Jose pulled it off again. Not only did he get us tickets for Trilogy Tuesday back in 2003, he pounced on tickets to Howard Shore's LotR symphony as it came to San Francisco. Friday night, we went.
We planned our arrival into SF to miss afternoon traffic, which gave us a few hours to kill. Unsure exactly what we would do, we were provided with an answer the moment we stepped out of the parking garage under civic square. Directly in front of us, slashing across the skyline and catching our gaze immediately, was an angular screened form perched atop the roof of a tall building. "Is that the new Federal building, by Morphosis?" As if it could be any other -- it was indeed and we went to check it out, walking fully around the site. (Renderings 1 2 3)
And damn, quite the impressive building. One of the few fully poured-in-situ concrete high-rises I've seen in a long time, with lots of nifty details, the least of which is not the screen that commences sculpturally on the rooftop (what we saw from afar) and travels down the side of the building to ground level, to become a canopy of sorts. The screen material is of fine enough a mesh it reads as a translucent skin from afar, and the rhythm of the panels gives a subtle reading of masonry coursing. A diagonal slash cuts along the skin, leading to a large three- or four-story balcony/opening (complete with bridge) that will be eventually planted to become a garden in the midst of the building's form. The underside of any exposed concrete slab (such as at this garden) was cast in a wavy pattern, which was remarkable to see. The backside of the building is no less impressive, with vertical fins of frosted glass covering the whole, set apart from the glazing system about 24 inches by a sunshade/catwalk shelf. At the time we walked by the site, the sun was setting just right as to catch these blades, making them glow in an ethereal light, a stunning effect especially given the expanse of them and their rigorous repetitiveness. A few of these fins wrap around to the frontside as well. The garden/terrace also reads on the rear façade -- the fins continue uninterrupted but the face behind is pulled back to create a subtle reading. Jose wondered if they would/could illuminate the blades at night, something I think would rock, it could be done subtly to give quite the effect, albeit you'd blow your Title 24 energy regs to hell.
We took probably about 45 mins to walk around the building, architecturally geeking the whole way.
Next up we visited the Main Library, designed by James Freed (of Freed Cobb Pei architects). I had heard of some of the controversies about the building and wanted to go check it out (I had never been in). Freed spoke of using light extensively in the building, and to that end it certainly succeeded. Light wells and atria galore provided not only light but also some amazing cross-floor vistas and vignettes. Some of the highlights included a pair of barrel vault courses, made of unhidden corrugated metal with a ridge skylight, the upper-floor triangularly-shaped terrace (that oddly had almost no seating save a few benches -- the library wishes not people to use it?), an amazing periodical room that pierces into the central atrium, and the atrium itself that while round has the centre of the skylight oculus offset.
One of the more amazing details was the treatment of the walls that enclosed the reference sections, carried through on three floors. Cards from the card catalogues no longer in use were given to artists and 200 volunteer scribes, who, following the artists' guidelines, selected a cataloguing card and annotated it with either a quote from the book indicated or with a text or image from a different work on the same subject. Fifty thousand of these cards were ultimately used, creating a huge grid (a fresco in reverse as one website has put it) that were set into the wall and covered with a thin wash of plaster (just ever so slightly white-ed out). Rich, unique, and fascinating all at the same time.
We traced several paths through the building (quite possible given its intricate nature), pointing out details, materials, vistas. As for those controversies, I looked them up: lack of book/shelving space (despite being double the size of the old library), caused mainly due to books coming out of storage (placed so after earthquake) and the building being cut in size and various administrative directives, and lack of ease of finding things. The latter I can understand, I wasn't sure how to navigate around and what order they would use to distribute the books, but then I wasn't trying to find anything so I wasn't making any effort to learn the layout. The other thing Jose and I noticed was the many expanses of exposed flat surfaces that were unreachable and fully viewable. And not cleaned regularly enough for that latter fact.
The concert itself in the next post...