by Patrick Monte, M.Arch 2018
Advisor: Adam Marcus
If a mine... is a series of spherical observatories located on the site of a cataclysmic landslide that occurred at Utah’s Bingham Canyon Copper Mine in 2013. The mine, notably the largest human excavation, is considered as a site for speculating upon architecture and architectural experience that traverses human, industrial, and geological scales. In particular, the project is conceived as a cultural form for reclaiming the mine and a monument to the impacts of human terraforming and resource extraction. Spherical observatories connected by traversing walkways frame and curate a landscape that scales the industrial and geological and creates an experience of the site that may last several hours, days, or even a week. Each observatory isolates and synthesizes an element of the historic 2013 landslide as a cultural artifact, positioned in relation to each other and the landscape in ways which seek to challenge environmental aesthetics.