Kate Scurlock, AIA, Associate Principal at GWWO Architects recalls, “This is a project for a client on Cape Cod, in Sandwich, Massachusetts. They have 100 acres called Heritage Museums and Gardens because they have a number of different museum buildings several gardens throughout the property.” Inspired by nature, the Heritage Museums and Gardens property features a flume, several gardens, and an abundance of hiking trails in addition to the 18,000 pieces in their museum collection celebrating the history on Southeastern New England.

“This was a new construction project in what is considered a historic district. There are historic properties within Heritage Campus, but this project is not a historic building, and we didn't want it to look like one. We told the historic district that we were doing a lot of things intentionally to allow this project to fit in with the vernacular in Cape Cod while still looking modern and new.”

Scurlock says, “They had an existing welcome center, which was located roughly at the end of a straight path. People would come to the Center, and it was a very small building, not necessarily built as a welcome center for as many of the people as they were welcoming to the site. And actually, the first thing you saw was restroom doors.”

“The other major problem they had was that folks were just kind of walking right past the ticket booth and they would kind keep going, not realizing they weren't paying.  I don't think it was an intentional thing, but just since it was just a straight path into the site; they were losing out on ticket sales because of that. Then when it was very crowded, as you can imagine, there wasn't a whole lot of space available. People would actually line up, and the line would back up into the drive aisle.” 

Scurlock continues, “The new visitor complex project started design post pandemic, in 2021. So, the idea of having an all-outdoor experience was on the client’s minds at the time – being able to visit the site and never go into a building if you didn't want to. It’s very multi-functional in that it allows people to just gather or wait for their group.

When we set out to make the new welcome center happen, we were trying to achieve a number of things. One was to make it so that people knew where they were going intuitively but didn't just walk right into the to the campus without paying. We wanted it to be welcoming. The big idea from an architectural standpoint that we were really focusing on was the idea of discovery.”

“Instead of it being this straight shot into the site, we wanted the experience of arriving to the site to be more akin with the experience that happens throughout the rest of the site, which is very much what you experience at kind of a public garden.

“We used the topography to our advantage to create this experience where people arrive from parking and are welcomed into an exterior courtyard space. There's a lot of things waiting for you; you go around and turn and there's something beautiful there, and it's not necessarily as you're expecting, but there's all of these hidden, glances at the topography, of the site.”

“We really wanted the buildings to be nestled within to that landscape to allow people a glimpse of what they're going to find as they go into the site. We didn't want there to be a lot of signs, but we wanted you to know where you need to go. It really had a lot to do with this idea of discovery.”

With the client’s desire for the visitor complex to assimilate into the landscape as well as to pay homage to the aesthetic of the cape, material choice was paramount.

The Barbey Welcome Center, ticket office and bathrooms are cladded with our FSC®-certified® and cradle-to-cradle certified Pioneer Millworks Accoya® Nickel siding, a top choice for sustainability and material health. The acetylated pine siding has significant rot and moisture resistance, the result of a unique vinegar treatment it is given directly after harvest.

Scurlock says the formative conversations were: “’Do we use Cedar? Do we let it weather? Or do we use any different number of wood products?’ We landed on Accoya® pretty early on in the process, and on using the nickel finish, because it has that silver tone to it and the client didn't want to live through the growing pains of it weathering and they wanted it to look like most of the houses you see on the cape, which are already weathered. I think this became, an easy kind of selection for them because they liked the subtleness of being able to see the wood texture. It looks like it was weathered already, but it was like that from day one where you can see the graining.”

“The Accoya® was much more uniform, and it gave them the light color from the start. Then over time, as we continued through design, we used it in a number of ways. The obvious one being is that it's on the exterior as a horizontal siding.

But we also have interior Accoya® Nickel siding on the inside of some of the spaces. We used some in the ceilings and then an exterior soffit. We even have acquired some of the Accoya® decking. I think we used it in basically any form we could.”

On the interior of the gift shop, we ran the Accoya® vertically which allows for a very nice focal point. I think we were able to give the clients a very modern take without it being kind of like a kitschy gift shop feeling.” 

As Scurlock describes, there is a material continuity running through the visitor complex. Accoya® is installed on the exterior of the restrooms and ticketing pavilion, the exterior and interior of the visitor center and decking on the park facing side of the visitor center’s accordion doors. 

Through a collaboration of history, preservation, and material health the Barbey Family Welcome Center at Heritage Memorial Gardens will not only inspire visitors but elevate their experience from the second that they step onto the grounds.

Partners:

• GWWO
• Dellbrook|JKS
• Photography: Justin Valadez_Dellbrook|JKS