There’s going to be a big benefit concert for Haiti in the Near Southside on March 27th.  To be held at Magnolia Green Park, Fort Worth Sings for Haiti will donate 100% of all money raised to Haitian relief efforts via Doctors Without Borders.

The artist lineup is being finalized, and will concentrate on Fort Worth-local talent.  The organizers met yesterday with Fort Worth South, Inc. and Red Oak Realty and have secured the use of Magnolia Green Park, located on Lipscomb between Magnolia and Rosedale in the Near Southside.  Early discussions we’ve heard point to this being a sizable event.

Plenty of details to come – for example, there are some plans for valet bicycle parking for attendees taking advantage of the site’s urban location (we were happy to help get those discussions underway with the promoters).  This ought to turn out to be a cool event for a great cause.

Fort Worth Sings can be contacted via e-mail.  Their web site currently loads a temporary blog while the full site is put together.  The effort is being led by a group of volunteers, led by co-founders Chris Maunder (owner of The Moon bar) and Christopher Lenzini.  Additional details can also be found on the organization’s Facebook page.

We recently took a stroll through Trinity Park (the part up by 7th Street) and visited the new Fort Worth Police and Firefighters Memorial.  The memorial turned out to be more elaborate than we thought – up near the entrance on Stayton/Museum Way, there is a small plaza and monument (there is also a lot of sidewalk and landscaping work going on up here, as the So7 development looks to be adding in some big, wide brick sidewalks to tie into all this).  Leading away from the entrance is a path lined with tablets featuring the names of fallen officers and firefighters.  This passes near the fountain on 7th and then leads to the statues of a police officer, firefighter, and horse, which are partially encircled by a large memorial wall with the names of police & firefighters who lost their lives in the line of duty.  It is a lovely and moving setup.

While there, we also noted the fountain on 7th was frozen over but still spraying, and got a few shots of that as well.

The new West Leuda Park, the first brand-new public park in center city Fort Worth in decades, is starting to shape up nicely.  The park, on partial blocks bounded by Leuda, St. Louis, Cannon, and Jennings, has streetlights and partial pouring of its paths.  Work is also underway on the central pavilion and playground.

West Leuda Park marks the center of the Leuda-May historic district, and is surrounded by the Leuda-May Apartments, Hattie May Inn, and more (and just down the street from the Rahr Brewery).

The new public park being built in the Near Southside’s Leuda-May neighborhood on an assemblage of land around Jennings, Leuda, St. Louis, and Cannon is starting to look more like a park. Paths are being poured and streetlights have gone up. West Leuda Park is said to be the first new public park in the urban core of Fort Worth in decades, and should be a welcome addition for one of the Near Southside’s less-redeveloped areas as infill occurs. It is adjacent to such existing developments as the Leuda-May Apartments and the Hattie May Inn, and just down the street from the Rahr Brewery.

Click the photos for a larger view.

Landscape architect Lawrence Halprin, one of the most creative voices in designing urban public space, passed away on Sunday at his home in California at the age of 93 from complications from a fall.

Halprin was a prolific designer, and created some of the most unique modernist public spaces in the United States. He studied how the human body moves and behaves in spatial settings, especially using dancers and choreography thanks to his wife and longtime collaborator Anna, who was a dancer. This sense of poetic movement found its way into his work, which exhibits strong relationships to human scale. Halprin devised his own landscape drawing system, which he called “motation” (motion and notation).

Several of Halprin’s projects have been demolished over time, and several more are in states of disrepair.

We have personally experienced two of Halprin’s designs, one of which is in dire condition and the other is gloriously restored and beloved. Of course, the one in disrepair is also the one Halprin did here in Fort Worth: Heritage Park, on the Trinity River bluff in Downtown.

All of Halprin’s designs reflect this passion to give people as many options as possible to go this way or that, to reverse directions, to pause, to start over, to be alone, to meet others, and to experience as many different sights, smells and sounds as the site permits.”

