Narrator> This program was made possible in part with grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and from the American Institute of Architects.

♪ From the wisp of a cloud ♪ ♪ to the seed of a song ♪ that talking to you, ♪ ♪ ♪ telling you ♪ just how important ♪ ♪ it is to keep the ♪ earth growing strong.

♪ ♪ It's talking to you.

♪ ♪ Listen, ♪ ♪ pass it along.

♪ ♪ You got the message.

♪ ♪ Make it a part ♪ of this beautiful land.

♪ ♪ Pass it along, ♪ ♪ keep it healthy and strong.

♪ ♪ we've got ♪ to pass it along.

♪ >> Crescent, Crescent, where are you?

Crescent.

I know you're here somewhere.

Well, it's about time you've got some explaining to do.

Crescent> How do you know?

>> I ran into Mrs. Jay at the library, and she... How did I know what?

Crescent> That I was here, before you could see me, I mean.

>> I don't know, I just had a feeling.

Stop trying to change the subject.

Crescent> What subject?

>> Mrs. Jay, remember?

She said she wanted to offer her support for the new nature center.

Crescent> Great.

>> What nature center, Crescent?

Crescent> Aw, sit down a minute.

I got to tell you something.

>> Well?

Crescent> Peter Bohlin.

I'll tell you about Peter Bohlin and the Shelly Ridge project.

>> Our nature center, no doubt.

Crescent> Kind of.

Shelly Ridge is a Girl Scout center near Philadelphia.

>> And Peter Bohlin?

Crescent> He's an architect, one of the designers of the buildings of Shelly Ridge.

He based everything there on the sun.

Look, right now there's a group of kids about to meet with him.

>> Was this all your idea, Crescent?

Crescent> Well.

>> Hi, I'm Peter Bohlin.

Can I help you?

Students> We'd like to learn about architecture.

Peter> Well.

That's great.

Can I show you the office?

I'd love to do that.

Students> Yes.

Peter> Come on, let's look about.

We work on many projects at one time.

For instance, right now we're doing work at the zoo, and we're working at the Harrisburg airport.

We're doing a new air terminal there.

And we're also working at New Bohlin Center, which is a large animal hospital.

And we do all that work together, really.

No one of us could do as find a job, as we all can as a group.

You know, something that I think would really interest you is Shelly Ridge, the Girl Scout program center.

Would you care to see that?

I can show you some photos of it.

Students> Yeah.

Peter> Great.

Well, come on, let's look at it.

Here are some photos and drawings of Shelly Ridge.

We designed all the buildings there to relate to the landscape and also to relate to the sun.

It was really quite wonderful.

But I bet you'd enjoy visiting Shelly Ridge rather than just looking at photos and drawings.

Do you want to do that?

Students> Yes.

Peter> Okay, well, it's only about ten miles right off on the edge of the city.

While we're looking out over the city.

It's a reminder that we spend most of our lives in the built environment, man made environment that can be wonderful or can be just ugly.

Let's go to Shelly Ridge.

What do you say?

Students> Yeah!

Peter> Okay.

Let's go.

Come on.

Well, I thought so we'd learned a little more about Shelly Ridge, We might do a game, a kind of scavenger hunt.

And I made clues.

And from those clues, perhaps you'll find various elements in the landscape or in the buildings that relate to the clues.

And then I'll meet you there when you found the answers.

And tell you a bit more about them.

Okay.

Students> Yeah.

Tia> Can you give us an example?

Peter> Why don't we look at the first card?

Students> Okay.

Peter> It says find where the sun is always setting over the water.

Any thoughts about that one?

Caroline> Is it inside or out?

Peter> Well it might be either.

It could be in buildings or it could be out on the site somewhere.

Joey> Do you mean the real sun?

Peter> It might be the real sun.

Or Joey, It might be a a symbol, you know, that stands for the sun.

Eric> Oh, I know, the pool house.

