bridge; announcing access to the World House and providing a tactile experiential moment along the primary spine of Locust Walk, as it wraps around to create an intimate space for conversation. The landscape transitions in scale and texture to meet the rich planting of the Kelly Writer’s House, and offers the quiet respite of an enclosed courtyard adjacent the World House Forum.

Location: Philadelphia, PA

Architecture: 1100 Architect