"After discussion ended, the consensus of the committee was to recommend that the library board interview 5 firms: Design Lab, Fanning Howey, Ross Barney, Luckenbach Ziegelman, and Engberg Anderson."
design lab and ross barney both have some beautiful work - design lab's a little more progressive, possibly more complementary of the breuer. either of these would probably produce an outstanding expansion.
fanning howey - the original architects with whom the board was working. they may still be favored but, even if not, their inclusion was probably seen as obligatory since there's some history there. their solution was to remove the breuer, of course, so i can't favor them.
luckenbach ziegelman has some interesting stuff, but i don't quite get it. i hope it looks the way it does because they were making the most of limited budgets. if not, the work just LOOKS inexpensive.
engberg anderson - perfectly ok. will give the library what they request, but probably won't bring a critical design attitude to it. a danger that they will be led to do something histor-icky which would be wholly inappropriate next to the breuer. these guys would be a 'safe' choice, but not necessarily a good one.
i find this list disappointing considering the range of talent that had submitted for the rfq. i think it's clear that the building committee was looking at factors somewhat detached from the actual quality of the architecture that these firms would provide, i.e. local firms, firms with "library experience," firms that had already done work for the library. the only firm that seems to have a bit of design cred is designlab, and what are the odds that designlab is going to fly in from belgium on such short notice for the interview? i hope i'm wrong, but their inclusion seems to be a token gesture.
i will try to keep an open mind until an architect is hired and a schematic design is presented to the public, but at this point i have my reservations.
From what I had heard there were some great practices that submitted.. none of which made the final shortlist.. with ross barney being the most progressive, and shes hardly an exciting architect.
some of the names that were on the shortlist included David Adjaya, Deborah Berke, Michael Graves, Marble Fairbanks, Michael Maltzan, Doug Garofalo/Quavirarch and Rios Clementi....
how can none of those firms make the shortlist when Design Lab, Fanning Howey, Ross Barney, Luckenbach Ziegelman, and Engberg Anderson all do...the most depressing aspect to this is that the Breuer will be replaced with the most bland, unmemorable, unremarkable piece of red stone and copper tin roofed building you could imagine..
Grosse Pointe should be ashamed of themselves for the opportunity theyre throwing away.
I must agree....very very disappointed in the selection of the shortlist. They had such a incredible opportunity to really have a beautiful and FUNCTIONAL addition. In my honest opinion, they seemingly have blown it. Even with the (as steven put it) of the obligatory selection of fanning howey, which could have been given to a .... say David Adjaye. Fanning Howey had an opportunity before and they BLEW IT. Now to give them another go is a disgrace. Clearly shows they really don't care.
And I am fully aware that some of the people involved see our boards. So I hope they read this. It's atrocious that they be so close minded. I'm at a loss for words.
At the very least designlab has an opportunity, and I am with steven on this...They get my VOTE too!!
What kills me, is how excited and active this community was during the whole "lets stop them from tearing it down" phase, and how completely invisible and done everyone is now that they are building a new one... I would have thought you would be more interested and communicative about the selections... but its just silent here.
hotsies, I don't think building a new one is an absolute yet.
And I don't think that "silence" is all that is going on either. So much - so much - of architecture work goes on behind the scenes. So much is political in such a way that even ACT-UP in their heyday couldn't have had an effect.
hotsies, to a certain extent i agree with you, we haven't been as vigilant after the charrette as we should have been. i'm one of the charrette participants that lives in detroit and have been attending library board meetings regularly. i do wish as a group we could have had more input in the architect selection process. the problem is the library building committee is very large (30 members) with three architects and an urban planner on their team. there was a lot of input in the selection process from a lot of different sources. unfortunately i'm not sure the selection of the five architects was based on design ability, and i also think there is a difference of taste between what we as architects would like and what the building committee wanted. there is only so much that can done, but i am still taking part in the process as best as i personally can and would encourage archinectors to take a second stand at preserving the building. right now the building is on what the library board is calling a dual track with architects making a proposal to add on and a proposal to tear down and build new. the preservation track would not have been possible a few months ago before the charrette. we've made progress, but there is still more that can be done.
