Project by Won Hwang, Napat (Beam) Leephanuwong
The Nevada Test Site remains an environment defined by uncertainty. Each layer of soil records an experiment in control now slipping beyond human calibration. What was once a testing ground has become a mirror of its own instability. Systems designed to measure destruction continue to operate, but what they record now is themselves, the slow degradation of data, instruments, and intent.
Every action here leaves a trace. While the desert’s natural formations appear adaptive and enduring, radiation, contamination, and material toxicity expose a fragile equilibrium. Geological resilience is overlaid with synthetic climates, where human ambition reshapes not only landforms but also ecological and moral conditions.
The response may not be restoration or erasure, but acknowledgment. Architecture becomes a gesture of reflection rather than reform, to mark, remember, and grant dignity to other forms of life. The project exists within tension between observation and interference, where each act of understanding risks becoming another experiment.
