The task is to make a gate that will fit into an opening that is framed by large wood members and short stone columns. The gate should reflect nature. It should welcome visitors into a wild garden.

The goal is to design something that is as beautiful and fitting as a flower in a meadow or a bird’s nest in a tree. I ask myself how this happens. Is there a plan that nature is following? The atoms are arranged and rearranged. I run into the question of whether anything in nature is designed. This drags the conversation down a hole into the rubble of Western Philosophy and Evolution. Turning ultimately to the question of whether you believe that there is a god. Ok, I should back up.

My most successful designs come when I try to understand what it is about natural beauty that is beautiful. Visual appeal comes from the contrasts of texture and form. But it also comes from the patterns of repeated shapes and rhythm. The question is how? How does a small triangular sunflower seed become a complicated mathematical spiral of complete perfection?

How does something exist? Does it exist to serve a function? This hints that there is some type of intelligence involved in the design. But what is intelligence? The vocabulary is lacking. Or probably, more likely, my vocabulary is lacking. I run across the word Teleology.

I began the process designing for a single gate that would remain mostly closed. The plans changed to be a double gate that would be mostly open.

Tel·e·ol·o·gy, The way the word rolls off the tongue, making the mouth jump through so many hoops, is attractive. It makes me want to know it better.

Teleology- the explanation of phenomena in terms of the purpose they serve rather than of the cause by which they arise.

Teleology is a hotly debated idea. It hints at the implication that nature has goals. This detracts from the randomness that obviously occurs in nature. People have been arguing about it for 2400 years.

Back to making a gate. I would like to use the theory of teleology when I begin my design. To design the gate around its purpose. To frame entry to the garden. To welcome. To look good both opened and closed. To fit with its surroundings. To function properly and comfortably. To attract people and birds and other creatures.

This gate will be part of the Willis D Hadley Interpretive Gardens Project in Ferndale, California. The project has just begun. The gardens, when finished, will be open to the public. They will be located at 665 Main St.