The project is based on Surtsey, a volcanic island that erupted from beneath the sea in 1963, was protected by law the following year and only accessible to scientists, and is now gradually melting into the ocean due to sea erosion and rising sea levels. Surtsey is located in the Vestmannaeyjar Islands in southern Iceland. The active volcanic belt allows Surtsey to witness primitive geological ages and ecological succession. It is both a living ecological experiment and a disappearing landscape.
Design is not about resisting extinction, but taking erosion and ecological succession as the core theme. The project is guided by theories of plant colonization and island ecology, and the materials come from various volcanic islands in the Vestmannaeyjar Islands. Each element reflects the geological and ecological memory of other islands. The project uses tuff, basalt, volcanic sediments and driftwood, arranged along the island's northern sand spit, eastern flora, southern nesting area and western crater. It is both an ecological monument and a time marker, breeding mosses, accumulating sediments, decaying, collapsing, and giving birth to new life, becoming part of the island's life cycle.
Two hundred years later, when only the volcanic cone remains on the island, the ecological monument and the stack will remain - the plants evolve and the shapes are reshaped - as a new habitat for non-humans, and when visitors come here, they can witness the evidence that life once touched this place and remember the story of Surtsey.