I am a member of the Building Committee and do want to provide a bit of explanation of the short-listing process.
We received 28 responses to the RFQ and each member was given the task of reviewing them and selecting their top three picks. These were then tallied for all members. At a meeting, we started from the top and discussed each firm which had received at least one vote. The discussion was greatly important, especially for me, a non-architect, who had never done this type of evaluation. In other words, I was working solely on the basis of the RFQ response. From that discussion, there were five firms selected, as has been noted in this thread. The discussions considered overall experience, library experience, Michigan firms, reputation (for which we relied on the three architects who are committee members).
There was no political input in arriving at the short-list. I think the large committee size precluded much of this. One comment in this thread above was that Fanning Howey was selected "obligatorily" because they had designed a previous branch -- this is untrue. Please note that Grosse Pointe has built two branches in the last 5 years and the designer of the other one did not make the short list.
The commenters are right that a great number of very talented architects were not chosen, such as Mr. Maltzan and Mr. Adjaye. While I can comment only for myself and not the committee as a whole, you must consider that Grosse Pointe is a very, very conservative community and the library is in the middle of a neighborhood and this does limit the spectrum of designs to some extent. Cutting-edge designers like Mr. Maltzan just would not fit for this project and his talent would be wasted.
Overall, the committee was left with having to narrow a long list of many outstanding architects and firms down to a small number for interviewing. I am sorry that some may believe we "blew it," but I disagree. The Board has interviewed two of the firms and I attended those interviews. One of the firms has arranged for the involvement of a Robert Gatje, who worked with Breuer and who wrote a Breuer biography. From those, after we hear the remaining three firms, the Board will have a difficult decision.
Finally, as to demolition vs. restoration/addition, the Board made a definite statement at the 4/23 meeting that restoration is the preferred option, and will be working with the architect to see if the existing Breuer building can work in providing the functionality that is desired. I, for one, do not want to see the Breuer building markedly altered; I am hoping that an addition can be designed which allows for the desired function while not destroying or overwhelming the existing design.
it is a great help, brianron. what you've shared makes it clear not JUST that this list was a considered response but HOW it was considered. as a participant in the original protests against tearing down the breuer and in the charrette, i appreciate the work of the committee.
those of us outside the process can only cross our fingers and hope that the selected architect can do justice to the breuer and not chain it to something too 'conservative'. mr mumby's earlier proposal to pay tribute to mid-century modernism by recreating it in the 21st century is just as disingenuous as building colonial in the 21st century. the addition should be reflective of the contemporary america, not some imagined vision of the past.
one caveat: the attitude behind your comment, "cutting-edge designers like mr. maltzan just would not fit for this project and his talent would be wasted", if exercised in 1953, would have meant that grosse pointe would not have this building by breuer.
Brianron, thanks for posting and clearing up a few things about the building committee's position. i think there's a difference in priorities between what the building committee was interested in determining through the rfq process and what we as a community of architects are interested in seeing for the library. for most of us involved with the charrette, we first wanted to see the building preserved (and it seems that good progress has been made on that front), and two, that the absolute best architect is chosen for the addition. our criteria for the "best architect" revolves around who can provide the absolute best design; other criteria such as "library experience," local v. non-local, etc. are of less interest (there are plenty of utterly banal libraries being designed by offices with library experience and an army of consultants).
leaving off david adjaye seemed to be the real disappointment. he would have done a beautiful addition that would have been very sensitive to the surrounding context. he recently lectured at ud-mercy and i know made a special trip out to visit the central branch. it's hard for a lot of us here to understand how an architect of his caliber could have been excluded while architects not nearly so respected in the profession would have made the cut.
