Last week I shared some of the historic structures of Pioneer Square. The great fire of 1889 did through fear of reoccurrence what might have taken until decades later to accomplish otherwise. Wood structures lost were rebuilt in stone, brick, and steel, ushering Modernity to the region as the population doubled during the rebuilding. The influence of the european moderns was full of beautiful half steps like the Maison Blanc Restaurant which are no longer standing. The effect of these missing awkward years makes the contrast between the historic Pioneer Square and the rest of Downtown all the more shocking. Structures like the Pioneer Building and Seattle Public Library are a short walk from one another, and in between lies generations of Architectures growing pains that are fascinating and inventive.
"Crowne Plaza Hotel" - 1980 by Anthony Callison
"IBM Building" - 1964 by Minoru Yamasaki w/ NBBJ
The IBM Building and the later Rainier Tower are a fascinating duo in view of one another across Fifth Ave. The even vertical lines make the buildings read like monolithic volumes resting on boolean cut bases. Rainier Tower emphasizes its centralized structure, while IBM emphasizes its structural wrapper, the two variations on tower design with the hybrid World Trade Center system constructed in 1973.
"Rainier Tower - 1977 by Minoru Yamasaki
"Fourth & Blanchard Building" - 1979 by Chester L. Lindsey Architects
What I love about the 4th & Blanchard Building and Seattle Public Library are the many ways they manifest themselves in views across the city. The Blanchard Building can afford to be more subtle because its height can be seen from further, but the results are the same in that the silhouette of the figures are slippery and shifting as you move around them. From some views SPL appears to be pulling itself together into a discrete volume, and from others it deforms wildly. 4th & Blanchard's vents make it appear sentiently peering over the city or becoming an ominous mineralogical urban shard.
"Seattle Public Library" - 2004 by OMA w/ LMN Architects
As a designer I'm less inclined toward stylistic high-water marks, and I find the compromised and impure in Architecture that reaches perhaps a little too far the most inspiring. For me Architecture is at its best when, like a Cezanne painting, function, truth, and form teeter on the edge of pure abstraction.
The reality of urban Architecture is that besides the relative few who inhabit it, it must function as part of the pedestrian experience for the rest of the city. The built environment can be so much more than a sharply defined edge between public and private spaces. My next post I will look at the streets of Seattle and that fluid social contract that is urbanism.