Campus Martius

Once architectural icons, public fountains didn’t fare too well beyond the early years of the 20th Century.

In the post-World War II era, marble and bronze edifices like the Scott Fountain on Belle Isle or Buckingham Fountain in Chicago’s Grant Park were deemed to be so, so 19th Century. Architects cared more about modernism and suburban expansion.

But now public fountains are making a comeback, thanks largely to the artistry and technical skill of Mark Fuller and his 100-person team at WET Design, a 21-year-old firm based outside Los Angeles. The nation’s best-known designer of water features, WET Design is most celebrated for its 9-acre fountain lake at the Bellagio casino in Las Vegas, where waters dance in ballets choreographed to lush musical accompaniments.

WET Design has just completed testing its latest creation, the centerpiece fountain in Detroit’s new downtown Campus Martius Park. On a recent evening, great shimmering arcs and jets of water shot high into the air, lit from below by brilliant incandescent light. With the testing done, the fountain went into its winter slumber, its most powerful features shut down until spring. In the meantime, the base of the fountain will serve as the platform for Detroit’s official Christmas tree, the lighting of which on Friday evening is part of the grand opening of the park.

The Campus Martius project marks the fourth time in recent years that WET Design has created a landmark in metro Detroit. First came the central water feature at the McNamara Terminal at Metro Airport —a black slab from which shoot arcs of water in a choreographed complexity that mimics an airline’s route map.

Then WET Design created the cascading, multi-story water installation inside the lobby of the new Compuware Corp. headquarters downtown, in which an ever-changing pattern of water falls from colored platforms to shimmer off a lighted screen below. At the Somerset Collection mall in Troy, the firm’s tranquil new installation creates soft, murmuring background noise.

All four projects display the elegance and whimsy that Fuller insists is central to WET Design’s vision.

What the Detroit projects also demonstrate is that public fountains are no longer about the base or plinth from which water shoots, no longer about marble or bronze figures of city benefactors or mythological creatures. Instead, public fountains are now all about the water itself, and, as Fuller says, about finding ways to make the water dance.

At Campus Martius, the base of the fountain is a simple stepped platform that would hardly get a glance without the water show. At Bellagio, there is no base at all; the numerous small nozzles from which jets of water shoot are hidden at or below the surface of the lake. In many of WET Design’s creations, the line between the fountain and the place occupied by spectators all but disappears.

This lack of design, or, rather, this focusing of artistic energy on the dancing water itself, makes Fuller’s accomplishments hard to categorize. “We’re walking that line between the constructed arts—architecture—and the performance arts—theater, dance—and always looking for that integration and that synthesis,” he said last week at Campus Martius.

Hidden below street level at Campus Martius Park, a concrete chamber holds the astonishing array of computers, pumps, valves and controls necessary to make the waters dance. Fuller says the technology, while essential, is kept hidden for a reason. “It’s not about the technology,” he says. “It’s about sitting up here, laughing, smiling. It’s about living in Detroit and saying, ‘Where shall we meet?’ ‘How about the fountain?’ And you don’t have to say what fountain!”

Growing up in Salt Lake City, Fuller designed his first water features using garden hoses in his yard. His college thesis described “laminar flow,” or how to make a stream of water look like a laser beam; the fountain at Metro Airport is based on that principle. Among WET Design’s dozens of patents are ones for “shooters,” air-pressure-powered nozzles that permit the myriad affects at places like Bellagio.

But simply creating powerful jets of water has never been enough. Fuller and his team strive for a suppleness and mystery that no one else had ever achieved with water displays. Their goal: “Could we create a mechanical fountain that would challenge people in terms of the nuance of performance that they’re used to getting out of human actors and dancers?”

If the technology is super modern, the effects tend to be old-fashioned and romantic. At Bellagio, waters dance to Frank Sinatra tunes and similar melodies; and the desired reaction is about the same as you expect to see at a fireworks show—surprise and delight. There is nothing edgy or neurotic about WET Design’s artistry. It is, and is meant to be, unabashedly popular.

Fountains were not always so appreciated. Detroit’s once-famous, now all-but-forgotten Merrill Fountain was a fine example of French classicism when it opened on the Campus Martius site in 1901, designed by the New York firm Carrere and Hastings. A quarter-century later, standing in the way of new development along Woodward Avenue, Merrill Fountain unceremoniously was carted several miles out Woodward Avenue to Palmer Park, where today it sits in disrepair.

Then, too, the Dodge Memorial Fountain on Hart Plaza, designed by Isamu Noguchi in the 1970s to enliven a moribund downtown, never achieved the popularity it might have in a livelier market.

A better fate awaits the new Campus Martius fountain. After decades of decline, public fountains once again serve as wonderfully democratic creations, a dash of enchantment in the heart of a city.