Brainron, thank you for sharing your insight with us. It's great to hear that the existing library will likely be spared demolition. Hopefully the chosen architect will deliver a project that augments the Breuer bldg and the city of Grosse Pointe Farms in a meaningful way.
everytime i read something about adjaye it makes me cringe to think that his office wasn't at least given a chance to present to the library board. my hunch is that in another fifty years, a brueur-adjaye 1-2 generational punch would be admired nearly as much as the free-standing breuer is today.
david adjaye was in the area earlier in the year for a lecture at UofD...would love to hear his thoughts on the project. Oh well.
There is still hope (of design lab)...
in re. to the fear of cutting edge contemporary designs, i drove in front of the library again over the weekend, and i think it's a perfect example of how contemproary architecture can add to the urban texture of a "conservative" neighborhood. its scale, material palette, and general presence all seemed very appropriate, while at the same time providing much needed variety in arch. language (cities forget how variety is an important element to a successfull streetscape).
Overall, i am pleasantly surprised as how this is all developping.
from the most recent published board meeting minutes, end of july:
Design Lab Architects – The Director reported that Bob Miklos and Scott Slarsky were in town for two days, July 11 and 12 to present three concepts for a new Central Library to the Building Committee and the Foundation. She said that one concept, which was aptly named “Over the Line” used part of the school property so it has been rejected but staff from the committee met to discuss the remaining two options and the “Carved Box” seems to be the more popular design. Ms. Bloom said that a decision needs to be made soon as to whether administration and processing stays in the building or is located in the proposed new building in the Park. She added that she will be asking for more detail from the architects as to exactly what is included in the admin portion of the concept which would mean adding a third floor to the concept. Ms. Bloom concluded by advising the Board that the architects will return on August 13, 14 and 15.
Ed Frederickson said the Board is still working with both the Grosse Pte. Public Schools and the City of Grosse Pte. Farms and noted that a lot of support will be needed from both of them for the Central project to be successful. He said he is trying to arrange for the Board to meet with both groups to discuss some of the issues, including numerous variances which will be required. The Director added that Dr. Tapan Datta of Goodell-Grivas, who conducted the traffic study for the Woods project, will be doing the traffic study for the Central project as well. Ms. Bloom said they will be conducting the study during the summer months and also while the schools are in session.
i was just trying to google designlab and came across this... it appears to be the central library building committee's blog... the most recent post states that they may be able to fet $50K from the World Monument Fund if they preserve the Breuer...
also, it didn't click until just now... one of my best friends from undergrad works in fanning howey's columbus, ohio office... if they get selected, they should let him design it... it would kick ass... he's a phenomenal designer...
at the risk of sounding corny and obvious, i think the important lesson here regardless of who is selected for the final design, (although i think designlab will do a nice project) is that architects can take the initiative to improve the built environment even when not directly involved in a project. the connectivity of archinect allowed a grass-roots movement to occur which will have a significant effect on the sense of place in gross pointe, and possibly push the standard for architecture in the detroit area a notch higher. hopefully this will encourage more architects in michigan to do likewise, as the level of quality work in the state overall is pretty bad in my opinion. (i wasn't involved in the project, but did something similar last winter for a different program). for all the complaining one hears on archinect about how underappreciated architects are, this library competition just goes to show that the level of public appreciation for design just comes down to personal initative on our part. for once the internet has lived up to it's expectations; we are witnessing the power of networks first hand.
a couple of news items regarding the central library that i would have posted earlier (if i wasn't so distracted with college football these days)...
1 - some conceptual design was presented at last month's board of trustees meeting. the detroit free press even noticed.
2 - next wednesday, 24 october 2007 the library will be hosting reed kroloff for a lecture & slide show on marcel breuer & mid century modern architecture. sadly, i will not be attending and it already appears that they have a waiting list for the limited space...but if anybody can manage to sneak in, we'd love to hear a first-hand account.
puddles, that's a nice article by john gallagher, but at the risk of sounding whinny [sp?] shouldn't he at least mention mapa? what, we did nothing? "e-mails poured in," that's it?
aml, if it's any consolation, anytime i talk to a community member at board meetings they are effusive in their thanks for the work that mapa did with the charrette and really credit us with saving the library. we may not be getting a lot of press over it, but it certainly isn't forgotten within the community.
