The Gap Bridge by Richard La Trobe-Bateman is built in Meadow Creek - British Columbia

In 2017 I started a photography project with designer maker Richard La Trobe-Bateman. He had been commissioned to design a foot-bridge to go into the Nevada desert at the Burning Man festival.

Richard La Trobe-Bateman studied sculpture at St Martin’s under Anthony Caro followed by furniture design at the Royal College of Art under David Pye. He moved to designing bridges in 1987 after a eureka moment, he had been feeling frustrated by the limitations for new design in furniture. Richard now has more than thirty footbridges built in England, Scotland and the USA, all very different in design, with the continuum of form, structure, tension, and contraction at the heart of his work.

With the event of Covid Richard’s ‘Gap bridge’, with a physical gap to cross at the top, never got built at Burning Man. It was sad to shelve this wonderful design, until an enquiry came from BC in Canada about building The Gap Bridge over a river on timber-man Dwight Smith’s homestead. In May 2025 Richard aged 86, his wife Mary and Son Will and I flew to Calgary, travelled across the Rockies to Meadow Creek to watch this beautiful bridge being built.

I am working on a book following the bridge from conception to fruition, and have an archive of video too. Please get in touch if you want access to the archive..

The Gap Bridge was built over 3 days by 5 timber men.