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Renowned as being the second largest brick built structure in England, the first being recognised as Battersea Power Station, Chappel Viaduct is situated near Wakes Colne in Essex off the A1124 (Colchester Road) and spans the picturesque Colne Valley. It presently still supports the Sudbury to Marks Tey line which regularly connects with trains to and from London's Liverpool Street Station along the main line.
The foundation stone for this man made wonder was laid on the 14th September 1847. A bottle containing a newly minted sovereign, a half-sovereign, a shilling, a sixpence and a four-penny piece was placed underneath this stone. This bottle and all its contents were stolen shortly after the laying ceremony; the culprit was caught after he tried to pass over a brand new sovereign coin in the Rose and Crown public house.
Chappel Viaduct is 1,066ft long and some 5 to 6 million bricks are believed to have been used in its construction. A work force of 606 men known at the time as 'navvies' were employed to complete the work which took two years, this was relatively fast for such a large structure. The Viaduct has 32 arches; each having a span of 30ft and at its maximum the height is 75ft. Although so many bricks were used in the construction, to save money and to cut down on weight, the piers were left hollow.
The engineer of the viaduct was Peter Schuyler Bruff and his plan was for the line to continue on as far as Ipswich in Suffolk, but the railway company did not have sufficient funds for this. Bruff later built the line himself and is also credited for founding the Essex seaside resort of Clacton-on-Sea.
On the 2nd July 1849, the first passenger train crossed the viaduct from Colchester to Sudbury carrying an official party. A large crowd greeted the honoured guests at Sudbury despite its station still being unfinished.
To this day Chappel Viaduct is in daily use by trains and is well worth a visit if you are in the area. It attracts many tourists and visitors every year and is a highly photographed structure. Bordering the viaduct is The Chappel Millennium Green and as the name suggests this was opened to celebrate the Millennium. It contains a walk around area and children's play area which should keep the kids amused while you take in this wonder.
The Stour Valley Railway opened on 9 August 1865, linking Shelford near Cambridge with Marks Tey in Essex, with 13 intermediate stations along the line.
The section between Shelford and Sudbury was closed on 6 March 1967 following the Beeching cuts, leaving Bures and Chappel & Wakes Colne as the only stops between the termini.
In 2005 the line received around £3 million of investment, which saw around 5 miles (8 km) of old jointed track replaced with new continuous welded rail. Further investment was made in 2006 to replace around 6 miles (10 km) of track, leaving just the Chappel viaduct and Lamarsh to Sudbury sections in need of modernisation. This work was completed in 2007.
In 2006 the line was designated as a community railway[2] by the transport minister and is part of the Essex and South Suffolk Community Rail Partnership.[3]
The current name of the line commemorates the painter Thomas Gainsborough, who was born in Sudbury; the previous name was the Lovejoy line, after the television series Lovejoy, which was filmed in the Sudbury area.
All passenger services on the line are currently operated by Greater Anglia, which runs an hourly service seven days a week, with frequency increasing slightly during peak hours. One train each day is extended to or from Colchester.
Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States
University Village is one of the finest examples of a mid-20th century residential complex located in New York City. Designed by architect James Ingo Freed of I. M. Pei & Associates for New York University, construction began in 1964 and was completed by 1967. Occupying a five-acre âsuperblockâ in Greenwich Village, between West Houston and Bleecker Streets, the site was originally part of a much larger urban renewal scheme conceived by Robert Moses, chairman of the Mayorâs Committee on Slum Clearance, in 1953. As part of NYUâs agreement with the city to take over the site in 1960, the school set aside one-third of the units for middle-income residents.
The complex includes three identical free-standing 30-story towers executed in reinforced concrete that are positioned at the center of the site in a âpinwheelâ configuration around a 100-by-100 foot lawn. The west tower, at 505 LaGuardia Place, is a cooperative residence with a long-term lease from NYU, and the east towers serve as faculty housing. The buildings were thoughtfully arranged by Freed to maximize views and privacy, as well as to increase general visual interest. Cast in place, on site, using fiberglass molds, these buff-colored towers fall into the general stylistic category known as âBrutalismâ and reflect the influence of the Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier, whom Pei admired. The buildings display twin sets of smooth gridded facades that project from a central core. Each floor has four or eight deeply-recessed horizontal window bays, as well as a 22-foot-wide sheer wall, creating strong contrasts of light and shadow.