i was checking out PLY's website today and in the news section it mentioned that they are teaching a studio at the University of Cincinnatti this fall that is designing an addition to breuer's library...
evilp, no actually. parking is rearing it's ugly head again, and it looks like there are people with the city that for political reasons are not on the library's side on this issue. more than money, parking could resurface as the biggest obstacle to the addition being built.
i contacted the library to see if they had any plans to record the lecture and possibly distribute via the web, however, they weren't sure if they had the time to coordinate that. oh well.
i also recently found this blog regarding their building updates. it includes a link to a library news podcast that features a short interview with designlab architect scott slarsky. it's about a 1 minute interview with slarsky and is about three minutes into the audio file for those of you who care to listen.
i just checked the gpcl website. here i believe is design lab's final conceptual design before it is brought to a millage vote this spring. unfortunately the pdf is only a plan, no renderings.
thanks for the update. too bad there's no elevations or renderings available...but even with just the floor plan, it's obvious that this is a much better solution than demolishing the original building in favor of that earlier design.
wonder what they did with the parking? seems they fill back to the back property line - a solution many of us tested. fairly straightforward and good answer if parking goes away.
was parking made a non-issue in some way through other agreements? haven't seen any comments about it as i've followed the library's notes and blog, but maybe in the local paper they address this?
i've been a little out of the loop since october, but last i knew they were planning on putting a portion of the parking under the new addition. that would only account for 30-50 spaces (as i remember), and the building committee was trying to work with the city to get the additional required parking off-site.
at one time design lab was talking about creating a third story that would cantilever over the breuer building along the fisher street side of the building. this was somewhat controversial among some residents and local architects. it was perceived was being out of scale with the neighborhood and the existing library. i tend to agree and am relieved that whether for cost cutting or not, the whole design has been limited to two stories.
i also noticed that it looks like they have preserved the mural in the adult reading room. this was of significance to the world monument fund and knoll. i can't recall who the artist was who painted it, but he or she had ties to knoll. in any case, i'm glad to see it still there.
i think the mural is by an artist with the last name "matter." puddles, does this sound familiar? i think henry ng told us this at lunch when you were in town...
you're right liberty bell, the square footage is significantly less than in the vadonna plan. the whole addition was reduced to cut down the cost (including the loss of the cantilevered third floor, which i think is a damn shame), most of the on-site parking is underground and the library is trying to fight for more street and off-site parking to save money and space.
i work at designLAB, and i poured over all the mapa charette submissions when we started working on the library, but i'm new to this thread - it's nice to see so many archinectors were pulling for us in the selection process! there will be some new perspectives of our proposed addition soon that should be publicly available - the library wants 7 or 8 renderings for fundraising, so that's all i'll be doing for the next few weeks. keep an eye out for those at the end of january/beginning of february.
grosse pointe?
any word on who was shortlisted for the breuer library? their blog says it was decided last week.
from the April 11 minutes:
"After discussion ended, the consensus of the committee was to recommend that the library board interview 5 firms: Design Lab, Fanning Howey, Ross Barney, Luckenbach Ziegelman, and Engberg Anderson."
not a bad list:
design lab and ross barney both have some beautiful work - design lab's a little more progressive, possibly more complementary of the breuer. either of these would probably produce an outstanding expansion.
fanning howey - the original architects with whom the board was working. they may still be favored but, even if not, their inclusion was probably seen as obligatory since there's some history there. their solution was to remove the breuer, of course, so i can't favor them.
luckenbach ziegelman has some interesting stuff, but i don't quite get it. i hope it looks the way it does because they were making the most of limited budgets. if not, the work just LOOKS inexpensive.
engberg anderson - perfectly ok. will give the library what they request, but probably won't bring a critical design attitude to it. a danger that they will be led to do something histor-icky which would be wholly inappropriate next to the breuer. these guys would be a 'safe' choice, but not necessarily a good one.
