When approached by artists Heather Ackroyd and Dan Harvey to help with their series of sculptures commissioned for the Olympic Park, the team at Expedition couldn’t help but get excited. We knew that the artists’ reputation for using natural and living materials in their work would add a new dimension to an already challenging project.
A large tree encircled by a hovering ring will mark each of the ten entrances to the Olympic Park. Each one is 6m in diameter, fabricated in bronze or stainless steel and hung from the trees trunks on cables. The rings were fabricated and delivered to site in two halves and joined together surrounding the tree while suspended in the air. We worked hard to provide seamless joints, structurally sound but barely visible from the ground. Treating the sculpture as a fine piece of jewellery; we kept the fixings to the tree and ring as small and discreet as possible so that each ring appears to be levitating around its tree.