A group of graduate students from the Daniels Faculty who were among the winners of the 2019  International Garden Festival Competition have constructed their installation Making Waves at Reford Gardens / Jardins de Metis. While there, they learned that they were the first student team to have ever won the competition.

The team included Master of Landscape Architecture students Cornel Campbell, Thevishka Kanishkan, and Reesha Morar, and Master of Architecture student and Anton Skorishchenko. Professor Ted Kesik was the students' advisor.

From the students' project description:

In physics, the kinetic energy of an object is the energy built up within it due to its motion. Building upon this idea, our team wanted to show how the motion of just two individuals could build up, expand, and multiply kinetic energy to create a spectacular wave of colour. Visitors are invited to play on a seesaw, but will be surprised at how a familiar activity can have such unfamiliar and exciting results. As the seesaw moves up and down, a wave of kinetic energy radiates from pink to blue as the colourful bars oscillate from the motion created by the users. The fantastic displays of colour and movement created by kinetic energy allows each participant to “make waves” in their own way.
 

Established in 2000, the International Garden Festival is the leading contemporary garden festival in North America. Making Waves was among six new garden projects that were selected from 154 submissions around the world.

The International Garden Festival runs until October 6 at Jardins de Metis / Reford Gardens on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River between Rimouski and Matane in Quebec. Visitors to the festival can explore 27 contemporary gardens, and enter the interactive spaces created by more than eighty-five landscape architects, architects, designers, and visual artists.

For more information, visit the International Garden Festival website.

Photos, top by Martin Bond for the Reford Gardens