Issaquah’s historic Pickering Barn has become one of the community’s premiere gathering spaces: used for weddings, corporate events, celebrations and farmer’s markets. As it has matured, the landscape has shown signs of wear and tear and accrued various layers of materials, furnishings and circulation patterns that no longer successfully accommodated the heavy use at the site.

MxM worked with the City to rethink the entire site’s landscape and portions of the architectural program to reposition Pickering Barn for the next century. Our team strengthened the spatial enclosure of the beloved outdoor courtyard, right-sized circulation patterns and added new experiences including a “dance deck” and a signature, grain silo-inspired welcoming sign.

We also added new, quiet spaces that allow event attendees and neighboring workers a quiet spot to step away, read a book, or have a quiet conversation. Finally, in a nod to the deep Native American history at the site, we proposed converting the existing lawn into a native plant meadow filled with camas and lupine, helping remind people of the tribes that stewarded this land and bringing more birds and bugs to the the site to help the salmon in nearby Issaquah Creek.