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Let us know how you envision the Future of the Old Boise Blocks on Grove Street (3rd St. to 6th St.) by adding examples of places and designs that highlight your ideas. Place a new pin using the + icon in the bottom right corner of the screen and add photos, drawings, webpages or text to share your thoughts. Contact aaron@agnewbeck.com if you have any questions or difficulties using this pinboard.

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The Old Boise Blocks on Grove Street project area includes 3rd through 6th Streets and the surrounding area. The map below shows a visual of the project area.

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Example: I imagine this area to be bike friendly in form and function.

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Remove/move parking lots, encourage commercial development, create a pedestrian street (similar to La Rambla in barcelona)

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Waterways by Artist / Dr. Katayoun Dowlatshahi

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Reflection Rising by Poetic Kinetics

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Desert Radiance by Bruce Munro

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Spiraling Droplets by Aphidoidea

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“Hanging” by Eileen Blyth and Mark Finley

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Bike Rack by Duncan McDaniel

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Street Furniture by Oliver Show

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Bench By Jeppe Hein

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Hired to develop an art program for the recently opened MGM Springfield Resort and Casino in Springfield, Massachusetts, art consultancy RAREculture (HOK, Rockwell Group, and Daroff Design are clients) took an unusual approach to an installation.

"The client wanted a piece that had movement, and was designed by an artist who understood the concept of community," says RAREculture CEO Susan Kroll. The consultancy interpreted that request to be an installation that would also provide seating in the hotel's courtyard to beckon, engage and encourage visitors to socialize at the resort. Kroll's team commissioned Danish artist Jeppe Hein to design and fabricate the piece. "We've been following Jeppe and love all the iterations of his work. It's ever evolving and seems to always be at the forefront of what people are hoping to see in the art world."

The result of collaborating with Hein is an unusual piece of site furniture, which serves a tripartite function as seating, play structure, and public art all rolled into a park bench.

Dubbed the "Bench of Expectation," the installation also references the whimsy of one of Springfield's favorite sons: Theodor Seuss Geisel (aka Dr. Seuss). The bench's sculptural form-made up of elongated winding forms, sharp bends, and loops-recalls the famous imaginary landscapes created by the children's book author and illustrator.

Constructed from aluminum, the bench's long, flat, and undulating segments twist and turn to accommodate conventional sitting in some spots, while also encouraging reclining and play in others. Its ribbon-like shape occupies approximately 650 square feet. According to Kroll, Hein used its playful Seuss-inspired elements to build ease between strangers and create space in which they can communicate.

Amid the resort's 760,000 square feet, the bench, a permanent installation, stands out. Hein's first public art in the U.S., it has already become one of MGM Springfield's most recognizable features, adding wayfinding to its list of functions. "It is a visual anchor as well as an interactive focal point and meeting place," says RAREculture vice president Elle Lachow ticking off the attributes of Hein's creation. As Dr. Seuss's Cat in the Hat character might say, "It is fun to have fun, but you have to know how."
This story was featured in Material World, Architectural Record's products-focused newsletter. Subscribe today!

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Whimsical Bench Serves as Play Structure and Meeting Hub for All Ages

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Hired to develop an art program for the recently opened MGM Springfield Resort and Casino in Springfield, Massachusetts, art consultancy RAREculture (HOK, Rockwell Group, and Daroff Design are clients) took an unusual approach to an installation. "The client wanted a piece that had movement, and was designed by an artist who understood the concept of community," says RAREculture CEO Susan Kroll.

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I Can't Give You Anything But Love by Shigeru Uchida

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Decorate with photos of Old Blocks

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Decorate with photos of Old Blocks

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Create an Old Blocks mural with tiles like this at Adam's school

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Design new buildings to look like old brick buildings in Boise

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Use the colored water displays like Grove for children's water play.

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Have benches with statues, maybe statues of animals that children would like, like squirrels, birds, racoons, etc.

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Have light poles that accomodate decorative flags that can be changed.

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Lightpoles with speakers for music

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A wall with moving lights, like at Grove. Maybe it spells out Boise Old Blocks in calligraphy.

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Example: I would love to see Grove Street incorporate additional festival street elements (plazas, pedestrian friendly lighting, seating, etc.)

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Statues, again maybe things children would like, like animals. Or historic individuals of Grove St.

