Hispanic Information and Telecommunications Network (2004)

HITN is a non-profit organization made up of a network of non-commercial facilities to advance the educational, social, cultural, and economic aspirations of American Hispanic residents. The project is a direct result of experimentation with materials and inversion of spatial norms corresponding to the new needs of the program. The mechanical, electrical and cabling systems, which would typically be housed in architecturally inaccessible dark plenum zones, are turned on their side and instead create a striated system of space that accommodate functional adjacencies. Polycarbonate, deployed to exaggerate its spectral effects, both transmits light from the perimeter and acts as supplemental ambient light source. The large interactive wall, which connects the entry to the functional broadcast “plaza” on the second floor, is used to identify the cultural makeup of the TV Station. Regions of concentrated light rays that follow the passer by and create an animated and changing environment interrupt its surface, which resembles blue sky pitched sideways. The project was designed in collaboration with Gia Daskalakis and Omar Perez from DAS:20.