The Meditation Pavilion in Tomb Brion sums up why I find this place so fascinating. It is rare to find a building that evokes both a feeling of “this has always existed” and “I’ve never seen anything like it”, in a way that feels almost spiritually revealing, without obviously referring to one culture or belief.In principle, it answers to an intangible brief that is the need for “a place for meditation”, with a tangible, material place. We can refer this as the coding behind the architecture, as such an intent cascades into all other design decisions.
For example — the pavilion is tucked away, close to the garden wall, guarded by it as if seeking refuge, and oriented towards a flat, calm body of water — all while enveloping the user like some form of baldacchino, a harmonic balance of shelter and exposure that physically forces us to sit down, slow down, look out and reconcile an intimate awareness with the outer world.The construction itself exceeds a pragmatic use beyond merely holding up a canopy, and by looking briefly at Scarpa’s expressive section, we get a sense of the tight consideration between material, joint, and structure; their tangible scale in relation to the subject, and the emotive impact intended — a dialogue between craft, construction, structure, form and feeling.
In my previous post I alluded to the importance for Dune’s world to feel emotionally relatable, achieved by virtue of synthesising a cross-cultural architectural language, borrowed from anywhere between Aztec and Syrian cultures (with Scarpa being a big influence across the Dune-verse).At every point, Scarpa interprets the powerful verb ‘to meditate’ and concretely fleshes it out at every level of consideration, as to achieve such a balance of complexities and meaningful bodily interpretations that most can feel — clearly excelling at it enough for such a blockbuster production to recognise its atmospheric weight and divert its crews from Saudi to Treviso.
