Puget Sound Naval Shipyard Memorial Plaza

PUGET SOUND

V i s i o n i n g B r a n d s E x p e r i e n c e s

Bremerton, Washington

...the humanistic link back to the community embodies the pride...

PUGET SOUND

V i s i o n i n g B r a n d s E x p e r i e n c e s

Bremerton, Washington

...honor the lives and contributions of the Naval Shipyard workers...

PUGET SOUND Bremerton, Washington

The Puget Sound Naval Shipyard Memorial Plaza lies on a narrow strip of land adjacent to the shipyard near the ferry terminal in Bremerton, Washington.

The site was created by the construction of a tunnel that directs

C L I E N T

ferry traffic. The Plaza includes seasonal water features, specimen

CLIENT NAME

landscaping, stone bollards, custom fabricated furniture and

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interpretive elements intended to honor the lives and contributions of

Signage/Wayfinding Environmental Graphics

the Naval Shipyard workers over time.

The design brief stated that the interpretive elements should be more than historical photos and captions. The designers believe that their forms should be unambiguously evocative of those found in large seagoing vessels constructed at the Naval Shipyard. The graphics were photomechanically etched into the stainless steel surfaces. .

At the south end of the Plaza near the employee entry gate to the Shipyard, the interpretive elements focus on present-day workers.

These pieces will be refreshed periodically to honor current employees. The Shipyard’s pivotal role in WWII is documented at the plaza’s center; this area includes the tip of the USS South Carolina, a battleship recently decommissioned at the Shipyard. The elements at the north end of the Plaza focus on the role of women in the workforce during WWI. The narrative displays conclude with

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a sculpture created from a photo of a young woman heating rivets poised next to her forge. This piece allows visitors to literally “walk among” the shipyard’s workers.

Contact

An epilog accompanies this story. During construction, the City

DANIEL AIZENMAN Principal daniel.aizenman@stantec.com

placed a photo of the rivet heater in the newspaper with the question “Who is this woman?” The phone rang weeks later, with a man responding, “That’s my mom”. His mother was Esther Bielmeier, an eighteen year old who along with her sister Nora, worked at the Shipyard from 1917-1918. She later married and raised a family in the area. This humanistic link back to the community embodies the pride and purpose of EGD in the Public Realm.

V i s i o n i n g B r a n d s E x p e r i e n c e s

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303.625.0357

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