Peter> You're right.

The pool house is a symbol of the sun, and it sets over the swimming pool.

Would you like another one?

Students> Yeah.

Peter> Okay, here it is.

Find the green triangle that is lit by the sun in the morning.

Bonita> There it is.

Joey> The green triangle.

Tia> And it's lit up by the sun.

Students> Yeah, yeah.

Peter> I knew you'd find it.

You notice it's lit in the morning and the caretaker's house is lit in the evening.

And then there's such strong shapes that are also familiar.

Here's your next clue.

Students> What does it say?

Find a building within a building that is the center of warmth.

Tia> Well, we're in a building.

It must be here.

Christine> Maybe that's it.

Students> Nah.

Bonita> Is that it?

Students> No.

Tia> There it is.

Students> Yeah.

Peter> You can see, we pull the fireplace in from the outside wall so that it would radiate its heat to all of the indoors.

And then you see, it makes the form and the shape of a kind of gabled house.

And we did that to relate to the shapes of the outside there.

And then beyond that, so it would be cozy.

And now, here's your next clue.

Students> Let's see what it says.

>> Find windows that don't look outside.

Tia> There's windows that don't look outside.

Students> Yeah.

Let's go find some more.

Oh yeah.

Student> Here's one.

>> Does it look outside?

Students> No.

Peter> Now, the reason we did that window was really relating to the bench you're sitting on.

The reason we did the bench is because we had a stair to the loft, and wanted to use the space under the stair, really, To make something cozy, like a bench.

What better thing to do with a bench than to have a peep hole looking at the front door.

Caroline> Yeah, but there's another answer.

Peter> Well, you're right about that.

And there's some other examples too.

Would you like to see them?

Students> Yeah!

Peter> Come on.

♪ ♪ Peter> Well, this is the caretaker's house.

You see how it's on one hand, a little house, but on the other, it's made large by opening it up through the middle, which not only takes heat up through the building from the stove, but also lets the light from the sun face here, filter through the whole inside of the house.

Well, shall we go upstairs?

Students> Yeah.

Peter> Okay.

Come on.

There are really two kinds of windows here.

that don't look outside.

These windows let light in to the bathroom from the middle of the house so it doesn't need an outside window.

And these windows really are shutters, open shutters, so that you can either make them closed for privacy or open them up so you can ventilate all the way through the house, get in the summer ventilation through the house, and in the winter, get the heat from the wood burning stove to move through the bedrooms, and you notice that you can see from the far side of the house through this window, through that window, through that window, all the way down to the program center.

And they all line up.

It's just that sort of thing that make it fun to be an architect.

Here's your next clue.

>> Where can you tell time without a watch?

Student> Wow, this whole room looks like a sun dial.

Peter> You're right.

That's just what it is.

It's a sundial.

Eric> And what's this thing here?

Peter> Well, why don't we go inside and I'll show you how it all works.

Come on.

Students> Yeah!

Peter> This room is all a sundial.

This is a gnomon.

While, it's a stained glass slot that casts a shadow across the floor.

And so you can tell the time of day.

And if you look at the gnomon for a moment, you'll see that it has the sun and the earth and the moon, the little faces as well.

Then what you should do is find the month, in this case, October, and then you follow the purple line across the floor until you hit the shadow of a gnomon on the floor right here and there we are between 2 and 3 o'clock.

Here's your next clue.

>> Find a wall that also provides heat and light.

Student> Here's a wall with a whole bunch of windows.

Peter> You're right.

That's the wall.

And you see it faces directly toward the sun.

And you see it has many different kinds of glazing, the windows at the top?

Why do you think they're, there.

Christine> Maybe it lets light into the building.

Peter> That's right.

That's exactly what it does.

Would you like to do something more now beyond just doing a scavenger hunt?

Students> Yeah.

Peter> All right, come on.

Let's do it.

Why don't we just gather around up here?

