Client: City of Fort Lauderdale

Overview

The Downtown Fort Lauderdale Water Tower is a 160 foot tall, million gallon Water Tank that was restored to become a monumental, socially engaged, interactive, permanent public artwork through murals (phase 1) and an array of user – controlled lights, whereby anyone with a web-enabled device can paint with light on the surface of the water tower (phase 2).

Goals

This Water Tower was rescued by the community who did not want to see it replaced with a new, ground tank structure. The goals were to make it an iconic monument for the City of Fort Lauderdale, to promote social engagement, to beautify a derelict structure, and to commemorate Fort Lauderdale's "All America City" designation.

Process

This was a 5 year process that involved having the design voted on by the City Commissioners, approved by the neighborhood HOA, a complete refurbishment, extensive discussions with the engineers, the development of an accurate 3d model for the purposes of lighting placement and mural placement, working with professional Water Tower Painters to accurately paint the design and application developers to create the interactive components that will be implemented in Phase 2.

Additional Information

This is an award-winning piece of public art. Numerous articles have been published about it, and it is the winner of the 2019 national Sherwin-Williams Water and Wastewater Impact Award.