UMass FAC and library--two awful buildings in one photo! Note FAC interior below--just as comfortable as it appears. And, yes, those are balcony seats in the back--like watching an event in Iowa from Indiana.
Years ago I was sitting at a faculty meeting in which plans
for a new student center were unveiled. They were impressive–sculptural angles,
exposed wooden beams, and a soaring glass atrium entrance. When the ooohs and
ahhs ended I raised my hand and noted that the atrium had a southern exposure.
“So what?” I was asked. “So are we building a student center or a greenhouse?”
I asked. “I’m sure the architects have thought of this,” was the answer. “Don’t
presume this,” I replied, “Western Massachusetts is littered with campus
buildings that are architectural mistakes. And while we’re on the subject, the
current blueprint is an impressive design,
but the interior space is rather impractical.” Let us just say that the
building was rethought and its atrium now has a northern exposure.
This week Amherst College halted construction of its new
science center when it was revealed that the site was more difficult than
architects had anticipated. (It was being built on a hillside, with parts of
the building tunneled underground.) Moreover, faculty members complained that
mundane things–such as labs–were either absent or had been given all the design
consideration of a broom closet. I applaud President Biddy Martin’s courage in
saying “Enough! This is a mistake!” and putting the kibosh on the project. (To
be fair to her, the project was conceived by her predecessor, a known egoist.)
Too bad the mistake cost Amherst a whopping $19 million. That’s a pretty
dramatic “My bad!”
On the other side of Amherst–at the University of
Massachusetts–sit two monumental architectural follies, and I do mean
“monumental.” There is, first of all, the 26-storey university library, as
ill-conceived an idea as ever imagined. The whole point of a library is that
one can browse in it. Try that on 26
floors. Try finding a book in a run that might begin on floor 17 and continue
on floor 14. Spalling bricks have also plagued the building, a potentially
fatal problem if one was struck by a chunk falling at 32 feet per second. This
necessitated the construction of a concrete canopy around the structure as well
as limiting access to one side. There have also been problems with weight
distribution, which meant that books had to be limited to every other floor and
the library’s final four floors are below ground level, which means there have
been major moisture problems (which is why the archives are on the 24th
floor).
As bad as the library is–and it’s horrible–it’s a Taj Mahal
in comparison to the Fine Arts Center (FAC). A poll of Massachusetts residents
recently declared Boston’s City Hall–allegedly cutting edge architecture
designed by wicked famous architects when it opened in 1968–as the ugliest
building in the Commonwealth. That’s because more people live in Boston; I’m
sure if they ventured west they’d agree that the UMass FAC is way uglier.
Legend holds that the FAC is
supposed to look like a piano from the air–as if musical instruments were built
from un-faced concrete slabs. That story may be apocryphal, so let’s dismiss
it. I’ve always said the FAC was proof Albert Speer got out of Germany after
World War II. It is a (mostly) windowless monstrosity of gloom and
soullessness. The FAC has a wonderful arts series each year, but I have to really want to see an event before I
subject myself to Spartan conditions that would have made East Berlin residents
tear down the Wall decades earlier.
Architects must not be allowed to use their reputations as a
way of duping the public. I am aware that the public is generally conservative
and that such great structures as the Eiffel Tower and the Empire State
Building were once ridiculed as eyesores. (My own bias is that I simply hate
glass-and-steel functionalist architecture.) I’m not against innovation or
design, but no building–especially one underwritten by taxes or tuition
payers–should ever be approved by administrators, CEOs, or management alone.
Such decision-makers are too susceptible to clever sales pitches and often
don’t understand how a building must function. Designs should have to pass
muster of, first of all, independent engineers to determine if the site and
design are even doable. It’s also a good idea to make sure that users and
workers approve the plans as well–they are the ones who understand how the
building needs to function, not some guy fiddling with a CAD program. Finally,
somebody with moxie needs to have the guts to say from the outset, “No–this
isn’t good enough” if it’s not. Who wants to spend $19 million on a mistake, or
be condemned to decades of cheerlessness because of some architect’s lousy
idea?
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