Sun 29 Jun 2008
This is the most irresponsible thing Williams has ever done. It punishes the landscape as a reminder to us all, that life is about more than money.
Sun 29 Jun 2008
This is the most irresponsible thing Williams has ever done. It punishes the landscape as a reminder to us all, that life is about more than money.
June 29th, 2008 at 10:44 am
For those who haven’t been to campus in a long time, that’s the new theater and dance building. I went in at reunions and while I wasn’t sure the building classified as a “need” (nor, when the money was donated, was williams itself), it is quite the upgrade for the theater and especially the dance programs and along with a fellow breaker, just imagining the opportunities that centerstage provided got us excited to dance with no music playing.
at least the original plan to put the building at the bottom of spring street fell through!
June 29th, 2008 at 11:23 am
rory -
WHERE IS THAT VIDEO?
P.S. PTC, he’s right that it could have been even more irresponsible: it was originally slated for Spring street and would have eaten the town.
Frank’s grandchildren and I think the gelato at the snack bar in Paresky (another dubious “Hey, look at me!” building) is pretty good. I’d treat you to one if I were there. Enjoy your visit.
June 29th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
Although this building apparently is very good functionally, couldn’t we have very good function architecturely not inconsistent with the essences of a small New England town and a small LAC in such a town? I guess not - we would rather behave nouveau richely.
June 29th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
I am on the fence. I like modern architecture as long as it’s done right, and I hate when people try to make faux old-looking buildings, always comes across awfully. But the problem with both Paresky and the new theater are the unecessary architectural flourishes (the enormous canopy and enormous entryway respectively) that make already large buildings feel disproportionate and out of place. The B&L building, and, from the photos and plans I have seen, the entire new Sawyer / Stetson complex (and for that matter, the new stone hill center at teh clark), are much better examples of buildings that are functional, contemporary, yet do not overwhelm the adjacent buildings and Berkshire landscape, which in particular should always be emphasized in any new construction. The studio art building is probably the worst offender in that regard, just does not work on the exterior. The buildings are certainly very attractive, and wonderful spaces on the inside, but I really wish the college and clamped down a little on some of the unnecessary architectural extravagances that do make them feel out of place.
June 29th, 2008 at 1:27 pm
It’s just unpardonable. I am the kind of person who always looks for mitigating factors before declaring something unjustified, but this building specifically ignores every opportunity to fit in with its surroundings. Maybe it neede to be that high, but was the vertical banding on the brick, which makes it look taller, necessary? The overhang has been mentioned.
The final unforgivable is the pink neon sign over the front (turned off in this picture). To my knowledge, there isn’t another neon sign anywhere until North Adams, let alone on campus. What the hell were they thinking? It gave me a smile, though, to see another example in which local colloquial always has the final triumph in naming: students sometimes refer to the place as “the strip club.”
June 29th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
Nice critique, Jeff. You write well about architecture.
I am kind of in the same boat, I like modern, but don’t like a lot of the 60’s and 70’s efforts… love original and old, but don’t like attempts to recapture it.
However, I do recognize the difficult job the architect has; to design something original and imaginative, that also fits tastefully within the setting that is Williams.
Oftentimes, a new building is lauded when built, and then disliked once time passes. And the reverse happens as well. Sometimes architecture that is initially criticized, begins to endear itself or settle into the landscape in a way that becomes more pleasing with time. Of course, a lot of these ‘feelings’ we develop for structures, have to do with what goes on inside of them…
All that said, I have to admit that the overhang on this particular building looks like a bad hat.
June 29th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
bad hair day building
June 29th, 2008 at 2:35 pm
You’re right, Larry…
…the ‘Donald’ comes to mind…
June 29th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
What this building needs is for some clever-with-their-hands, artistic students who are good with ropes to “prank it” — perhaps adding words to the neon sign, perhaps putting a white elephant up in neon, or maybe a huge neon purple cow (I love the picture of the neon cow on the Chapin porch that sometimes pops up here from the linked flickr photos). A “zip line” (Times Square style) with sports scores could be amusing as well. If the building has to stick out , we may as well make the most of it.