–Benjamin Forgey, The Smithsonian, 1988

Heritage Park’s quiet, meditative spaces and interplay of paths and “rooms” are classic Halprin. It’s not too difficult to imagine, as you walk through the park, how engaging it all would be if it were fully restored and taken care of by the city, rather than closed, dried-up, and left to decay and be overtaken by out-of-control landscaping. We were fortunate enough to make our first visits to Heritage Park before it was closed, and even in its run-down condition it felt very special. At one point, the city hired Carter + Burgess to come up with a plan to restore the park, and their response was to destroy the park’s character and integrity by slathering it with railings and other incompatible design features that were in complete opposition to Halprin’s lifelong intent of direct engagement between visitors and his works. Fortunately, Downtown Fort Worth, Inc. and other interested parties are now leading the way with a fundraising effort to carry out a restoration of Heritage Park that is sensitive to Halprin’s design, thanks to a collaboration with Laurie Olin, fellow landscape architect and friend of Halprin’s.

We’ve written a lot about Heritage Park in the past, and here are a few selections, including our three-park exclusive look at Halprin’s original design sketches of Heritage Park and the Trinity waterfront:

Heritage Park, “Insulted and Humiliated” – July 2008
An Update on Heritage Park – February 2009
Heritage Park now slightly less closed – August 2009
Designing Heritage Park: Inside the Halrpin Archives, Part One: Alternate Sites and Designs
Designing Heritage Park: Inside the Halprin Archives, Part Two: Oddities Along the River, Leonard’s Subway Extension, and More
Designing Heritage Park: Inside the Halprin Archives, Part Three: The Design Comes Together

As you advance towards the water in the collecting pools, you might wonder if you can trust you own sense of privilege, if you’re really allowed to do this. Trail your fingers in the fast flow up top, perch wet or dry atop the falls, wade barefoot into the bottom, or climb. You’re operating in that wonderful audio cocoon-bubble of privacy created by the loud rushing water, behind or maybe inside that wall of sound, so you feel alone and brave. Eventually you give yourself permission. Or you don’t. You decide how brave you want to get, or not. It’s a detail, but many have commented on that moment.

–Walt Lockley

The other Halprin design we have personal experience with is one that’s been well-loved: the Ira Keller Fountain in downtown Portland, Oregon. The Ira Keller Fountain creates an inviting space in the heart of the city that’s both playful and peaceful, depending on your mood. It’s a remarkable space in that there are no safety railings or nanny-safety-devices to prevent you from exploring the space. As we wrote about the fountain in our post about visiting it:

That’s it. There’s nothing stopping you from dipping a toe in, running your hands along the falls, wading around the pads. It is the kind of public space we simply don’t do anymore. The restoration and ongoing use of Ira Keller Fountain is in direct opposition to the blandified, watered-down world of railings that Carter + Burgess recommended for Heritage Park, which is even less arguably dangerous than the Keller Fountain. Keller has kept its interactivity and its soul, and that little bit of mostly-imagined danger that, as Lockley says, lets you “decide how brave you want to get, or not.”

The Ira Keller Fountain is an outstanding example of Halprin’s brilliance, and because it’s been respectfully cared for it’s a real direct, undiluted experience. Because the city hasn’t cordoned off the fountain and interfered with Halprin’s intent, the simple act of visiting it is also an act of engaging in a conversation with Halprin, as your body and mind respond to the subtle cues and design touches that he used to guide your procession through the space.

It’s that the verbal message of those signs is so effectively contradicted and drowned out by the bravery, openness, good sense and loud sexiness of the water, that’s the best part. There are no railings or fences. The place is untamed and attractively dangerous, like the natural world.

–Walt Lockley

Coming from another urban area (Oakland-Berkeley) a number of years ago my first reaction to Ira’s Fountain was slack-jawed disbelief. The thing most striking to me was its absence. Where were the signs saying ‘keep out,’ ‘danger’, ‘caution’, ‘no swimming’? There were no warnings or precautions visible. Did the lawyers know about this? How do they pay the liability? I was charmed, impressed and fell totally in love with the city of Portland at that point. Charmed that they cared enough to give over this energy and space to a non-revenue generator… To this day, many years since, I would name either the Salmon Street Springs or Ira’s Fountain as my favorite spots in the entire city. It is the joy factor of watching people interacting with the water. The kids especially are surprised that it is O.K. to go in. They look around as they approach the fountain, half-expecting someone to yell, ‘Stop, don’t touch that!’

–Barbara Duncan

So today, we celebrate the work and talent of Lawrence Halprin, master of designing spaces for human-scaled interaction. We are fortunate in Fort Worth to have an example of his work in our city, and hopefully soon we will all be able to enjoy it again, the way he intended us to.

