In 2017 when we won the interview for the Middle Earth Housing design/build project at UC Irvine, it was all we could do to contain our excitement and finally gush about how much of a Tolkien geek we were. I mean come on, the project was Two Towers on a Hobbit Hole landform base and we had hid images of Gandalf in our renderings.
As is customary, I always like to sneak in a little gem within willing client’s projects. In this case, the design team was skeptical, but the client loved it. Prominently shown in the image above (it will soon be hidden behind the cascading terraced water feature and landscaping).
One would definitely have to be a bit of a Tolkien folklorist to make the connection upon finding it anyway. But, my hopes, perhaps like the binary code I snuck into the Boelter Hall Student Creativity Center, these weird characters cast into the concrete planter wall will peek the curiosity of enough visitors to research the characters and find the meaning behind them.
It is Middle Earth after all. So, speak friend, and enter.