Article source: Ball-Nogues Studio

Commissioned by the City of Santa Monica, Cradle is situated on the exterior wall of a parking structure at a shopping mall – originally designed by Frank Gehry.  The site is near the beach, and is heavily trafficked by tourists on foot and in automobiles. An aggregation of mirror polished stainless steel spheres, the sculpture functions structurally like an enormous Newton’s Cradle – the ubiquitous toy found on the desktops of corporate executives in Hollywood films. Each ball is suspended by a cable from a point on the wall and locked in position by a combination of gravity and neighboring balls. The whole array reflects distorted images of passersby.

Images Courtesy Monica Nouwens

• Architect: Ball-Nogues Studio
• Name of Project: Cradle
• Location: Santa Monica, California, USA
• Principals in Charge: Benjamin Ball and Gaston Nogues
• Project Manager and Lead Fabricator: James Jones
• Custom Software Design: Ayodh Kamath
• Photography: Monica Nouwens
• Project Team: Benjamin  Jennett,  Rach Shillander, Alison Kung,  Daniel Morrison, Jielu Lu, Amador Saucedo, Ron Shvartsman. Lawerance Shanks, Norma Silva, Andrew Lyon, Tim Peeters, Will Trossell
• Structural Engineer: Buro Happold, Los Angeles. Matthew Melnyk

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