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TheBuzz Erika Engle |
Concrete canyon’s
elevators to get
native greenerySome Spooner-cloth and nylon-clad downtowners may feel they're in a Star-Trek-like transporter or holo-deck, rather than in an office building elevator starting Friday.
That's not exactly the intention.
Facilities personnel will have replaced the normal elevator interiors with huge, wraparound scenes of Hawaiian forests.
Rather than piped in melodious (or malodorous) Montovani music, riders will hear bird songs and ambient sounds recorded in the forests depicted.
Certain elevators in 10 downtown office towers, including Alii Place on Alakea Street, Pioneer Plaza on Fort Street Mall, 1132 Bishop Street and Pacific Guardian Tower, will be getting at least a monthlong make-over as a way to raise awareness of something that may have escaped your attention -- 2003 is the Year of the Hawaiian Forest.
PHOTO COURTESY OF DAVID MEUNCH
This photo of the koa forest at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, with palapalai ferns in foreground, is due to premiere Nov. 7 at Alii Place.
The exhibit was created by Malama Hawaii, a nonprofit organization, and the Division of Forestry & Wildlife of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources.
Titled, "Step into the Hawaiian Forest," the four 7-foot by 14-foot panoramic photographs were taken by David Ulrich, the team of David Liitschwager and Susan Middleton, and David Meunch. The photos feature flora and fauna from Oahu's Mt. Kaala, Molokai's Kamakou Preserve, Maui's Puu Kukui Forest Preserve and Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island.
"These are some of Hawaii's last remaining native forests, and since they're mostly in very remote, inaccessible places, most people never get the opportunity to get to these places," said Beth McDermott, an environmental communications consultant serving as project manager.
"We wanted to bring them to the heart of Honolulu and put them in places where they'd be right in people's path."
Fund-raising is not the ultimate goal of the exhibits, but contributions and volunteer efforts would not be turned away, she said.
It's not a cheap endeavor and organizers are still raising money, though the Kosasa Family Fund is among the effort's primary sponsors.
The photographs are valued at $4,000 to $5,000 each, including commissioning and printing costs. Sound equipment had to be acquired for piping the soundtracks into the elevators. The recordings were made years ago by the Cornell University Laboratory of Ornithology.
"What I did was put together a soundtrack of the birds you would hear in each of these forests," McDermott said. "In some cases they are birds that are almost extinct," such as the Alala, or Hawaiian Crow, that is part of the Big Island soundtrack.
Mitsubishi Elevators & Escalators, Otis Elevator Co. and Schindler Elevator Corp. are donating the labor, said McDermott.
Bobbie Lau, a vice president at Colliers Monroe Friedlander Inc., who oversees 1132 Bishop, thought it was a natural fit.
The building's lobby regularly features art exhibits and collections for the enjoyment of the 60 tenants and their 600 employees.
"We're hoping it will be nice for tenants, but that it will also attract other people to the building," she said.
It's also about serving the community, as the company also will be absorbing some of the expenses, she said.
The elevator forests travel and take root in various downtown elevators during the next four months.
Malama Hawaii is not listed in the phone book but has a Web site at www.malamahawaii.org.
See the Columnists section for some past articles.
Erika Engle is a reporter with the Star-Bulletin. Call 529-4302, fax 529-4750 or write to Erika Engle, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., No. 7-210, Honolulu, HI 96813. She can also be reached at: eengle@starbulletin.com
