A unique tribute to North Fork first responders — in the shape of a winding, serpentine metal structure — is about to be unveiled in downtown Riverhead. “Grateful Turnout: A Public Thank You to First Responders” is being woven from two tons of worn-out, decommissioned fire hoses.

The walk-through, wheelchair-accessible artwork stands 4 feet high and takes visitors along a zigzagging, 34-foot path where they can experience the symbolism of the lifesaving equipment in a reflective setting.

The sculpture will soon be installed on Heidi Behr Way along the Peconic River in downtown Riverhead, a particularly fitting location for a tribute to first responders. Behr, a first responder with the Riverhead Town Volunteer Ambulance Corps, was 23 when she was killed in 2005 on Route 58 in Aquebogue while transporting a patient.

“It’s the perfect spot for this tribute and the whole volunteer community,” said Riverhead Councilman Ken Rothwell, a volunteer firefighter for 23 years. “It will honor all our volunteers as people walk through it.” The project’s placement was approved at a Town Board meeting last month.

On a recent Saturday afternoon, fiber artist Sherry Davis was working on the S-shaped structure with her partner and engineering fabricator, Mark Alhadeff, in their Riverhead driveway.

“I have wild ideas and he helps me figure it out,” Davis said.

An ‘intense saw’

The two worked as a creative team, fastening hooks and buckles from firefighters’ jackets onto tightly woven strips of discarded and donated fire hoses. Along with bright green reflective tape, the strips provide space where visitors can write thoughtful notes and thank-yous to firefighters, police, EMS personnel and dispatchers.

Cutting through the hoses — some 3 inches wide, others 5 inches, with multiple layers of nylon and rubber — proved challenging for the artist.

“Mark came up with this intense saw,” Davis said. “He designed it, built it and that enabled me to wrap each piece of hose, looping it around the curved metal armature.”

The armature is made from bending what would normally be a circular cattle feeder filled with hay.

On the outside, the sculpture features one type of weave, described by Davis as regimented. The inside is “chaos, just like the jobs our first responders often face.”

Washed-out white hoses represent EMTs, alongside numbered red hoses and faded blue hoses representing firefighters and police. Yellow and gold hoses pay tribute to dispatchers.

Alhadeff also built a 3D model of Davis’ vision and then went high-tech, using augmented reality (AR).

“I created the image on my phone and with this technology, we’re able to picture how Grateful Turnout will look in any spot,” he said.

He walked around, phone in hand, as an image of the fire hose sculpture was projected first in his front yard and then behind the house.

“This enabled us to avoid having to move this really heavy piece around. We could see what it looked like in any background in AR!”

Sherry Davis photos

‘Materials that have a soul’

Known locally for her massive, woven spheres made from old blue jeans and, more recently, an American flag that hangs in the lobby of Riverhead Town Hall, Davis said her inspiration for working with fire hoses came from her belief that old materials carry a little of the spirit of the people who used them.

“I’m drawn to materials that have a soul and one day it struck me: imagine what a fire hose must carry.”

Now she was working with tough, heavy material that had been in the hands of people working to save lives.

Deborah Wetzel video

The hoses and jackets have many stories to tell. Davis said one of the jackets may have been worn during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

“It’s powerful and I’m trying to decide what to do with it, how to honor the firefighter and never forget.”

Alhadeff chimed in.

“Repurposing things is what makes Sherry unique. I’m Jeanne-Claude to her Christo!” he joked, referring to the artists famous for “The Gates” in Central Park.

Davis describes herself as “not a traditional weaver,” though one with a nearly 100-year-old mahogany loom sitting in her basement.

Also helping the project along over the past year were about 30 volunteers who hauled hoses and participated in the weaving.

“Folks are quite literally weaving their appreciation of first responders into the work,” Davis said. “They are transforming it into a work that honors the people who used it.”

‘Like cardinals’

Earlier this year, Davis used exclusively red fire hose to create one of the outdoor sculptures at Bird Song, the sculpture trail at the North Fork Audubon Society’s Inlet Pond County Park in Greenport, which is open to visitors through Nov. 29.

The red hoses trace the waveform of a northern cardinal’s call across a fallen tree.

“I got to thinking about their calls and the calls of first responders because like cardinals, fire hose is red!”

She linked lengths of decommissioned fire hose to mimic the bird’s digital call.

“I’m drawn to materials that have a soul and one day it struck me: imagine what a fire hose must carry.” Sherry Davis

On this particular Saturday, Rothwell stopped by Davis and Alhadeff’s home to drop off weathered blue supply and service hoses. The gear comes to Davis from multiple fire departments, including Greenport and Wading River.

“We had a pile [of older gear] and rather than putting it in a dumpster, we donated it to Sherry,” said David Nyce, first assistant chief of the Greenport Fire Department. “It sounded like a cool project. The message of the piece itself fits for us.

“Most of our gear has a lifespan and it gets tested every year for viability,” Nyce said. “Usually, it’s good for ten years but it does reach the end of its useful life.”

Davis said that “Grateful Turnout: A Public Thank You to First Responders” is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the governor’s office and the New York State Legislature.