Camp Paint Rock
Hyattsville, Wyoming

Camp Paint Rock is a summer camp for urban 8th graders from Los Angeles with academic and leadership potential, and a desire to pursue a college career with the help of a five-year mentoring program sponsored by the Alm Foundation, a private L.A. non-profit. The project reflects the camp’s philosophy of self-reliance and risk-taking. So we began by asking: How can our buildings encourage teenagers to confront the unfamiliar? How do we create architecture that promotes self-reliance within an interdependent community?

The plan we developed harnesses the dramatic elements of the West—its geology, its ruggedness, its compelling landforms—into an architecture that in itself is a type of western landscape: a canyon rim, a rocky ledge, a steep hill to scale. The campers are involved in a process of discovery of the natural world, experiencing the playful expression of natural light, the fluctuations of wind and rain, and the sounds.

Each building stands independently but connects through a series of pathways and bridges; steel-framed cabins perch on the canyon’s steep walls, creating lookouts and stunning views. In other cabins, sliding doors open to the sky; ladders and roof decks entice campers to climb and explore. Openings in the roofs, such as in the main dining hall, evoke the fissures and crevices of the region’s rock faces and allow in abundant northern light. Seen from above, the individual buildings, which connect via bridges and informal pathways, make a light impression on the land—almost like a grouping of tents—and yet together form a substantive community.