For the majority of visitors to Rocky Mountain National Park, the Beaver Meadows Visitor Center (BMVC) serves as a gateway to the park’s inspiring peaks, valleys, and lakes. While thousands pass through its doorways daily, few know of its unique connection to the landscape and architectural history.
The BMVC, which opened in 1967, is a National Historic Landmark and an artifact of bold, modern, midcentury architecture.
Shortly after World War II ended, a national sense of optimism trended across the United States. With the rise of automobile use and a booming economy, Americans were eager to go on road trips and explore their national parks. However, most parks at this time lacked visitor centers and capacity for the growing crowds. To improve park infrastructure, the NPS launched an initiative called Mission 66 in 1956. A new type of centralized facility, called a visitor center, was coined. 100 park visitor centers were built; five of those, including the BMVC, became internationally known for their architecture. Mission 66 ushered in a new era of bold, modern architecture, and increased visitation of National Parks.
Adamant on using natural materials when designing the BMVC, E. Thomas Casey, a structural engineer, followed the principles of Organic Architecture developed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Pieces of sandstone with lichen were quarried from Lyons, CO, and Casey used Cor-ten steel to allow the structure to weather in place. “This is the way [that] architecture ought to be. You know, that what you see is what you get,” Casey told the National Park Service (NPS). Casey aimed at showing habituation between the natural world and humans by using nature motifs and mirroring effects, breaking the concept of the box, and allowing natural light to flood the indoor space.
Next time you are at the BMVC, consider how the natural light illuminates the main room at different times of day, how the steel beams rise alongside the ponderosa pine, and how the designs on the exterior mirror the triangular shape of mountain peaks. Casey’s hope was that this space would be for the community and remind each of us that we exist with nature, not outside of it.