I just returned from a quick trip to Salt Lake. My father was sealed to his wife in the Salt Lake Temple early Saturday morning and it was a beautiful occasion. I had an hour to spare after the celebratory breakfast, and Sister Hinckley’s funeral was nearly over, so I headed north to the Conference Center for a tour. The tour included the impressive 21,000 seat arena, Arnold Friberg’s original Book of Mormon paintings series, and several interesting examples of Mormon folk art. It was the roof, however, that I found most interesting.
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\nThe four-acre roof mostly consists of a relatively formal plaza, with fountains, monuments, pathways, gardens, and a spire. I think it’s a great use of space and contributes to an overall building profile which is surprisingly minimal for a structure of that size. Off to the western side of the roof is a field that, at first distant glance, looks like a slightly-cared-for vacant lot from anywhere in Utah or Idaho. Yes and no. The Church service missionary guiding our tour explained that the meadow was a careful reconstruction of high-desert mountain fields, containing only indigenous plants and trees. In other words, it is a snapshot of what the first pioneers may have seen as they wended their way toward Emigration Canyon and into the Salt Lake Valley — all wild grasses, gnarled bristlecone pines, and sego lilies. It’s a perfect touch. Looking out over the Church’s ever-expanding downtown campus, and then over the sprawling Salt Lake Valley, the meadow serves as a welcome reminder of both the natural beauty of the region, as well as the collective effort that transformed such a wilderness into a pretty, great place.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I just returned from a quick trip to Salt Lake. My father was sealed to his wife in the Salt Lake Temple early Saturday morning and it was a beautiful occasion. I had an hour to spare after the celebratory breakfast, and Sister Hinckley’s funeral was nearly over, so I headed north to the Conference Center for a tour. The tour included the impressive 21,000 seat arena, Arnold Friberg’s original Book of Mormon paintings series, and several interesting examples of Mormon folk art. It was the roof, however, that I found most interesting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mormon-life"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=655"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5924,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655\/revisions\/5924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}