Indian Watchtower

Final Project: Indian Watchtower at Desert Vie

Final Project: Indian Watchtower at Desert View
February 2, 2013 I returned to the Grand Canyon National Park. It was absolutely a perfect day, nice and sunny with a decent temperature around 45 F not too bad for 7000 feet of elevation, drive from Flagstaff AZ was uneventful, I took off fairly early to allow my self enough time for my research and at the same time to do a small hike down the Canyon.
Each visitor that comes to Grand Canyon National Park and there are about five millions annually, is seeking the perfect viewpoint of the park and the surrounding areas. I was one of them for the second time around. This time I visited park as a part of my final preparation for this class.
Paul University. In 1901, Mary got a job with Fred Harvey Company her first project was the Indian Building of the Alvarado Hotel in Albuquerque New Mexico. Over her life span, Mary designed many projects but not all of them survived, there are 6 buildings located at the Park she made a lifelong achievement in architecture and had big contribution to the history of America (http://www.womenheritagetrail.org). As we already know from our history class, 1930’s are known in American History as a depression era. Unfortunately, the great depression did not happen just in America it was worldwide phenomena, were every nation in this universe got sunk into it. Despite the Depression 1930’s period was rich with art, literature, radio, music, and shows. I think what is significant between her architectural designs at the park, and other artwork in this era is that all of these artist want so tell the American History, preserve what’s left, for new times to come for new generations. While she was designing, The Watchover tower she had in mind Native American culture, which is obvious in all of her artwork. She worked closely with another artist Hopi descent, Fred Kabotie; he is the one that
This beautiful design is located at the eastern end of the South Rim Grand Canyon National Park, completed in 1932 this designed served as a tourist attraction, museum representing Native American culture and a small shop. From my research, and talking to the people that worked at this museum I gathered some interesting information’s, the building itself is 70 foot tall, four story tower designed in a circular motion originally meant to resemble kiva- ceremonial room- many Pueblo groups used this type of rooms for ceremonies. As we are noticing from many designs at Grand Canyon we can conclude that Native American Culture fascinated this architect because with this design it is so obvious that she is representing a nation. This design blends so well with the natural surroundings from far distance you cannot even distinguish it from the surroundings; the tower gives the impression of coming out from the earth like a planted flower. We can see, that material used to build this particular structure were traditional, found in this environment which is another interesting point, she wanted to really preserve the surroundings and its beauty, to use what is there to make clear statements for many years to come. This tower is designed in a circular motion, has tree floors, a central well, and magnificent three hundred and sixty degrees panorama view of the park and surrounding area. In order to survive