Global Courtyard Earns Sir Walter Raleigh Award

For years, NC State alumnus Heath Satow’s large-scale Dream of Flight sculpture was one of the first things travelers saw when they ventured through the general aviation terminal at the Raleigh-Durham International Airport. Now the work of art is the centerpiece of NC State’s Global Courtyard, serving as a symbol of the university’s international community and partnerships around the world.

Last week, the city of Raleigh honored the Global Courtyard with a Sir Walter Raleigh Award for Community Appearance. Tom Skolnicki, NC State’s university landscape architect and director of land planning, wrote in the nomination letter that since its dedication in 2021, the space has served “as a platform for cultural exchange, student interaction and outdoor events, reinforcing NC State’s global mission.”

Community Effort Pays Off

“We have a lot of award-winning projects on campus that I’m proud of, but there aren’t many like this where our staff and students have been so intimately involved,” Skolnicki said in an interview. “We usually hire a consultant, but in this case we had the opportunity and the skills among our staff and campus partners to take this one on ourselves, and we were thrilled with how it turned out.”

Creating the space on campus took a community effort that began shortly after the Office of Global Engagement moved to Primrose Hall in 2017. Bailian Li, retired senior vice provost for global engagement, and David Hawley, former manager of global programming, brainstormed ideas for the adjacent outdoor space with Skolnicki and Dave Josephus, retired landscape architect. Ultimately, they solicited input from the College of Design’s landscape architecture studio, and faculty members Andrew Fox, Travis Klondike and Ben Monette invited their students to get involved. 

Twenty-two NC State students hailing from Bangladesh, the United Kingdom, Brazil, China, Korea, Canada, India and the United States submitted design proposals. Each student developed a full set of construction documents reviewed by NC State Global and the Office of the University Architect. Many of the designs took into consideration sustainable construction and maintenance practices and materials, efficient lighting, universal accessibility, historic trees already in the space and native plant species. Josephus integrated designs by Jodi Hart, Pankti Trivedi and Raaga Bhandari into the final product, with lighting inspiration drawn from a design by Brenna Laffey. 

“We want to give every student at NC State an experiential education,” Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Warwick Arden said of the partnership. “Through the Global Courtyard project, our landscape architecture students gained an opportunity to engage in the planning and design of a space that generations of students, faculty and staff will enjoy.”

Work on the project started in October 2019. The first step was to relocate a fountain gifted by NC State’s class of 1914 closer to its original home between Peele and Leazar halls. As part of the move, its foundation was repurposed with granite cobblestone salvaged from the Memorial Belltower, which was also being renovated at the time. 

Satow’s Dream of Flight sculpture was a surprise addition to the project after it had been slated for removal from the airport as part of a renovation. He and Josephus worked closely with the university’s Public Art Committee to ensure a smooth transition from indoor to outdoor display, specifically redesigning the flooring material from terrazzo to concrete pavers. 

“One of the reasons we nominated the Global Courtyard for this award was because it recognizes projects that have to do with preserving landscapes, buildings and other structures,” Skolnicki said. “I think the fact that we found a new home for this public art really resonated with the judges for the Sir Walter Raleigh award.”

This post was originally published in NC State News.