June 29th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Thanks Soph Mom, I have forwarded your comment to EJ Johnson, who gave me my second worst grade at Williams in Art History 101 :).
And Larry, I am still very proud that my entry was the one who painted the David Hammonds rock fan (one of the coolest things ever at Williams) purple and plastered it with post it notes, which amused the artist so much that our “addition” was featured in a book on Hammonds …
June 29th, 2008 at 11:35 pm
Pop quiz: which ‘05 graduate zinged this building and those who allowed its creation in his excellent Commencement speech?
June 30th, 2008 at 1:28 am
The problem, boys, is one of scale and respect for space, not of architectural style.
The strength of past additions to the campus was not simply that buildings were designed using styles appropriate to modern construction and usage, but that the buildings were done with respect to human and campus existing scale and skyline.
When the old grads, particularly from the era of the ‘gentleman’s school’ returned for the occasional visit, they could recognize and identify with the Williams they knew. The identity held, the ‘brand’ was familiar. This sense of seeing the past in the present is why reunions are held with no students present. If a dated expression could be used to characterize this brand even as expressed by the architecture, it might be “Old Shoe”.
Granted, my view of the identity of Williams and it’s brand is formed through reading the various posts on this blog. Perhaps, then, I am only reading the views and assessing the attitudes of a very small base to apply to Williams overall.
But it is certain to me that ‘Old Shoe’ is dead and gone and has been replaced by a new identity and brand. With new identities come new strategies and tactics to carry them out.
‘Scale’ seems to have transformed from the personally familiar to the monumental sense of personal statement and the sense of ‘space’ has become one of ‘owning’ the geography for the building rather than any sense of fitting into the larger campus.
In fact, maybe these architectural terms can be applied to the new ‘identity’.
I have reported what my father Rectal Turgidley Sr ‘28 used to ask:
“Who are these people and where did they prep?”.
Rechtal Turgidley Jr
June 30th, 2008 at 1:58 am
Jonathan:
The quip on the architecture is one thing…but the text of Cronin’s speech…wow.
What a beginning to your four years at Williams. And not to bring up a past subject…but it does shed a different sort of light on your post about your brother…at least for (thick-headed) me. Thank you for posting it. (BTW, what is Cronin up to these days?)
And Rechtal… you address the…ahem…’boys’?
Geez…
June 30th, 2008 at 11:02 am
Speak of the devil, check this out. Williams apparently now has a nuclear fall out shelter (no worries, folks, this is way, way off campus … but it’s nice to know that when the computers in Jessup become self aware and begin a campaign to destroy organic life forms on campus, students will have a safe haven):
http://www.thetranscript.com/ci_9742967
June 30th, 2008 at 11:26 am
I hope they aren’t going to buy offsets to “offset” the carbon produced by hauling the books around town.
I have always hated buildings that read as fortresses from the outside. Surely, there were ways (missed opportunities) to tone this thing down and make it more friendly and more compatible with the surroundings/landscape. As I think about this, I realize that traditional chapels and churches are often formidable from the outside; yet, they welcome from part of the exterior, too. This doesn’t seem to and reminds me of the recently proliferating festering scab on many rural landscapes: self-storage facilities .
Williams ought to look into human
June 30th, 2008 at 11:29 am
Part of my post didn’t post: Williams should look into making humanly-appealing exteriors on its remote buildings. Just because it’s off-campus or seems hidden now isn’t a good excuse.
June 30th, 2008 at 11:48 am
The notion that this building doesn’t fit with Williams’ character doesn’t hold water, as one of the oddities of Williams’ architecture is its heterogeneity.
Williams didn’t take the approach of many schools, with a central “historic district” of a unified theme, with the newer buildings hidden on the outskirts. Williams is an amalgamation of differing styles, functions, and time periods. This means that future architects at Williams can building pretty much anything they want to, because Williams doesn’t have a unified style, like many other small LACs. Therefore, these Starchitects can build their giant ego-boosting centers and claim that they are in keeping with the Williams style of having no specific style.
