Ramat Hanadiv Visitors' Center
Ada Karmi-Melamede and Dan Price

The architectural concept evolved from the need for a buffer zone separating the noise and banality of the visitor’s parking lot and the repose and decorum of the Ramat Hanadiv Memorial gardens. This building is therefore designed as a berm located exactly between the visitors parking and Memorial Gardens. During the first phase of the design, the client requested we design a museum to display the archeological findings of the annual excavations organized on the Ramat Hanadiv site. The program included a museum, a visitor’s center and a restaurant.

 

During design development, the importance of environmental education took preference over the archeological artifacts and the program evolved to include an auditorium, classrooms. The focus of the visitor’s center became the local ecology and environmental sustainability. The 450 m2 building includes an auditorium, classrooms, visitor’s facilities, a restaurant, exhibition spaces and two open courtyards.

 

The building is completely covered by two sloping green roofs. The landscaping of the southern slope is a continuation of the natural landscape, using indigenous flora and wild grasses. The northern slope, which faces the Memorial Gardens, is landscaped as a manicured garden, as if a preamble to the memorial gardens within. Between these to slopes is a skylight, carefully designed to allow daylight to wash down into the interior of the visitor’s center.  The interior circulation, lit by the skylight, stretches the entire length of the berm and strings the various functions coherently together.

 

The berm can be crossed in three places. Each crossing is an opportunity to lengthen the approach and change the pedestrian pace before arriving at the formal entrance to the gardens. As in the design of a classic basilica, the berm forces visitors into the “foyer” before entering the “aisle.” The concave embrace of the curved berm is as a foyer before to the iconic wrought iron gate of the Memorial Gardens.

 

The project included various additional support building which were constructed before the visitor’s center and established the architectural language of exposed concrete and limestone cladding.

• the gardener’s dining hall

• Gardener’s storerooms

• fire tower and green houses compound.

• a light structure to house a micro sewage processing plant. This became necessary as the client determined not to damage the natural landscape by excavation a sewage connection to the nearby town of Zichron Yaacov.

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The building was the first in Israel to achieve LEEDS accreditation. Besides the fundamental educational mission of the center, the construction and management set the bar of environmental sustainability.

• All grey and brown water is purified on the site and used for irrigation.

• A geothermal heating/cooling system was installed rather than a conventional heat pump.

• The green roof has created a habitat for small animal, birds and butterflies while providing outstanding insulation and minimizing the visual presence of the building on the site.

• In spite of being completely “underground”, the natural daylight penetrating the spaces minimizes the necessity for artificial lighting.

 

STATUS: Completed
SITE: Zichron Yaacov, Israel

SIZE: Visitor’s center - 450 m²

          Service buildings – 500 m2

CLIENT: Yad Hanadiv Foundation

Design: Ada Karmi-Melamede and Dan Price

Project architect: Yuval Amitzi