Yahrzeit Memorials at Kol Shofar
In the Jewish tradition, the anniversary of a person’s death is known as a yahrzeit. Yahrzeits are collectively recognized in synagogues with, what has sadly become, standardized, off-the-shelf signage. These “fixtures” tend to be hung on the wall as an afterthought, often unrelated to and undermining the surrounding architecture.
While the wooden slats that surround Kol Shofar’s sanctuary generally imbue its perimeter with a steady rhythm, scale and cadence, the slats along the memorial wall are arranged in a more unsettled composition, allowing memorials to peek through the slats in a similarly unregimented way so that over time, memorials can be easily added. Their arrangement also embodies the individuals represented, each occupying a space and place of its own, thereby giving character(ness) to the marking of a life passed.
The memorials are made from sandblasted and back-painted resin. Their horizontal ledges, backlit by tiny invisible LED lamps, glow with ephemeral light. Nameplates, painted in black with English and Hebrew text carved into the resin, identify the deceased and the dates they lived. They, too, glow from the borrowed light.
Individual memorials are illuminated only two times during the year—once on the Sabbath nearest the anniversary of the person’s death (when a special prayer is recited by loved ones), and again on the Eve of Yom Kippur, the holiest night of the Jewish year, when all ledges are lit together and all the dead are remembered.
The memorials are located at the base of a gentle ramp which leads congregants from the lobby along a narrow, curved passage, putting the ultimate destination out of view. As one descends the gentle ramp, one sees the hemlock slats obliquely and the natural daylight which penetrates through veiled clerestory windows.
As the asymmetrical sacred space unfolds, the intimately scaled memorial plaques, identifying those in the congregation (and their loved ones) who have passed, slip gently through the hemlock slats to occupy the sanctuary alongside the seated congregation.
