By M.W. Penn

PROJECT TEAM Designer: SMBW Architects, Richmond, Va. Stone supplier: Scott Stone Inc., Mebane, N.C. Stone installer: Jim Skiles, Antioch, Tenn.

Belvedere Gardens is located within a 110-acre cemetery in the quiet southwest Virginia town of Salem. Founded in 1928, family-owned Sherwood Memorial Park had already expanded its mausoleum facilities twice. Phase I was designed and constructed in the late 1930s, and Phase II was realized in the early 1950s. Due to an increasing demand for crypt space, in 1999 the client requested the design of Phase III: a 2,500-crypt mausoleum and columbarium.

In an effort to capitalize on commanding views of the Appalachian mountain range to the northwest, the building committee selected a 2.4-acre hilltop site for the new expansion. With the exception of a Loblolly Pine forest to the south and east, this parcel was devoid of any noteworthy land features. The architect's challenge was to elevate this nondescript site to a sacred place that would fit humbly within its surroundings and become a destination for all generations.

SMBW Architects of Richmond, Va., a 25-person architectural firm founded in 1991, was chosen to design the new expansion. The foundation of SMBW's practice is the exploration of the relationship between landform and the built environment, which is evident in their memorial work, single- and multi-family housing, corporate projects and urban mixed-use developments. The firm is dedicated to being both a responsible steward of the diminishing landscape and the redevelopment of urban fabric. Their method for every commission is rooted in thorough research, intensive analysis, thoughtful editing, and active collaboration between architect, consultant, craftsperson and client.

For inspiration for the Belvedere Gardens project, the firm looked to Erik Gunnar Asplund & Sigurd Lewerentz's Woodland Cemetery and Crematorium in Stockholm, Sweden. As a direct reaction to the prevailing approach to European cemetery design in the early 19th century, their objective was an artistic attempt to reintegrate life with death by exploiting the natural characteristics of the landscape. The result achieved an emotionally charged place that is transcendent and spiritual.

To achieve the goals of creating a sacred space, SMBW Architects chose to suppress the presence of the new mausoleum so that the land and building were in harmony. Two fundamental design moves were employed to create this new landscape. The first was a subtractive process that carved the main space out of the existing ground plane. The second was the additive use of the displaced earth to create a one-acre plinth. These two moves created three distinct outdoor rooms: the Sunken Garden, which is the lower excavated room around which the entire project is structured; the Grove, an area of ground interment sites created by the plinth of displaced earth and ordered by a bosque of Osage Orange trees; and the Allée, which initiates the entry sequence by creating a promenade along the eastern edge of the property.

The Sunken Garden is an outdoor room, which is at once reverential and quiet. A sinuous crypt wall to the south and five mausoleum structures to the north act as a boundary for the 8,500-square-foot space; the curved sod roofs of the mausolea echo the landscape of the mountains in the distance. A narrow reflecting pool on the north side of the Sunken Garden is fed by a man-made spring and activates this space, simultaneously unifying and separating the lowest and highest rooms. Four bronze and cypress footbridges negotiate passageways between the mausolea and the Grove.

Influenced by the colorful regional geology, a blend of quarried stone provides a warm counterpoint to the concrete, which is the project's primary structural framework. A mix of irregular fieldstones defines the secondary site and retaining walls, while a more refined cut stone milled in Tennessee encapsulates the crypts. Scott Stone of Mebane, N.C., assembled the splitface sandstone from four different sources within the region, and Jim Skiles of Antioch, Tenn., supervised the installation of the stone to execute SMBW's vision. On site, masons blended and hand cut the various colors of stone.

Walking surfaces are articulated with a combination of Pennsylvania bluestone paving, tan stone dust and sod. The palette is intended to engage the visitor's senses on a tactile level to reinforce a more personal relationship to the land. This relationship is further revealed on an emotional level as one moves through the passageways and rooms on a personal journey of contemplation and reflection.

To encourage introspection along the journey, perception is controlled through the suppression and extension of views to the landscape beyond. There are spaces that encourage movement and others that encourage one to pause and reflect. It is intended that each space transcend the previous, while visitors discover something beautiful and meaningful along their journey.

By emphasizing a physical and perceptual connectedness to the local and extended site, SMBW Architects created an enduring sense of place, which cultivates an atmosphere of emotional and spiritual reflection and underscores our relationship to the natural order of life. Belvedere Gardens has received numerous additional awards including the Chicago Athenaeum's 2005 American Architecture Award and Faith & Form magazine's 2005 Design Award for Architecture: Sacred Spaces.

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