Pulse Memorial & Museum winning design selected

ORLANDO | The onePULSE Foundation announced the winning design team for the Pulse Memorial & Museum at the Dr. Phillips Center in Orlando Oct. 30.

The winning design team of Coldefy & Associés with RDAI, Orlando-based HHCP Architects, Xavier Veilhan, dUCKS scéno, Agence TER and Prof. Laila Farah was announced by Mayra Alvear—whose daughter, Amanda Alvear, was killed in the Pulse tragedy— and Pulse survivors Neema Bahrami and Brian Reagan.

As the design team took the stage, Alvear hugged each of them with tears in her eyes. The winning design was one of six finalists who presented their concepts at the Orange County Regional History Center Oct. 3.

The winning design team’s memorial concept includes a fountain, shallow reflecting pool and a garden filled with 49 trees.

“Water is the connecting element,” the team states on onePULSE’s website. The reflecting pool, which will encircle the club, will feature “a palette of 49 colors” lining the basin which “radiates towards the public spaces” in honor of the 49 Angels.

As for Pulse itself, the design team’s concept has the building split with a corridor allowing visitors to pass through the structure with a crescent moon canopy half-encircling the building.

The project’s museum component will be a circular tower with “vertical gardens and public plazas” and “a rooftop promenade.”

The final component, the Survivors Walk, will include promenades, bike paths and interactive sculptures.

Above concept photos from onePULSEFoundation.org

“The National Pulse Memorial & Museum will honor the 49 lives taken and all those affected while also educating visitors and future generations on the profound impact the tragedy had on Orlando, the U.S. and the world,” said Barbara Poma, onePULSE Foundation CEO. “We are excited to work with Coldefy with RDAI | HHCP and the full team, whose next step is to embark on a master plan for the project, which will include robust community engagement.”

Above photos by Jeremy Williams

While the design team’s concept has been presented to the public, onePULSE states that it will serve as “a starting point for discussion and a basis for the design but is not the final, finished memorial and museum.”

onePulse goes on to state that the design team will “work to further refine the designs so they can best reflect community feedback” over the next year.

The Pulse Memorial & Museum is expected to be completed in 2022. For more information on the project and the foundation’s work, visit onePULSEFoundation.org.

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