JOHN GALLAGHER is architecture critic for the Free Press and co-author of AIA Detroit: The American Institute of Architects Guide to Detroit Architecture. Contact him at 313-222-5173 or gallagher@freepress.com



	ARCHITECTURE: Fountains make a splashy return By John Gallagher Free Press Columnist Once architectural icons, public fountains didn’t fare too well beyond the early years of the 20th Century. In the post-World War II era, marble and bronze edifices like the Scott Fountain on Belle Isle or Buckingham Fountain in Chicago’s Grant Park were deemed to be so, so 19th Century. Architects cared more about modernism and suburban expansion. But now public fountains are making a comeback, thanks largely to the artistry and technical skill of Mark Fuller and his 100-person team at WET Design, a 21-year-old firm based outside Los Angeles. The nation’s best-known designer of water features, WET Design is most celebrated for its 9-acre fountain lake at the Bellagio casino in Las Vegas, where waters dance in ballets choreographed to lush musical accompaniments. WET Design has just completed testing its latest creation, the centerpiece fountain in Detroit’s new downtown Campus Martius Park. On a recent evening, great shimmering arcs and jets of water shot high into the air, lit from below by brilliant incandescent light. With the testing done, the fountain went into its winter slumber, its most powerful features shut down until spring. In the meantime, the base of the fountain will serve as the platform for Detroit’s official Christmas tree, the lighting of which on Friday evening is part of the grand opening of the park. The Campus Martius project marks the fourth time in recent years that WET Design has created a landmark in metro Detroit. First came the central water feature at the McNamara Terminal at Metro Airport —a black slab from which shoot arcs of water in a choreographed complexity that mimics an airline’s route map. Then WET Design created the cascading, multi-story water installation inside the lobby of the new Compuware Corp. headquarters downtown, in which an ever-changing pattern of water falls from colored platforms to shimmer off a lighted screen below. At the Somerset Collection mall in Troy, the firm’s tranquil new installation creates soft, murmuring background noise. All four projects display the elegance and whimsy that Fuller insists is central to WET Design’s vision. What the Detroit projects also demonstrate is that public fountains are no longer about the base or plinth from which water shoots, no longer about marble or bronze figures of city benefactors or mythological creatures. Instead, public fountains are now all about the water itself, and, as Fuller says, about finding ways to make the water dance. At Campus Martius, the base of the fountain is a simple stepped platform that would hardly get a glance without the water show. At Bellagio, there is no base at all; the numerous small nozzles from which jets of water shoot are hidden at or below the surface of the lake. In many of WET Design’s creations, the line between the fountain and the place occupied by spectators all but disappears. This lack of design, or, rather, this focusing of artistic energy on the dancing water itself, makes Fuller’s accomplishments hard to categorize. “We’re walking that line between the constructed arts—architecture—and the performance arts—theater, dance—and always looking for that integration and that synthesis,” he said last week at Campus Martius. Hidden below street level at Campus Martius Park, a concrete chamber holds the astonishing array of computers, pumps, valves and controls necessary to make the waters dance. Fuller says the technology, while essential, is kept hidden for a reason. “It’s not about the technology,” he says. “It’s about sitting up here, laughing, smiling. It’s about living in Detroit and saying, ‘Where shall we meet?’ ‘How about the fountain?’ And you don’t have to say what fountain!” Growing up in Salt Lake City, Fuller designed his first water features using garden hoses in his yard. His college thesis described “laminar flow,” or how to make a stream of water look like a laser beam; the fountain at Metro Airport is based on that principle. Among WET Design’s dozens of patents are ones for “shooters,” air-pressure-powered nozzles that permit the myriad affects at places like Bellagio. But simply creating powerful jets of water has never been enough. Fuller and his team strive for a suppleness and mystery that no one else had ever achieved with water displays. Their goal: “Could we create a mechanical fountain that would challenge people in terms of the nuance of performance that they’re used to getting out of human actors and dancers?” If the technology is super modern, the effects tend to be old-fashioned and romantic. At Bellagio, waters dance to Frank Sinatra tunes and similar melodies; and the desired reaction is about the same as you expect to see at a fireworks show—surprise and delight. There is nothing edgy or neurotic about WET Design’s artistry. It is, and is meant to be, unabashedly popular. Fountains were not always so appreciated. Detroit’s once-famous, now all-but-forgotten Merrill Fountain was a fine example of French classicism when it opened on the Campus Martius site in 1901, designed by the New York firm Carrere and Hastings. A quarter-century later, standing in the way of new development along Woodward Avenue, Merrill Fountain unceremoniously was carted several miles out Woodward Avenue to Palmer Park, where today it sits in disrepair. Then, too, the Dodge Memorial Fountain on Hart Plaza, designed by Isamu Noguchi in the 1970s to enliven a moribund downtown, never achieved the popularity it might have in a livelier market. A better fate awaits the new Campus Martius fountain. After decades of decline, public fountains once again serve as wonderfully democratic creations, a dash of enchantment in the heart of a city. JOHN GALLAGHER is architecture critic for the Free Press and co-author of AIA Detroit: The American Institute of Architects Guide to Detroit Architecture. Contact him at 313-222-5173 or gallagher@freepress.com

ARCHITECTURE: Fountains make a splashy return