Here at 215 Timelapse, we love to get in on the ground floor of a building’s construction, both literally and metaphorically, but we’re just as happy to add finishing touches to a project in progress. By working with existing footage and adding some of our own, we created a film that captured the museum’s “growth” from a pit in the ground to the sprawling garden that now surrounds it.

Located in Philadelphia, where Alexander Calder was born, Calder Gardens is a two-part “sanctuary” made up of a partially underground space that houses a rotating installation of Calder’s artworks and a four-acre garden, designed by renowned landscape architect Piet Oudolf, that serves as a subtle transition between city and gallery.

After breaking ground three years ago, builders LF Driscoll installed a camera to capture the building’s construction. They also flew a drone over the site at regular intervals to document the whole site’s progress, including the garden grounds. This past spring, they asked me to begin transforming that footage into a blended hyperlapse shot. After editing, these two shots open the film above.