What does it mean to generate a climate, to build with the air, to create space? When we inhabit a place, we do not live inside the concrete, the glass or the wood, but in the space that they surround.
The Weather Garden investigates architecture’s invisible elements: space, ambiance, atmosphere and how people experience them. The place itself is an urban void, an empty stage. The events that activate this space are an integral part of the project. A weather forecast announces the program (film screening, lecture, musical performance, party, reading …) using a silver screen facing the street as a billboard.
exhibition images
The project is an “inverted architecture,” it reveals the condition of the air, the effects of the material, the light. It is more specifically a garden of air; the climate (light, water, occurrences…) is generated, preserved or avoided. It can function as a greenhouse, a plant park, a public stage, a winter garden, a café… The house extends itself into an outdoor living room as the street enters the courtyard and creates inclusionary and public space. Like medieval pleasure gardens or ladies' gardens, it becomes a place to find shade, smells, and sounds. The weather garden is an environment built around senses and organs other than the eye, around the invisible layers that create a space and our perception of them.
About the Artist
François Perrin lives and works in Los Angeles, California. He was born in Paris, France, where he earned his professional degree in Architecture. He has completed several residential, commercial and exhibition designs. Concerned with site specificity, his work is always unique to the immediate environmental context and addresses issues of local and sustainable systems. His projects have been featured in Artforum, Domus, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Wallpaper, Sunset, Dwell, and The Architect's Newspaper. In addition to his work as a designer, he is also an educator and curator. He has organized several exhibitions including Dialogues and Yves Klein-Air Architecture at the MAK Center for Art and Architecture and Architectones in several locations. Perrin has taught at UCLA, Art Center College of Design, Cal Poly Pomona, Woodbury University, and Sci-Arc and has lectured on his work internationally including the Jan Van Eyck Akademie, MAK Vienna, Columbia University, USC, UCLA, Universite de Montreal and Ecole Speciale d'Architecture.