I had the great honor of assisting Kohei Owatari of Modern Zen Gardens and Gordon Carrier of Carrier Johnson Architects on this project. The grand opening was on May 1st, 2018 where everyone was recognized including myself who contributed. There were horn players to start the ceremony, a few great speakers and they did the whole ribbon cutting with about 200 people who attended.

What I really liked aside from the ultra modern architecture was how the Architect weaved in the concept of ‘The Trinity’ with (3) main sitting nodes in the landscape and also came up with utilizing an Olive tree which has biblical symbolism at the main entry. Kohei replicated this idea again in (3) large groupings of the purple sage on the South end of the building. It was great to be a part of a monumental design that‘s meaningful and symbolic and not just purely about aesthetics.

My contribution involved helping put together the landscape plan set guided by Kohei’s Design and Gordon’s direction and I was also able to pick a few of the plantings such as the Mexican Bush Sage and Gold Lantana. Other key design elements included a large entry fountain, boulder seating areas, DG walkways and stained glass sculpture panels all framing the beautifully new crafted architecture of the Chapel.