When you walk across the plaza in front of the building, you do get the sense that this is a building with a message. And that message is: We will crush you.
I actually like the building, but it does have that "Borg cube" feeling about it.
How Boston City Hall was born
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Re: How Boston City Hall was born
#32> It was in this context that the city decided to demolish the neighborhood known as Scollay Square and build in its place what would come to be called Government Center.
It’s interesting (and sad) to imagine what Boston could have been like without the damage of urban renewal. These neighborhoods could have easily become the quaint North Ends people love today.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_End,_Boston
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scollay_Square
It’s also eye opening to realize the extent of their plans that didn’t get done:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_695_(Massachusett...
Re: How Boston City Hall was born
#33There used to be a neighborhood around it that had architecture similar to what the neighboring North End still has, which is very distinct among the entirety of the Americas. The lack of imagination that existed back then that led to it all being razed to build this and the rest of the garbage of the current West End is stunning.
Re: How Boston City Hall was born
#34I always think of the building (and brutalist architecture in general) as absurdist architecture, and I find City Hall to be quite humorous in that light.
The general shape lifts up and is trying to appear as if it's floating, in contrast to the material selection. Think of an Elephant ballerina, or Douglas Adams "It hung in the air in exactly the way bricks don't".
Another example is the Holman government building a few blocks away - with these ridiculous stairways through a massive open space underneath an imposing bridge of offices.
Pure absurdist humor.
Re: How Boston City Hall was born
#35When you walk across the plaza in front of the building, you do get the sense that this is a building with a message. And that message is: We will crush you.
Yeah I've always thought that the point of much of the design was to have obvious places to put machine guns to mow down protesters.
Re: How Boston City Hall was born
#36I like brutalist architecture. And I am not the only strange one: r/brutalist has 174K members and the original fuckyeahbrutalism on tumbler.
Think of it like being a fan of 486 PCs or pixel art.
I do hate this architecture, though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowellism
Re: How Boston City Hall was born
#37> It was in this context that the city decided to demolish the neighborhood known as Scollay Square and build in its place what would come to be called Government Center. It’s interesting (and sad) to imagine what Boston could have been like without the damage of urban renewal. These neighborhoods could have easily become the quaint North Ends people love today. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_End,_Boston https:…
There's a WGBH podcast about the Big Dig and the first episode I think helps you appreciate why some of the interstate connections and routings around Boston are so weird. https://www.wgbh.org/podcasts/the-big-dig
Re: How Boston City Hall was born
#38Architecturally, the city of Boston has changed many times. You can more or less pinpoint when a building was built by its appearance. City Hall's architecture is mirrored in most of the transit stops from the 1970s-era expansion. Some of them (e.g. Wollaston, Harvard) have since been rebuilt; others (e.g. Quincy Adams, Malden Center) are still concrete behemoths like City Hall. Anything built within the last ten yea…
The glass box thing started here too: IM Pei's Hancock tower was one of the first, from the 1970s. And like many architectural wonders, the construction was crap. I can still remember going by and seeing all the boarded-up windows, because the glass kept falling out.
Though none of the Brutalist IM Pei buildings at MIT were as bad, my understanding that they had to retrofit a revolving door in one of them because the wind tunnel effect could make it really hard to open the doors.
https://nowiknow.com/the-curious-problem-with-mits-tallest-b...
Re: How Boston City Hall was born
#39I like brutalist architecture. And I am not the only strange one: r/brutalist has 174K members and the original fuckyeahbrutalism on tumbler. Think of it like being a fan of 486 PCs or pixel art. I do hate this architecture, though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowellism
I like to think of it like a car wreck: no one actually enjoys looking at one, but you still have to look.
Re: How Boston City Hall was born
#40Architecturally, the city of Boston has changed many times. You can more or less pinpoint when a building was built by its appearance. City Hall's architecture is mirrored in most of the transit stops from the 1970s-era expansion. Some of them (e.g. Wollaston, Harvard) have since been rebuilt; others (e.g. Quincy Adams, Malden Center) are still concrete behemoths like City Hall. Anything built within the last ten yea…
Funny thing about the glass box. If you look down Tremont Street towards the bay you used to get a beautifully framed view of Old North Church. The sightline was considered a historical landmark (there's even a plaque for it in front of the Omni Parker House hotel). The Government Center station completely obstructed the view to Old North. Allegedly this is one of the main reasons that Government center is a glass box, it was the only way the construction was approved.