CRYSTAL LAKE PAVILLON

floating elegance

Marc Thorpe Design

A conceptual structure of Crystal Lake Pavilion, a floating, timber-built pavilion for the West Catskills region of New York, which functions as a meditation and yoga retreat.
Architect and designer Marc Thorpe was inspired by the unique 497-acre Crystal Lake Wild Forest landscape, visualising a timber-framed pavilion with an all-glass skin to create structural transparency and to forge a close connection to the natural environment.

In celebration of its remote natural context, the site-specific Crystal Lake Pavilion by Marc Thorpe Design is only accessible by boat, while the proposal is wrapped in a transparent glass skin to showcase the beauty of its surroundings. Constructed with a traditional King Post timber frame, the structure will comprise heavy timbers elements that have been joined together via lap joints and pegged mortise and tenon joints. Its roof will take shape with light steel connections and a standing seam steel roof.

The defining element of the pavilion is a central post, which is suspended from a single concrete pier in the lake bed. Its triangular roof, mirroring the lake surface, gives the illusion of weightlessness, as the pavilion appears to hover above the water.