NYC ROADTRIP

A Clearing in the Streets
Collect Pond Park; Leonard & Centre St

Julie Farris and Sarah Wayland-Smith, both with backgrounds in landscape design, were commissioned by the Public Art Fund to design and build this temporary public installation in downtown New York’s Collect Pond Park. A Clearing in the Streets is a living urban meadow partially enclosed by a series of plywood panels, measuring 15 feet in diameter. It’s an attempt to “re-insert” nature into the concrete jungle while allowing people on the street an opportunity to re-evaluate how they relate to their urban surroundings.

On view through October, 2009.

On a recent Roadtrip a bunch of us were kickin’ around the Bowery when we stumbled on a curiously dingy little hotel and decided to stop in for a look-see. Time was frozen here – the front lobby seemingly as it was thirty years ago, the musty air of those days thick in the nose – and  I was sure we were being watched through peep holes cut into the eyes of people in scenic pictures on the walls. This was definitely a branch of the Twilight Zone. 

We sat around for a few minutes, resting our feet, and decided for the hell of it to inquire about a room.  We told the clerk that we were just exploring our options and, to our surprise, he gave us two sets of keys – one for a single room, one for a double – and sent us upstairs, unchaperoned, to take a look.  Was this some kind of trick? We weren’t sure, but we were willing to take a chance. …

Acutely thrilled, our little hearts a-thumpin’, we scrambled to the stairwell and shot up to the second of four floors, where we discovered creaky darkened hallways lined with flimsy doors that opened to teeny rooms about 7 x 4 feet, barely big enough for one person to unpack a suitcase. Each room contained a short-person bed, a matchbox closet, super wide spaces between the door and doorframe (making it easy for peeping toms to get a good look at you from the hallway), and there was no ceiling (there was open space between the walls of the room and the original ceiling).

Needless to say, we never intended to get a room.  We were simply wandering, being proactive in our search for meaningful experience, creating a story to share with others, trying to make our own (free) fun. New York City – not unlike any other city – is full of these lesser seen sites, some active, some not. All you have to do is seek them out. 

Designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and architect Calvert Vaux, Central Park is a 843-acre greenspace in the heart of New York City.  Used by 10s of millions of people each year, this designated landmark – which is almost completely landscaped, not natural as it appears – contains multiple bodies of water, walking trails, cool tunnels, waterfalls, natural woods, a zoo, a wildlife sanctuary, a conservatory, ice rinks, swimming pools, ghosts, leprechauns and unicorns.  

Central park is usually our first destination once we ‘re settled at our hostel.   It’s arguably the best way to feel the pulse of the city.  Note: Beware the wood nymphs and fairies of this park; they are known to be carriers of one of the one of the rarest (and untreatable) species of madness called nympholepsy – the most common symptom of which is a confused state of sexual arousal.