i find this list disappointing considering the range of talent that had submitted for the rfq. i think it's clear that the building committee was looking at factors somewhat detached from the actual quality of the architecture that these firms would provide, i.e. local firms, firms with "library experience," firms that had already done work for the library. the only firm that seems to have a bit of design cred is designlab, and what are the odds that designlab is going to fly in from belgium on such short notice for the interview? i hope i'm wrong, but their inclusion seems to be a token gesture.
i will try to keep an open mind until an architect is hired and a schematic design is presented to the public, but at this point i have my reservations.
sorry, i may have the wrong design lab. there are a lot of them out there. anyone know this firm?
i think i remember that it was designlab of boston: http://www.designlabarch.com/
...and they were partnered with a michigan firm.
thanks, steven. their work does look more compelling.
not that it matters to anybody, but they'd get my vote.
From what I had heard there were some great practices that submitted.. none of which made the final shortlist.. with ross barney being the most progressive, and shes hardly an exciting architect.
some of the names that were on the shortlist included David Adjaya, Deborah Berke, Michael Graves, Marble Fairbanks, Michael Maltzan, Doug Garofalo/Quavirarch and Rios Clementi....
how can none of those firms make the shortlist when Design Lab, Fanning Howey, Ross Barney, Luckenbach Ziegelman, and Engberg Anderson all do...the most depressing aspect to this is that the Breuer will be replaced with the most bland, unmemorable, unremarkable piece of red stone and copper tin roofed building you could imagine..
Grosse Pointe should be ashamed of themselves for the opportunity theyre throwing away.
I must agree....very very disappointed in the selection of the shortlist. They had such a incredible opportunity to really have a beautiful and FUNCTIONAL addition. In my honest opinion, they seemingly have blown it. Even with the (as steven put it) of the obligatory selection of fanning howey, which could have been given to a .... say David Adjaye. Fanning Howey had an opportunity before and they BLEW IT. Now to give them another go is a disgrace. Clearly shows they really don't care.
And I am fully aware that some of the people involved see our boards. So I hope they read this. It's atrocious that they be so close minded. I'm at a loss for words.
At the very least designlab has an opportunity, and I am with steven on this...They get my VOTE too!!
What kills me, is how excited and active this community was during the whole "lets stop them from tearing it down" phase, and how completely invisible and done everyone is now that they are building a new one... I would have thought you would be more interested and communicative about the selections... but its just silent here.
hotsies, I don't think building a new one is an absolute yet.
And I don't think that "silence" is all that is going on either. So much - so much - of architecture work goes on behind the scenes. So much is political in such a way that even ACT-UP in their heyday couldn't have had an effect.
well frankly some of the names not listed are fine with me. to me garofalo makes some ugly buildings.
yeah but adjaye doesn't (make fugly buildings).
i think of all of them, his would be most complementary/subservient/respectful of the breuer.
schade
hotsies, to a certain extent i agree with you, we haven't been as vigilant after the charrette as we should have been. i'm one of the charrette participants that lives in detroit and have been attending library board meetings regularly. i do wish as a group we could have had more input in the architect selection process. the problem is the library building committee is very large (30 members) with three architects and an urban planner on their team. there was a lot of input in the selection process from a lot of different sources. unfortunately i'm not sure the selection of the five architects was based on design ability, and i also think there is a difference of taste between what we as architects would like and what the building committee wanted. there is only so much that can done, but i am still taking part in the process as best as i personally can and would encourage archinectors to take a second stand at preserving the building. right now the building is on what the library board is calling a dual track with architects making a proposal to add on and a proposal to tear down and build new. the preservation track would not have been possible a few months ago before the charrette. we've made progress, but there is still more that can be done.
I am a member of the Building Committee and do want to provide a bit of explanation of the short-listing process.
We received 28 responses to the RFQ and each member was given the task of reviewing them and selecting their top three picks. These were then tallied for all members. At a meeting, we started from the top and discussed each firm which had received at least one vote. The discussion was greatly important, especially for me, a non-architect, who had never done this type of evaluation. In other words, I was working solely on the basis of the RFQ response. From that discussion, there were five firms selected, as has been noted in this thread. The discussions considered overall experience, library experience, Michigan firms, reputation (for which we relied on the three architects who are committee members).