June 30th, 2008 at 11:51 am
It isn’t far off-campus (my estimate 1 1/2 miles) and fronts on and is easily observable from U.S. Route 7 (near the Vermont state line)- however, the College has cleared and landscaped, consequently improving the appearance of, the lot which had represented an abandoned greenhouse.
June 30th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Re: the Library Shevling facility:
While I would appreciate them taking aesthetic concerns into account, isn’t this building basically just a warehouse? As the article says, various parts of the collections will be accessed with forklifts. It is fortress-like because it is highly temperature- and humidity-controlled and really not set up for anyone to hang around in.
Lest I be considered hypocritical after my previous discussion of Bronfman, I’ll point out that this design does seem to consider the usage of the building and not just some trend in architecture. Or perhaps the core of my previous critique is that I just don’t like rough concrete interiors? Although I think much it still gets back to the funny smell of damp concrete that permeates the building…*shudders*
As for the ‘62 Center, I haven’t been back to campus since it was finished so I can’t much comment as to its particulars other than saying that from the pictures, the overhang looks huge - as does the one on the new student center (I miss the front of Baxter that always stangely reminded me of an old-fashioned riverboat).
I will say that I like that Williams has different types of architecture. I wouldn’t want one of those rigidly controlled campuses with no variation and fake-old architecture. When I lived in the Berkshire Quad as a frosh, I absoltuely adored the oddity of the Driscoll Dining Hall with its stone exterior and round shape, seemingly a part of the trees and hills surrounding it. And while Mission is a fortress and its rooms are a bit challenging, living in a hexagonal (octagonal?) room was kinda fun - and the number of windows was great. The bright, high-ceilinged dining hall there was pretty nice as well. I also had the joy (mostly) of living in a Poker Flats Co-op as a senior, and it certainly has some unusual touches with the big second-floor porches in the front of the building, but the space was interesting and quite nice.
To sum up my rather rambling response: I echo other commenters that scale matters, but I like the heterogeneity.
June 30th, 2008 at 1:38 pm
Honestly, I hope The Donald isn’t offended (and something tells me he can take it), but the resemblance is uncanny.
BTW, where is Ronit these days? Ronit, if you see this, I hope you are okay…and…I miss your wit.
June 30th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
Yes, where is the town… or the College… Although we have a son who will start at Williams this Fall, my husband & I have been going to the Clark in the late summer for many years. Whenever we went, either as a couple or as a family, we were barely aware of the College, except when we went to the college’s museum, mostly because classes were not in session. We would drive from the Clark to Spring St and search for a restaurant. Long ago there was a lovely restaurant beside a brook (river?) on Water St.
My point is that for most out-of-towners, or non-Ephs, they are in Williamstown for a specific cultural reason, or an outdoors one. With this in mind WTF is a big draw. I’m not going to comment on the ‘62’s architectural merits or demerits. However, it does stand out, a signature building for a highly regarded festival. I assume it was meant to be visually striking and have impact.
As for the town/College, I now look at Spring St. differently. Rather than wonder what happened to the Clarksburg bakery or what restaurant disappeared, it seems more like the commercial pieces of a student union, but in the shape of a small village, which it is. I also realize that many of the large houses belong to the College.
I actually think it’s a tribute to the College that it’s unobtrusive… no enormous gate announcing entry….discrete signage. It implies both being the community and wanting to be part of it. And, the heterogeneous architecture makes it interesting. I would imagine in its geographic isolation the architecture helps to remind one of places and times away from Williams.
June 30th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
the sad thing, PFM, is that 10 years ago, the college was even less intrusive. while i don’t mind the ‘62 center because the upgrades inside were SO tremendous I can overlook the bombastic outward appearance (but I certainly appreciate the critiques of its critics), it is part of a trend of Williams (and of its comparable peer institutions) to assert its monetary/building might on its neighborhood.
All that said, williams still is quite quaint and kind to its surrounding neighborhood when compared to Princeton trying to route commercial traffic through a residential neighborhood instead of by their new (and bizarre) Gehry library, Penn patrolling West Philly with its own police and video surveillance, or Columbia’s attempt to completely demolish the Audubon ballroom, to name a few.
