Enjoy Yourself: Tipping the Cap

The New York Mets proudly unveiled Citi Field, its new home whose naming rights the team sold to Citigroup Financial Services, on April 3. The 41,800-seat, $900 million stadium, which Kansas City-based Populous (formerly HOK Sport) designed, features an exterior façade reminiscent of Ebbets Field, beloved home of the erstwhile Brooklyn Dodgers.

As an additional nod to baseball history, Populous developed the Jackie Robinson Rotunda, which features eight, porcelain-tile murals named to reflect the pioneering player’s core values: Courage, Excellence, Persistence, Justice, Teamwork, Commitment, Citizenship and Integrity. The team hired NYC-based Two Twelve Assoc. to design the panels. The firm also developed templates for the stadium’s wayfinding and concession-stand signage, as well as the rotunda’s complementary environmental graphics. The firm collaborated with the Jackie Robinson Foundation, the Mets Development Corp. and team officials to research and brainstorm the program’s imagery.

Ann Harakawa, Two Twelve's principal in charge, said, “[Mets owner] Fred Wilpon sought to create a vision that not only celebrated Jackie’s career as a Brooklyn Dodger, but his character and cultural contributions.” the company chose porcelain tile best for the job

Two Twelve retrofitted the Rotunda’s environmental graphics to fit the design within Populous’ architectural plan. Darlene van Uden, Two Twelve’s project manager, said, “This required a lot of exploration to determine where to move the murals and other graphics to optimize placement.”

Two Twelve enlisted Winsor Fireform (Tumwater, WA) to fabricate the murals. Bryan Stockdale, Winsor Fireform’s principal, said the company specified porcelain tiles because of their ability to withstand New York’s weather extremes. Six of the murals measure 11 x 17.5 ft. and comprise 187 tiles apiece; the remaining two entail 11 x 12.5 ft. and 132 tiles. Each tile measures 1 ft. sq. Such key decisions as color, tile size and type and grout width must be determined before fabrication begins. The tiles’ total weight exceeds three tons.

“Two Twelve created a custom color palette for the project,” Bryan Stockdale, Winsor Fireform’s principal, said. “We were able to accommodate the project thanks to our library of 17,000 custom hues and inhouse color chemists. Designer’s plans can require months to formulate, so there’s a major investment of time and energy.”

Winsor Fireform used a proprietary imaging and firing process to decorate the tiles prior to baking the pieces in its custom-manufactured kilns. Before shipping the components, they create a grid and number each tile before packing them sequentially to facilitate installation. Hunt/Bovis, the general contractor for Citi Field’s construction, subcontracted the murals’ installation.

To identify and complement Winsor Fireform’s program, North Shore Neon (NYC) fabricated the letters that identify the Rotunda and installed them on a pre-cast lintel. D Magnan & Co. (Mt. Vernon, NY) produced the inlaid, terrazzo-tile graphics that identify the rotunda and Robinson’s size 14 footprint, and Polich Tallix (Rock Tavern, NY) created the abstract “42” sculpture that immortalizes Robinson’s jersey number, which has been retired throughout professional baseball.