There was no political input in arriving at the short-list. I think the large committee size precluded much of this. One comment in this thread above was that Fanning Howey was selected "obligatorily" because they had designed a previous branch -- this is untrue. Please note that Grosse Pointe has built two branches in the last 5 years and the designer of the other one did not make the short list.
The commenters are right that a great number of very talented architects were not chosen, such as Mr. Maltzan and Mr. Adjaye. While I can comment only for myself and not the committee as a whole, you must consider that Grosse Pointe is a very, very conservative community and the library is in the middle of a neighborhood and this does limit the spectrum of designs to some extent. Cutting-edge designers like Mr. Maltzan just would not fit for this project and his talent would be wasted.
Overall, the committee was left with having to narrow a long list of many outstanding architects and firms down to a small number for interviewing. I am sorry that some may believe we "blew it," but I disagree. The Board has interviewed two of the firms and I attended those interviews. One of the firms has arranged for the involvement of a Robert Gatje, who worked with Breuer and who wrote a Breuer biography. From those, after we hear the remaining three firms, the Board will have a difficult decision.
Finally, as to demolition vs. restoration/addition, the Board made a definite statement at the 4/23 meeting that restoration is the preferred option, and will be working with the architect to see if the existing Breuer building can work in providing the functionality that is desired. I, for one, do not want to see the Breuer building markedly altered; I am hoping that an addition can be designed which allows for the desired function while not destroying or overwhelming the existing design.
I hope this has helped.
it is a great help, brianron. what you've shared makes it clear not JUST that this list was a considered response but HOW it was considered. as a participant in the original protests against tearing down the breuer and in the charrette, i appreciate the work of the committee.
those of us outside the process can only cross our fingers and hope that the selected architect can do justice to the breuer and not chain it to something too 'conservative'. mr mumby's earlier proposal to pay tribute to mid-century modernism by recreating it in the 21st century is just as disingenuous as building colonial in the 21st century. the addition should be reflective of the contemporary america, not some imagined vision of the past.
one caveat: the attitude behind your comment, "cutting-edge designers like mr. maltzan just would not fit for this project and his talent would be wasted", if exercised in 1953, would have meant that grosse pointe would not have this building by breuer.
Brianron, thanks for posting and clearing up a few things about the building committee's position. i think there's a difference in priorities between what the building committee was interested in determining through the rfq process and what we as a community of architects are interested in seeing for the library. for most of us involved with the charrette, we first wanted to see the building preserved (and it seems that good progress has been made on that front), and two, that the absolute best architect is chosen for the addition. our criteria for the "best architect" revolves around who can provide the absolute best design; other criteria such as "library experience," local v. non-local, etc. are of less interest (there are plenty of utterly banal libraries being designed by offices with library experience and an army of consultants).
leaving off david adjaye seemed to be the real disappointment. he would have done a beautiful addition that would have been very sensitive to the surrounding context. he recently lectured at ud-mercy and i know made a special trip out to visit the central branch. it's hard for a lot of us here to understand how an architect of his caliber could have been excluded while architects not nearly so respected in the profession would have made the cut.
Brainron, thank you for sharing your insight with us. It's great to hear that the existing library will likely be spared demolition. Hopefully the chosen architect will deliver a project that augments the Breuer bldg and the city of Grosse Pointe Farms in a meaningful way.
everytime i read something about adjaye it makes me cringe to think that his office wasn't at least given a chance to present to the library board. my hunch is that in another fifty years, a brueur-adjaye 1-2 generational punch would be admired nearly as much as the free-standing breuer is today.
Too bad that Deborah Berke didn't make it to the final short list. She would have been a perfect fit, in my opinion.
david adjaye was in the area earlier in the year for a lecture at UofD...would love to hear his thoughts on the project. Oh well.
