One can sometimes forget that Charlottesville is a river town, but Alexandria Searls keeps the Rivanna firmly in mind. As director of the Lewis & Clark Exploratory Center, she’s helped influence the choice of its location (overlooking the river in Darden Towe Park) and its mission (educating visitors, especially kids, about boatbuilding and nature-based aspects of the Lewis & Clark expedition). “The river is an historic part of this community,” she says.
So it’s fitting that the center’s new home—a building designed by Hays + Ewing Design Studio and completed in October—harkens to the Rivanna, both in the river view that it prizes and in the boatlike form of the building.