It is now a bald, scorched, desolate space with views of the ocean and the eerie sound of nothing but the wind.
In this desolate space he sowed seeds of something new - he pumped it full of copper sulphate solution and waited until blue crystals grew over every surface - floors, walls, ceilings, a bathtub.
Missing Buildings is a book of traces and shadows, of solid structures and the often desolate space between them.
But it's also a game about fear of company, exposure and emotional vulnerability – wandering around a desolate space, surveyed constantly by an unseen presence, it's a game about having your personal space abandoned and having it invaded.
"We're taking this desolate space and finally turning it into something," said Del T. Adams, development manager with the A&R Development Corporation of Baltimore, one of the partners in the project.
Ms. Melkonian hired James van Sweden of the landscaping firm of Oehme, van Sweden & Associates in Washington -- whose clients include Oprah Winfrey and David Brinkley -- to make the desolate space beautiful.
The desolate space, she said, "is going to be the most magnificent, verdant, luxurious green park".
Punchdrunk re-make desolate spaces.
The West Bank is small, but in desolate spaces like this one it feels huge, mythic.
The desolate, empty spaces of the Sahara in northern Niger and neighbouring Mali are home to drug and arms traffickers, people smugglers and armed Islamist militant groups, some of them linked to al-Qaida.