There is still hope (of design lab)...
in re. to the fear of cutting edge contemporary designs, i drove in front of the library again over the weekend, and i think it's a perfect example of how contemproary architecture can add to the urban texture of a "conservative" neighborhood. its scale, material palette, and general presence all seemed very appropriate, while at the same time providing much needed variety in arch. language (cities forget how variety is an important element to a successfull streetscape).
Overall, i am pleasantly surprised as how this is all developping.
from the most recent published board meeting minutes, end of july:
Design Lab Architects – The Director reported that Bob Miklos and Scott Slarsky were in town for two days, July 11 and 12 to present three concepts for a new Central Library to the Building Committee and the Foundation. She said that one concept, which was aptly named “Over the Line” used part of the school property so it has been rejected but staff from the committee met to discuss the remaining two options and the “Carved Box” seems to be the more popular design. Ms. Bloom said that a decision needs to be made soon as to whether administration and processing stays in the building or is located in the proposed new building in the Park. She added that she will be asking for more detail from the architects as to exactly what is included in the admin portion of the concept which would mean adding a third floor to the concept. Ms. Bloom concluded by advising the Board that the architects will return on August 13, 14 and 15.
Ed Frederickson said the Board is still working with both the Grosse Pte. Public Schools and the City of Grosse Pte. Farms and noted that a lot of support will be needed from both of them for the Central project to be successful. He said he is trying to arrange for the Board to meet with both groups to discuss some of the issues, including numerous variances which will be required. The Director added that Dr. Tapan Datta of Goodell-Grivas, who conducted the traffic study for the Woods project, will be doing the traffic study for the Central project as well. Ms. Bloom said they will be conducting the study during the summer months and also while the schools are in session.
i was just trying to google designlab and came across this... it appears to be the central library building committee's blog... the most recent post states that they may be able to fet $50K from the World Monument Fund if they preserve the Breuer...
also, it didn't click until just now... one of my best friends from undergrad works in fanning howey's columbus, ohio office... if they get selected, they should let him design it... it would kick ass... he's a phenomenal designer...
hi vasy if you see this... :) nnlnn
designlab was already selected. they're a couple of months into schematic design discussions with the building committee.
oh... ok... good... somehow i missed that...
at the risk of sounding corny and obvious, i think the important lesson here regardless of who is selected for the final design, (although i think designlab will do a nice project) is that architects can take the initiative to improve the built environment even when not directly involved in a project. the connectivity of archinect allowed a grass-roots movement to occur which will have a significant effect on the sense of place in gross pointe, and possibly push the standard for architecture in the detroit area a notch higher. hopefully this will encourage more architects in michigan to do likewise, as the level of quality work in the state overall is pretty bad in my opinion. (i wasn't involved in the project, but did something similar last winter for a different program). for all the complaining one hears on archinect about how underappreciated architects are, this library competition just goes to show that the level of public appreciation for design just comes down to personal initative on our part. for once the internet has lived up to it's expectations; we are witnessing the power of networks first hand.
a couple of news items regarding the central library that i would have posted earlier (if i wasn't so distracted with college football these days)...
1 - some conceptual design was presented at last month's board of trustees meeting. the detroit free press even noticed.
2 - next wednesday, 24 october 2007 the library will be hosting reed kroloff for a lecture & slide show on marcel breuer & mid century modern architecture. sadly, i will not be attending and it already appears that they have a waiting list for the limited space...but if anybody can manage to sneak in, we'd love to hear a first-hand account.
unfortunately andrew freear is speaking the same night at UDM.
i'm going to be out of town. any other detroiters interested in going to the gpcl that evening and giving a report? should be a very good lecture.
interesting. i'll see if i can make it. but with $1000 plane tickets, i'd say it's pretty unlikely.
puddles, that's a nice article by john gallagher, but at the risk of sounding whinny [sp?] shouldn't he at least mention mapa? what, we did nothing? "e-mails poured in," that's it?
hmmmpf.
