Lasker Rink, a swimming pool and skating rink, activated Central Park’s north end since 1966, but was due for an upgrade. This week the renamed and revamped recreation spot opened again to the public alongside the new Davis Center at the Harlem Meer, reconnecting the Harlem community with the park and making a trek uptown all the more worth it. Before Central Park this area was the confluence of three streams that were built over by the city’s expanding street grid. Since that initial reconstruction, the site has undergone a series of modifications that added Harlem Meer, a man-made body of water; a boathouse; and later Lasker Rink. This latest round of renovation—led by  Susan T. Rodriguez Architecture and Design, Mitchell Giurgola Architects, and Central Park Conservancy—considers the park’s history with contemporary means and vision. Susan T. Rodriguez Architecture and Design and Mitchell Giurgola Architects deigned the Davis Center at Harlem Meer, a recreation facility located in Central Park’s north end. (Courtesy Central Park Conservancy) From above, the Davis Center’s green roof camouflages with the park’s grassy expanse. Its “curvilinear geometry” was built into the site’s sloping topography and was designed to fit into the loop of Park Drive. The green roof and the creation of a building integrated into its landscape were concerted efforts to deliver a sustainable design. These decisions also course-corrected decades of damage the 1960s Lasker Rink facility caused to the site’s ecology and hydrology. “Parks are the essential counterpoint to urban life that we can never take for granted. The new Davis Center at the Harlem Meer re-envisions and transforms the northern end of the Park making it more open and accessible to all,” Susan Rodriguez told AN. Lasker Rink, added to the park in 1966, was also a swimming pool. The new facilities replace it. (NYC Parks) In spring and fall, the ovoid lawn space fronting the Davis Center will transform into Gottesman Pool; when temperatures drop, the site will transform into a full-size skating rink. At 285 feet by 120 feet, the Gottesman Pool is larger than an Olympic-sized swimming pool. It’s not the first time this location of the park has welcomed this sort of recreational programming. The new pool slash rink was built atop the Lasker Rink, demolished in 2021 to make way for this three-in-one complex; when not used for swimming laps or spinning on ice, a lawn will cap the facilities, making space for yoga, dance, games, bird watching, and other park activities. “Envisioned as a truly sustainable civic space and building—three in one: pool, rink and green–the design reconnects the Harlem community to the rest of the Park,” Rodriguez added. “The project marks the intersection of history, landscape and architecture to create more park and a vital new community center open to all–the ultimate fusion of landscape and architecture that enhances the experience of being in the park.” In spring and fall the Harlem Oval is a lawn for recreational use, in winter it can be transformed into a skating rink and in a summer a swimming pool. (Patricia Burmicky) The Davis Center building was built for all-season use too. When it’s hot out, the floor-to-ceiling glass doors lining its facade can pivot outward, permitting a seamless flow between the outdoors and the interiors. To foster continuity between the two, the architects used the same exterior materials inside—locally sourced stone, green ceramic tiles, and wood accents. When the doors are opened, the overhang roof provides shade and a sort of porch for the structure. The underside of the roof and ceiling were clad with ribbed wood slats and the curved walls were masked with gray stone. A series of rectangular openings were cut into the stone to lead patrons through to the locker rooms, skate rentals, concessions, and bathrooms. A green roof that spans nearly a half acre tops the Davis Center. (© Richard Barnes) In addition to the new building and updated rink, a major component of the project, less glamorous but dutifully important, involved restoring the water channel that originally flowed through the Ravine and Huddlestone Arch into the Meer. Kempner Boardwalk was added, too; it wraps around the body of water to bring visitors closer to the existing freshwater marshes and wetlands located adjacent to the Davis Center site. The underside of the roof was clad with crenelated wood. (© Susan T Rodriguez) Inside, the Davis Center opening in the stone wall lead through to locker room and bathroom facilities. (© Susan T Rodriguez) With a reverence for the park’s history, Davis Center at Harlem Meer is rooted in the vision thought up by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux back in 1858, in which pastoral scenery and public enjoyment are one of the same.