Rest in peace, Mr. Halprin. And thank you.

We have just heard from Fort Worth South, Inc. that tonight’s scheduled First Friday on the Green, which was to have featured Dove Hunter with The Orbans and Luke Wade, has been cancelled due to the weather. Magnolia Green Park is already wet from the earlier rain, and with more rain forecast tonight it has been decided that the conditions aren’t right for an outdoor concert.

Fret not, because there’s still another two more First Fridays this year – October 2nd and a new one on November 6th that FWSI is working on to replace this month’s, so you’ve still got two more of these great free concerts in the Near Southside for 2009.

Heritage Park might still be closed and awaiting restoration, but it’s been opened back up just a little bit while the design process takes place.

The city has rearranged the various fences enclosing the park, and they now allow people to get slightly within the space. It looks like it’s been done to, in essence, “let people see what they’re missing,” to give them an idea of the interior of the park while it lingers in closure.

Design work on the restoration is underway, and we wouldn’t be surprised to see a fundraising effort surfacing at some point. For now, visitors can get a little better look at Lawrence Halprin’s handiwork and the state of neglect it’s in. Click the photos for a bigger view.

If you’re curious to read more on Heritage Park, here’s some of our earlier posts on it:

Designing Heritage Park – Inside the Halprin Archives, Part One: Alternate Sites and Designs
Designing Heritage Park – Inside the Halprin Archives, Part Two: Oddities Along the River, Leonard’s Subway Extension, and More
Designing Heritage Park – Inside the Halprin Archives, Part Three: The Design Comes Together
Fort Worthology Goes to Portland, Part Three: Ira Keller Fountain
An Update on Heritage Park
Heritage Park: “Insulted and Humiliated”

Just a reminder: Fort Worth South, Inc. is presenting another installment of their free concert series, First Friday on the Green, this Friday. First Friday on the Green takes place at Magnolia Green Park, located on Lipscomb between Magnolia and Rosedale, in the Near Southside. The headline act is Spoonfed Tribe, with Shuttle as the opening act. Bring your family, friends, blankets, and chairs to Magnolia Green Park this Friday to enjoy some free live music. The music starts at 7:00 PM.

Chadra Mezza will be selling food and drink. We’ve noted “no outside coolers” in the past, and we think we should clarify why: this concert series exists because Coors generously provides the stage and equipment to do so. If you like the First Friday series and want to see more of them, please do so by purchasing a drink from Chadra. The way it’s all set up, the money you spend on beer & wine with Chadra goes to helping Coors offset the cost of the stage and equipment. You don’t even have to buy a Coors product – you can buy Rahr from Chadra and it still helps support the concert series. So please – buy some drinks from Chadra if you want the series to continue.

Admission is free, but you are encouraged to bring school supply items for the Southside Church of Christ assistance program. An approved list of school supplies can be found on the Fort Worth Independent School District web site.

Fort Worth South, Inc. is presenting another installment of their free concert series, First Friday on the Green, this Friday. First Friday on the Green takes place at Magnolia Green Park, located on Lipscomb between Magnolia and Rosedale, in the Near Southside.

This time around, the headline act is Spoonfed Tribe, with Shuttle as the opening act. Bring your family, friends, blankets, and chairs to Magnolia Green Park this Friday to enjoy some free live music. The music starts at 7:00 PM.

Chadra Mezza will be selling food and drink. We’ve noted “no outside coolers” in the past, and we think we should clarify why: this concert series exists because Coors generously provides the stage and equipment to do so. If you like the First Friday series and want to see more of them, please do so by purchasing a drink from Chadra. The way it’s all set up, the money you spend on beer & wine with Chadra goes to helping Coors offset the cost of the stage and equipment. You don’t even have to buy a Coors product – you can buy Rahr from Chadra and it still helps support the concert series. So please – buy some drinks from Chadra if you want the series to continue.

Admission is free, but you are encouraged to bring school supply items for the Southside Church of Christ assistance program. An approved list of school supplies can be found on the Fort Worth Independent School District web site.

The Near Southside’s newest park is making good progress. Grading and earthmoving has been underway for a while now. Here are a couple of views of the park, looking south toward the Leuda-May Apartments and west towards Jennings.

Here’s the site plan of the finished park: