by Jaime Endreny Executive Director of the Center for Architect
Students in the Center for Architecture Foundation summer camp visit the High Bridge Tower.
Courtesy CFAF
During the Center for Architecture Foundation’s first week of “Secret Places” summer camp, students became acquainted with unique, beautiful, and typically unexplored places in NYC. Educator Jane Cowan led seventh-to-ninth-grade students on multiple site visits around the city to explore its hidden gems. Students created handmade journals, which they filled with sketches and photographs throughout the week. Highlights of the camp included a trip to the landmarked High Bridge Tower in Washington Heights, an important piece of the Croton Aqueduct system that first brought fresh water into the city in the 19th century. Students noted the intricate, perforated details on the steps as they cautiously climbed to the top of the tower. Then they constructed models of the water tower in a workshop. Later in the week, students rode the tramway to explore Roosevelt Island and took the ferry to Governor’s Island, investigating the island on bikes. The weeklong camp provided an opportunity to shift the attention away from the well-known buildings of NYC to other exciting spaces and places.