June 30th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
The ‘62 Center was created as much for the WTF as for the College.
It’s high tech and quite impressive on the inside. Ask anyone who has worked there behind the scenes how it compares to the pre-renovations AMT.
The CenterStage is highly innovative - the balconies are suspended from the ceiling, there is a giant elevator in the middle of the performance space floor that can go up or down a level, creating a giant pit or a free standing platform, the seating is completely modular, second level “gondolas” can be moved across the space, creating bridges or islands suspended from the second level, and don’t get me started on the grid above the entire space made of airplane cable. It’s like walking on a trampoline! And one side of the space opens up like a giant vault door holding back King Kong. That’s always handy.
June 30th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
Well, that’s kind of the point, PFM. Students saw the theatre as an effort to “improve” theatre space driven primarily by a desire to attract and provide for professional groups and tourists. The new facility improved opportunities for dance tremendously, but students feared its impact on student theatre, as opposed to theatre projects of faculty or outside professionals.
The old Adams Memorial theatre complex included a mainstage that was small compared to the new Center’s, and more critically it contained two much smaller stages. This meant there was performance space that, due to space and tech limitations, was in lower demand from professionals but quite suitable to small scale student productions. The new Center eliminated these spaces.
I was not a theatre person, but I was a Council person, and serving on CC was and is always a great way to learn of the student issues of the day. The champion for student theatre then was Amy Shelton ‘05 (Cronin’s long time sweetheart, incidentally–likely no small impact on his speech). She recognized the new Center was a reality, and tried to mitigate its impact on student theatre by getting a new performance space built in the new student center, with Council’s support. I do not know if she was successful, but it was a very forward-thinking effort. Her petition to Council was the first time I met her, and she was impressive in all ways.
June 30th, 2008 at 4:18 pm
Re: #20 –
Perfect picture! The resemblance is even closer than I thought when I made the “bad hair day building” remark but that is exactly what I was thinking of!
June 30th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
Jonathan, the new theater complex also contains two smaller stages.
June 30th, 2008 at 4:52 pm
The ‘62 center keeps the AMT’s mainstage and adds its own as well as two other venues (Centerstage and the Director’s Studio) that are good for smaller productions. The Paresky center also has a ~100-seat auditorium, so between that, Brooks-Rogers, the various house common spaces, and Goodrich if/when it ever reopens, there’s not really a shortage of small performance spaces on campus.
I’d say the bigger issue is actually the shortage of larger spaces. Chapin is useless for anything but classical concerts, and the ‘62 center mainstage is constantly overbooked and rarely available to student groups. This leads to travesties like the wildly popular Cap&Bells production of Sweeny Todd getting relegated to the Centerstage (where they sold out a weekend’s worth of performances and still had to turn many, many people away) while the MainStage was used to hold an intercollegiate step dance competition - a worthy event, sure, but it shouldn’t get precedence over a major show involving dozens of actual Williams students.
June 30th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Hmmmm … makes me think of the Morty quote, I am betting some powerful alum(s) have a real dance hankering, because it seems to me that the resources and attention devoted to dance (one commencement that was basically ALL dance speakers / honorees, the huge new dance studio, the new space for dance in Goodrich, priortization of dance programming) are wildly disproportionate to the number of students interested in dance …
June 30th, 2008 at 5:31 pm
Whoops! As I have never toured the full Center and my information about its suitability for students mostly dates back to Amy’s opinions in 2003, it is quite possible that the new space improved on small spaces fro students. ’10’s words are much more valuable to us. Let’s chalk this up to my misinterpretation of Amy’s words: I think she did talk about small space availability, but she and many others certainly also worried about competition with new off-campus and professional groups attracted by the new space.
June 30th, 2008 at 6:18 pm
while I do agree it is a travesty that Sweeney Todd couldn’t be on a larger stage if there was the demand for that, the intercollegiate competition probably involved Sankofa, Williams’ outstanding step team as host. This wasn’t a case of Williams getting kicked out by outsiders, but Williams students competing for the space.
Sankofa’s deserved that kind of recognition and shine for a long time–a student created and run dance program that has been quite impressive for over a decade now. It’s a shame they competed for the weekend’s space.
Now, if Sankofa wasn’t involved, i’ll retract all that. but how often do two student groups compete for that space? Is this the exception to the rule or is it more common?
June 30th, 2008 at 7:55 pm
Actually, in addition to the performance spaces identified above (Main Stage, CenterStage, AMT, and directing studio), there is also the dance studio, which has the lovely views from the second level of the mountains to the north of the building.
June 30th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
I’m not sure what the relationship was between Sankofa and the step competition - it would make sense that they would have at least participated, but I don’t know who organized the whole thing. I will say that in general, the MainStage does not see much use by student-run groups. Looking at the ‘62 center website, there are about 30 discrete events on the MainStage over the last school year, six of which involved student dance groups, one a student music group (Concert Choir, albeit only as a part of the ReWind extravaganza), and one a student theater group (Frosh Revue). The other events were all external speakers or performers.
I don’t know much about the management of the dance groups, but some of them (INISH, Dance Company, Kusika) are definitely not student-run. Others might be (Sankofa? Ritmo Latino?). Giving them the benefit of the doubt, there were four student-run MainStage performances against (roughly) twenty-six college-run performances. Of course, that might not mean anything; maybe just that student events tend to seek out smaller spaces. A corresponding analysis of Chapin events would probably support this, since the only student-run groups I know of that perform in Chapin are Student Symphony and occasionally the Springstreeters (and neither group fills it). Still, it seems as though the college could do a better job of working with the students who do want to use those spaces. It would certainly help it cultivate the impression that the theater was actually built for us.
June 30th, 2008 at 9:02 pm
Look at the Music Department website for additional uses of Williams venues.
June 30th, 2008 at 9:40 pm
‘10 said: “It would certainly help it cultivate the impression that the theater was actually built for us.”
That’s just the point - it wasn’t! It was made as much for the WTF as the students. Herb Allen likes WTF and Williams, so two birds with one stone.
Also, there’s a good reason student groups don’t use the Main stage. It’s too big. Student groups can not fill the space. It seats 550 people. It is going to take a turnout of several hundred before an event looks more than sparsely attended.
Because it’s so big, not only can students not fill enough seats, but they can’t put on the shows. It takes quite a crew to effectively put on shows in venues that large. Running the lights, the sound systems, not to mention installing all of that, is not something Cap and Bells can do in a weekend. It takes a full crew of work study students to hang all the lights, do all the cabling, build sets, and do everything else necessary to run one of the theatre department shows. That’s hard for a student group to pull off with minimal prep time.
The Main Stage is a professional venue, not designed for student groups without big crews. The CenterStage is much better for that, and its unique format encourages student creativity.
June 30th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
Jay: you’re right that the MainStage is too ambitious a venue for the vast majority of student events. That said, there are still a few that would benefit from using it, and Sweeney Todd was one example (albeit maybe the only one this year). Someone still has to build sets, run lights and sound, etc. no matter which venue a show uses, and a lot of students put enormous amounts of time into doing all of that for Sweeney Todd on the CenterStage (far, far more than “minimal prep time” - at least several hundred person-hours over the course of two months). I don’t think it would have been significantly harder for them to do the same things on the MainStage.
July 1st, 2008 at 8:07 am
‘10 - I guess this is where planning well in advance makes the decision. My assumption is that whoever is making use of the venue appropriately and gets to the scheduling office first, gets the space on that date. The intercollegiate step competition signed up first (probably hosted by Sankofa as Rory said, I can’t imagine how it would get there otherwise).
I’m sure Sweeney Todd was great (wish they had done it while I was there) and probably could have filled the big theater, but what would you have had them do? Sometimes you don’t know the popularity of a show until you get there, so they might have made the choice to use the smaller venue. Who knows. But would you have had them kick out another event because Sweeney Todd is *only* Williams students? Or because after ticket sales started it seemed that it would be well attended? Or is there some other hierarchy of scheduling you’d like to set up. There will always be competing groups trying to use the same space on campus, sometimes when you don’t plan far enough in advance you get second pick. It sucks, but it’s a learning experience.
