BAU_Butzer Architects and Urbanism

The Oklahoma City National Memorial honors victims, rescuers, survivors, and others affected by the April 19, 1995, bombing

Selected through an international competition, the memorial design process engaged members of the community at each stage. Memorial scholar Edward Linenthal called the process an “ingeniously designed model of community consensus building.” Writing for the New Yorker, critic Paul Goldberger called the Memorial the “most elegant” public space in Oklahoma City.

Two monumental gates stand at either end of the east-west axis, acting as the formal entrances to the Memorial. The East Gate represents the moment just before the attack, 9:01 a.m., where innocence was left behind. The West Gate represents the moment where the healing in the aftermath of the tragedy began, 9:03 a.m. Together, the gates frame the moment of the explosion, 9:02 a.m., and delineate the edges which contain the story of this moment. At the city scale, the gates provide a powerful identity for the Memorial. At the human scale, the inscribed words of the community’s Mission Statement above the gates’ openings clearly and simply state the goals of the Memorial and invite passers-by to enter this outdoor room.

To the south, tall evergreens protectively stand watch over a field of 168 empty chairs. The empty chairs are a simple yet powerful portrayal of someone’s absence. Like an empty chair at a dinner table, we are always aware of the presence of a loved one’s absence. The chairs are constructed of a solid seat and back, mounted atop a glass base, which is inscribed with a victim’s name. By day, the chairs seem to float above their translucent bases, just as memories of loved ones seem to float past at any given moment. By night, the lighted glass bases accentuate the names of those we miss.