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Building fronts that recapitulate old Boise buildings

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?decorative sign in Old Blocks

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Continue stone walls along Old Blocks

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?pergola on Old Blocks

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?add decorative tiles to streets

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?make a wall with murals and lights, like at Grove Plaza, with pathway that leads from Grove at 3rd past electric power apparatus to connect Grove to Broadway.

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Continue city's nice tree accoutrements on Grove St.

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This is a recently finished project in Salt Lake City!

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Another example of SLC's creek

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Can the streets of Old Blocks be bricks like Whole Foods parking lot?

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hard to see all the sculptures, but these are places where kids (and adults!) are constantly climbing and sitting. The plaza is framed by a beautiful fountain (with turtle sculptures and real turtles) at one end, and the street entrance on the other. Loads of sculptures in between, including humans playing instruments, sitting and reading, varying in size and shape and look. The stores on either side of the arcade include retail, restaurants, and wine-tasting shops.

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Public seating in Westlake Park in Seattle

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This photo displays corn-hole and foosball being played!

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The Basque Block has proven the interest and demand for this pedestrian friendly layout and historic flavor.  However, this one block is too small to sponsor many events.  Extending this streetscape theme, but in a different style to preserve the original BB effort, will provide more space for larger events which are inevitable as the city grows.

Consider incorporating the canal design from the CW Moore Park, as depicted below into the sidewalk btwn 5th & 6th.

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Turtle Fountain - real and cast turtles.

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Turtle Fountain - real and cast turtles.

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Flags as honoring past residents' countries of origin

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Flags as honoring past residents' countries of origin

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Last pic of Arcada plaza, I promise. But it has it all -- water feature, amenities for adults and children, and honoring of diverse residents with the flags.

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This post lists 6 self-guided walking tours of Boston, including one GPS-enabled audio tour, all produced by our guides here at Free Tours by Foot.

Click here for our pay-what-you-wish guided walking tours of Boston.

The Freedom Trail at the center of historic Boston is a red brick path through the city leading visitors to the historic sites.

At the center of Revolutionary America, you'll weave your way through the eighteenth century.

We have created a general guide to planning your visit and walk along the trail, which includes tips on how to get here and where to eat and more.

This self-guided tour and map will cover the entire 2.5 miles of Freedom Trail sites and should take you two hours to complete. You can also download a PDF version.

You could also take our GPS-led audio tour of the Freedom Trail (English and Spanish). Here's a sample.

https://freetoursbyfoot.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Boston_Massacre-2275720a.mp3

We also offer a daily, pay-what-you-wish-guided tour. This tour runs mostly in the morning and afternoons but also at night in the summer.

Make sure to take a look at our self-guided tour of the Granary Burial Ground, one of the Freedom Trail's most important stops.

HARVARD AND CAMBRIDGE

Harvard University is the oldest college in the United States (1636). Eight United State Presidents attended Harvard University and the name is known worldwide.

Here offer a self-guided tour of Harvard University and Cambridge and an area guide that will help to explore some the wonderful sites on campus.

You can download the map to your smartphone or download a PDF version of the tour.

We also offer a guided pay-what-you-like walking tour several times each week (see the video above).

BEACON HILL

Boston's Beacon Hill is and always has been Boston's most exclusive neighborhood where politicians, poets, and philanthropist among others have made their home.

It is a neighborhood that many tourists fail to explore as it can be a bit intimidating without a guide but this 90-minute self-guided tour should make navigation of that neighborhood easy.

We offer a special guided tour called the Beacon Hill Crime Tour several nights a week from April through October. As with all of our guided tours, this tour operates on the pay-what-you-like model.

NORTH END AND LITTLE ITALY

Boston's North End/Little Italy neighbor is famous for its delicious food as well as its colorful history.

We have put together a quick, self -guided walking tour of North End/Little Italy and some of its most interesting sites.

Additional Resources - There are many more self-guided tours of Boston available. The City of Boston offers several resources, including walking maps, audio tours as well as theme tours, such as the JFK Boston trail.

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This post lists 6 self-guided walking tours of Boston, including one GPS-enabled audio tour, all produced by our guides here at Free Tours by Foot. Click here for our pay-what-you-wish guided walking tours of Boston. THE FREEDOM TRAIL The Freedom Trail at the center of historic Boston is a red...

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Kid Friendly daylighting - Normal Illinois 

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Kid Friendly daylighting - Normal Illinois 