EMERGING
THEN
EMERGES
A MONUMENT TO WHAT RISES FROM RUIN.
Then LOVE Emerges
Then LOVE Emerges is a 24-foot monumental concrete sculpture created by Dylan Myers for Comstock. Its story spans two homes at Reston Station—first at 1900 Reston Metro Plaza and now at LOVE Park in Reston Row.
Four cast letters—each standing 6′6″ tall—rise on 1¼-inch stainless-steel supports, making the enormous weight of concrete appear to float.
ONE SCULPTURE.
TWO HOMES.
A STORY STILL EMERGING.
THERE WAS NO CAUTIOUS BEGINNING.
For his first sculpture, Dylan Myers didn’t begin at human scale. He cast LOVE in concrete—four letters standing 6’6” tall—then lifted their enormous weight onto slender stainless-steel supports and made the entire word appear to float. There was no cautious beginning.
The concept began as a sketch on a shop whiteboard and a direct video pitch to Comstock. Before casting a single letter, one question had to be answered:
Screen grab of Dylan
pitching the project.
How will I float the concrete letters
to make the weight disappear?
THE BASE WAS NEVER A PEDESTAL.
The base was never intended to read as a pedestal. It was conceived as the remains of an old concrete wall—board-formed, broken open, weathered, discarded and left behind.
From that forgotten structure, LOVE rises.
It does not erase the ruin or stand safely apart from it. It emerges directly from what the world abandoned.
Base and stainless-steel
support mock-up.
THE TIMING WAS NOT PLANNED.
THE MEANING WAS UNAVOIDABLE.
Then LOVE Emerges was not conceived as a response to COVID-19. But it was fabricated and installed inside it.
Through 2020, as public life contracted into distance, uncertainty and isolation, four monumental concrete letters were taking shape inside the workshop. A meaning already embedded within the sculpture suddenly carried the weight of the world around it.
While the world was being pulled apart,
LOVE was emerging.
Letter connection mock-up.
FIRST SCULPTURE.
Each 6′6″ letter appears to float above the concrete on exposed 1¼″ stainless-steel supports. The separation is narrow but essential. Weight becomes elevation. What should feel immovable begins to rise.
The L, V, and E were cast in ICE gray. The oversized “BIG O” was cast in a red terrazzo / ICE finish containing recycled red glass. As daylight moves across it, the glass appears and disappears—holding fragments of light within the mass of the concrete.
NO SMALL BEGINNING.
Detail of the sealed “BIG O”.
THEN LOVE EMERGES
Monumental public concrete sculpture
Board-formed concrete, GFRC, terrazzo, recycled glass + stainless steel
24′ × 9′ 9″ × 2′ 9″
7,675 lbs of love.
Making LOVE
TWO HOMES | ONE STORY
VIRGINIA IS FOR LOVERS
PART OF VIRGINIA
LOVEWORKS.
300+
LOVEWORKS ACROSS THE COMMONWEALTH
Then LOVE Emerges is Reston Station’s official LOVEworks—part of Virginia Tourism’s statewide program, turning four letters into site-specific portraits of Virginia communities.
ONE OF 300+. BUILT LIKE NO OTHER.
THE FIRST HOME
1900 RESTON METRO PLAZA
Reston Station · Reston,Virginia
Architecture by JAHN
Before it arrived at LOVE Park, Then LOVE Emerges entered public life at 1900 Reston Metro Plaza—the dramatic JAHN-designed tower at Reston Station.
Commissioned by Comstock and installed during 2021, the 24-foot concrete sculpture stood on the landscaped grounds behind the tower as Reston Station’s official Virginia LOVEworks.
A SECOND EMERGENCE.
Originally installed on the landscaped grounds behind 1900 Reston Metro Plaza in 2021, Then LOVE Emerges was relocated in 2025 to LOVE Park beside JW Marriott Reston Station.
THE FIRST HOME GAVE LOVE A PLACE.
THE SECOND GAVE IT A PARK.
THE SECOND HOME
LOVE PARK
Reston Row · Reston, Virginia
Image courtesy of Comstock Companies.
LOVE LIVES HERE.
At LOVE Park, Then LOVE Emerges is no longer encountered beside a single building. It now belongs to an entire public landscape—surrounded by open lawn, gathering spaces, hospitality, architecture and monumental art.
Set beside JW Marriott Reston Station within Reston Row, the park gives LOVE room to become more than an object. It becomes a meeting place, a landmark and part of the daily life unfolding around it.
An unplanned winter visit. No production. No staging. Just the woman I love standing beside the concrete I love.
LOVE IS NOT ALONE HERE.
LOVE Park is not simply a setting for a single work. It is a public landscape built around participation.
Set beside Virginia’s first JW Marriott at Reston Row, the park brings together monumental art, open lawn, gathering spaces, events and an oversized red swing—turning the space between buildings into a place people can enter and inhabit.
Image courtesy of Comstock Companies.
Across the park, Lorenzo Quinn’s Building Bridges creates a passage beneath six pairs of monumental hands:
Friendship. Faith. Help. Love. Hope. Wisdom.
First presented at the 2019 Venice Biennale and installed in Reston in 2025, the work carries its message of unity into the center of LOVE Park.
One sculpture rising from ruin—the other reaching across division.
Then LOVE Emerges now stands in conversation with Building Bridges.
Different materials.
Different histories.
The same refusal to accept separation as permanent.
One rises from ruin.
One reaches across it.
CONNECTION IS NOT FOUND.
IT IS BUILT.
MONUMENTAL WORK
Public art, placemaking, and site-responsive concrete works developed through material, scale, and place.