BTW, the fact that Williams is hosting an intercollegiate step competition now is fantastic. After the initial difficulties the founders of Sankofa had in the late 90s getting funding, space, and frankly any kind of respect from CC and others (having to explain step to people at every turn), I’m glad to see that it is seen as a legit event on campus.
July 1st, 2008 at 10:18 am
Jonathan doesn’t speak for all students in his critiques of the theater. I am an ‘07, was involved with theater and CC at Williams, and never one heard the theater referred to as the “strip club” until coming to ephblog. Additionally, my impression of students’ opinions about the theater is that they are far more mixed that Jonathan’s comments might indicate. Sure, I know students who don’t like the way the theater looks (on the outside), but I also know students who love the way the theater looks. Overall, my impression was that students in my year tended to view the theater more positively than negatively (although it would be hard to separate the opinions of my group of friends from the class of ‘07 as a whole). Additionally, as someone who has worked in both the old and the new theater, I am confident in saying that the new theater is a huge–and much needed–improvement. The old theater simply wasn’t adequate for the demands Williams put on it–student productions and non-student productions alike had grown in scope and frequency to the extent that groups were making fairly significant sacrifices to meet the demands of the overbooked spaces. One reality at Williams is that–as a world class institution–not all of the performances that take place are student. I am sure the student groups who were bumped from Chapin for Howard Dean or Salman Rushdie weren’t happy, but I think we all would agree that those were examples of student sacrifices made for the overall good. Sure, the MainStage in the theater wasn’t designed primarily with students in mind, but there are more than enough other stages in the center to support student productions, especially since the larger non-student productions end up in the MainStage. Chapin isn’t especially well suited for student groups either, but I doubt many on this board would condemn it.
Now, returning more to the main point at issue, I do think the architects of the theater have done a good job encorperating it into the surroundings. The materials echo the buildings around it, and the facade is an homage to the old theater. The lines and the curves of the theater exist within and compliment the surrounding landscape, and the theater actually looks deceptively small for how large it is. Sure, it is big and modern, but I am sure that most of the buildings at Williams looked big and modern when they were built–as a previous poster pointed out, Williams isn’t one of those colleges that only builds out of a 19th century cookie-cutter mold. I think the science quad, or that little quad with the MCC and the back of the new science addition are both great examples of how Williams has successfully integrated modern and traditional architecture. Like it or not, but you can expect to see a lot more big and modern at Williams in your lifetime. Now obviously, I’m not going to be able to talk you out of your opinion, nor you out of mine. I just wanted to point out that there as much merited praise for the building as there is criticism, and it’s nowhere near the thorough failure that most of the posts on this board imply that it is. Next time you see the center, try to look at it with new eyes and an open mind and see if you don’t start liking it a bit.
July 1st, 2008 at 10:22 am
The CenterStage can hold quite a few people, if the seating is designed correctly. The seating is modular, can be arranged in any format, and the capacity is extremely flexible. It’s billed as a 150 seat space. That’s not tiny, and I imagine more could be seated, depending on fire codes and the like.
July 1st, 2008 at 10:41 am
current: But naturally my subjective judgment is vastly superior to your subjective judgment.
July 1st, 2008 at 11:33 am
Good line, Frank…and could be the sub-title to this entire thread.
No doubt about it, the Williams campus is exceptionally beautiful. All “Donald-isms” aside, the theater, IMO, fits in reasonably well. If you look at it alongside Paresky, you see that an effort was made to keep them ‘of an ilk’. And the (slightly awkward) overhang does accomplish an element of drama,…forgivable, and appropriate, considering the purpose of the building.
I saw a wonderful Frosh Review there, and thought the interior was terrific, as was the show.
July 1st, 2008 at 1:35 pm
Current- I can tell you that the reaction from people who live in this area is not mixed at all.