aml, if it's any consolation, anytime i talk to a community member at board meetings they are effusive in their thanks for the work that mapa did with the charrette and really credit us with saving the library. we may not be getting a lot of press over it, but it certainly isn't forgotten within the community.
i guess it sort of is... thanks jafidler. for a minute there [after reading gallagher] i just feared the whole thing had just been in our heads.
gallagher sort of started it for mapa. wasn't it his article that jafidler passed to puddles and from which puddles started the thread-of-origin?
did gp drop the parking req?
in other grosse pointe library news...
i was checking out PLY's website today and in the news section it mentioned that they are teaching a studio at the University of Cincinnatti this fall that is designing an addition to breuer's library...
you can see the studio brief (PDF) here...
those people should teach easy money in local adult education school. i bet they got the studio project idea from MAPA.
evilp, no actually. parking is rearing it's ugly head again, and it looks like there are people with the city that for political reasons are not on the library's side on this issue. more than money, parking could resurface as the biggest obstacle to the addition being built.
hey, i'm right here near cincinnati. maybe i'll offer my services as mapa's visiting critic!
there. did it.
cool steven let us know how it goes!
anybody hear how the kroloff lecture turned out?
i contacted the library to see if they had any plans to record the lecture and possibly distribute via the web, however, they weren't sure if they had the time to coordinate that. oh well.
i also recently found this blog regarding their building updates. it includes a link to a library news podcast that features a short interview with designlab architect scott slarsky. it's about a 1 minute interview with slarsky and is about three minutes into the audio file for those of you who care to listen.
i just checked the gpcl website. here i believe is design lab's final conceptual design before it is brought to a millage vote this spring. unfortunately the pdf is only a plan, no renderings.
http://www.gp.lib.mi.us/building/Central_Plans_01162008.pdf
i had some difficulty opening the pdf. i suggest downloading it to your desktop first.
thanks for the update. too bad there's no elevations or renderings available...but even with just the floor plan, it's obvious that this is a much better solution than demolishing the original building in favor of that earlier design.
wonder what they did with the parking? seems they fill back to the back property line - a solution many of us tested. fairly straightforward and good answer if parking goes away.
was parking made a non-issue in some way through other agreements? haven't seen any comments about it as i've followed the library's notes and blog, but maybe in the local paper they address this?
i've been a little out of the loop since october, but last i knew they were planning on putting a portion of the parking under the new addition. that would only account for 30-50 spaces (as i remember), and the building committee was trying to work with the city to get the additional required parking off-site.
at one time design lab was talking about creating a third story that would cantilever over the breuer building along the fisher street side of the building. this was somewhat controversial among some residents and local architects. it was perceived was being out of scale with the neighborhood and the existing library. i tend to agree and am relieved that whether for cost cutting or not, the whole design has been limited to two stories.
i also noticed that it looks like they have preserved the mural in the adult reading room. this was of significance to the world monument fund and knoll. i can't recall who the artist was who painted it, but he or she had ties to knoll. in any case, i'm glad to see it still there.
yes the artist was a significant contributer to knoll as was explained to me by david bright of knoll. frankly, i perfer the vadonna plan to this one.
i think the mural is by an artist with the last name "matter." puddles, does this sound familiar? i think henry ng told us this at lunch when you were in town...
The plan looks tight, amazingly so, in fact - I'm thinking the square footage is significantly less than what the vadonna team was working with!
you're right liberty bell, the square footage is significantly less than in the vadonna plan. the whole addition was reduced to cut down the cost (including the loss of the cantilevered third floor, which i think is a damn shame), most of the on-site parking is underground and the library is trying to fight for more street and off-site parking to save money and space.
i work at designLAB, and i poured over all the mapa charette submissions when we started working on the library, but i'm new to this thread - it's nice to see so many archinectors were pulling for us in the selection process! there will be some new perspectives of our proposed addition soon that should be publicly available - the library wants 7 or 8 renderings for fundraising, so that's all i'll be doing for the next few weeks. keep an eye out for those at the end of january/beginning of february.
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