AR Awards for Emerging
Architecture

 Prize winner
MIRO RIVERA ARCHITECTS
Pedestrian bridge
Lake Austin, Texas, USA
December 2006
The extraordinary simplicity of this bridge earmarked it for further consideration from the beginning of the judging process; in the event the design went all the way to become one of this year's winners. It would have been hard to predict, from images alone, that the location of the project is in Texas, generally thought of as a hot, dry and taciturn sort of place. But here we are given a delightful, contextual and curiously natural structure.
The bridge looks enjoyably risky to use, and is in fact not for public consumption it links the main house on the estate to a guest house, across the lake. The 100ft arch structure has a main span of 80ft, achieved through the 'nesting' of five 5 inch diameter pipes that diverge from the spring point of the main span and the abutments. The pipes support half-inch diameter bars which act as both decking and guard-rail; their irregular length and spacing are intended to respond to the reeds on the site.
The handrail comprises a rope secured with steel wire rings to a horizontal tube welded to the vertical bars, while the abutments are made from local stone slabs, layered vertically to create ramped access; deep raked joints recreate the rhythm of the deck and railings. The bars and reeds intertwine at the abutments, making it appear that structure and nature are merging into one. This is a light-maintenance bridge, whose man-made elements have been translated by architecture into something as beautiful as it is unexpected. P. F.

Architect
Miró Rivera Architects, Austin
Structural engineer
Chuck Naive
Photographs
Paul Finkel
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