Well, you guys, so far we've looked at the buildings.

We've seen a lot of details that are very interesting.

It would be useful to understand how those pieces go together to make four buildings, and how the buildings then become places.

And maybe we could do it by being parts of the building ourselves.

Why don't two of you help me right now by standing up and being columns.

Just stand facing that way with your hands up over your head like so.

Well, your columns just like these that hold up the building.

I think we can put a roof over you just like that.

Now, if you put enough of you in there in a line, you're sort of a solid wall, very much like a building, but we still haven't made a place.

We're still just making a kind of object.

It doesn't have any volume to it.

Let's see how we might really hold up a roof, More like at Shelly Ridge.

Maybe the four of you would face each other and become arches, okay?

Maybe I can put this roof right over the top of you.

Now all of a sudden we don't have a thing.

We have a place.

And maybe, Caroline, you'd like to get into our place and see if it's really a place.

And this is just the way you make places out of pieces.

But I think what we could do is go inside, put buildings together to make a bigger place.

just as we have here at Shelly Ridge, with the buildings around this field.

Peter> Freeze!

You see, because you've been milling about, this is the way much of what we all build these days, you're just sort of scattered about, but you don't have any really definite relationships to each other.

And I don't think there's any real special place between you, do you?

I don't think so.

So why don't we try to make a special place, okay?

Maybe we could all line up here in the middle of the space.

And, William, you can stand at the end.

Stop.

Do you see the difference between what we were just doing and your relationship, now?

That now there's a definite outdoor room between you with that place between you.

That is more important than any one of you.

You're still individuals, but it's more important.

That's how you make cities and towns just the same way.

We can then begin to play with that.

For instance, William, why don't you make a steeple, for instance, and see when you make a place like this, you really are making a place that is more important than any of you as individuals.

And by then making William, for instance, a more important individual, let's say a church or maybe a city hall.

He's become a kind of symbol of a more important use in that place where many places are less organized and looser, and they can be and still be places.

So why don't we experiment with that?

Let's see.

Eric, maybe you turn sideways toward Christine.

Joey, you stay as you are.

And William, maybe you back up about two steps, and maybe make a triangle, instead.

Bonita and Tia and Caroline, you come down here.

Tia, you face, William That's it.

That's good.

Okay, now there's still a place, but it's harder to see, isn't it?

Let's think of a way to strengthen it a bit, to make it clearer and more of a feeling of a really important place.

What do you think?

Any ideas?

Tia> Maybe I should put my hands up, like William Peter> All right.

Try that.

I think now that you're both the same, sort of facing each other, sort of pull the place back together and it reminds me of some place.

Any of you have any thoughts about that?

Christine> Well, there's two buildings alike.

Peter> That's right.

Joey> I know, Shelly Ridge.

Students> Yeah.

Peter> That's right.

That's what we did at Shelly Ridge.

So we made the buildings at both ends of the field.

After loosely arranging buildings around it to look alike so that they would make it sort of special and strong.

And that's just the way you are.

And that's one of the pleasures of being an architect.

It's making special places, each for their sort of special circumstance.

Why don't we go out and enjoy this place, Shelly Ridge?

Come on!

Students> Yeah!

>> Beautiful place.

Crescent> And it's so important because it's near the city.

>> Like we are.

Crescent> Well, don't you think it's important?

Remember the kids.

A place like that could teach them to love nature.

That's important, isn't it?

>> Yes, Crescent.

That's important.

Now, about this nature center, Mrs. Jay wants me to help her with.

Okay, we'll look into it, see what's involved.

Crescent> Yippee!

>> Wait a minute.

There's a condition.

You've got to stop playing these little games with me, Crescent.

Crescent> What games?

>> This farm.

The nature center.

You planned it all from the start, didn't you?

Anything else I should know about?

Good.

Well, I guess the first thing we ought to do is Crescent?

♪ Crescent?

♪ What are you up to, now?

♪