Near the center of the complex stands a large sandblasted concrete sculpture, an enlargement of a 1954 cubistic work by Pablo Picasso. Executed in 1968 by the French artistâs frequent collaborator, the Norwegian sculptor Carl Nesjar, the off-center placement of the 36-foot tall bust echoes and enhances the projectâs dynamic plan. University Village was a critical success and received awards from the American Institute of Architects, the City Club of New York, and the Concrete Industry Board. It was also selected as one of âTen Buildings That Climax an Eraâ by Fortune Magazine in 1966. Both Pei and Freed have received significant recognition for their contributions to this project; when Pei was honored with the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1983 University Village was cited as one of his most notable works and at the time of Freedâs death in 2005 Museum of Modern Art architecture curator Terence Riley counted the complex as among âthe most refined examples of modern architecture in Manhattan.â
DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS
South of Washington Square
University Village contains three apartment towers designed by I. M. Pei & Associates. Located two blocks south of Washington Square, between Mercer Street and LaGuardia Place, the two buildings to the east are owned by New York University and serve as faculty housing; the west building is a cooperative apartment house on land owned by NYU. Conceived during the early 1950s as part of an ambitious âsuperblockâ plan to improve a nine-block section of Greenwich Village, these striking structures were skillfully sited to create a distinct sense of place and to contrast with the surrounding blocks of late nineteenth-century tenement and loft buildings.
Washington Square first became a public park in 1827. Many fine homes were erected in the vicinity, as well as the Gothic Revival-style building that originally housed NYU . Following the end of the Civil War, however, the neighborhoodâs character began to change. Affluent residents were gradually replaced by French, Italian and Irish immigrants, and the blocks to the south and east of the square became an important wholesale district. Under Chancellor Henry MacCracken, the school was reorganized and the undergraduate arts and science division moved to University Heights in the Bronx where a Beaux-Arts-style campus , designed by the prominent architects McKim, Mead & White, opened in 1894. Unlike Washington Square, the suburban campus provided dormitories, making it less of a commuter school and more of a residential college. The schoolâs original building was then demolished, but for financial reasons the trustees retained ownership of the site and constructed a revenue-producing loft building at 100 Washington Square East. Completed in 1895, the upper floors were planned as classrooms, allowing NYU to remain, in a small way, associated with Washington Square. The university began to plan its return to Greenwich Village in 1915. With the Bronx campus only partially executed, the school leased space in the structure where the tragic âTriangle Shirtwaistâ fire had recently occurred at 23-29 Washington Place and also began to fully occupy the structure it owned at 100 Washington Square East.
Following the Second World War, NYU developed ambitious plans to increase its presence in Greenwich Village. Whereas the University Heights campus occupied a large site with considerable potential for expansion, here the school grew in stages, block by block, acquiring large and small parcels for present and future needs. These transactions frequently caused controversy and strong community opposition, especially projects requiring government approval or financing. Despite criticism, Chancellor Harry Woodburn Chase alleged in 1949: âFar from regarding Washington Square as its campus, New York University regards it as a national landmark of which it is glad to be a part and its devotion to which it has repeatedly manifested over the years.â Over the next decade or so, the school would adopt a somewhat traditional approach to design, choosing contextual aesthetic strategies that blended new buildings with old. Most of these structures were faced with red brick and limestone, including Vanderbilt Hall at 40 Washington Square South, Hayden Hall at 33 Washington Square West, the Loeb Student Center , and Weinstein Hall at 11 University Place. Even Philip Johnson and Richard Fosterâs divisive master plan of 1964 attempted to respect the schoolâs historic context by proposing to clad new and existing structures with complementary red sandstone.
Robert Moses and Urban Renewal
During the 1950s, a nine-block area bordered by West Houston Street, West Broadway , Mercer Street and Washington Square, was targeted for slum clearance. Under United States President Harry S. Truman, the National Housing Act was passed in 1949 to provide Federal funds for local municipalities to acquire property in blighted urban areas for resale to private developers. This program had an extraordinary impact in New York, which received more aid than any American city. Under Robert Moses, chairman of the mayorâs Committee on Slum Clearance, sixteen sites were identified, including thirteen in Manhattan. Such projects, public officials believed, would stabilize the middle class, support higher education, and elevate the cityâs reputation. The blocks where University Village would ultimately be located, called Washington Square Southeast, was the fourteenth project proposed by Moses. The initial prospectus for Washington Square Southeast, prepared by Eggers & Higgins in August 1953, called for the demolition of 191 buildings, of which only 16 were residential. Most displaced tenants, consequently, were businesses, requiring no compensation under the 1949 law. Covering almost eighteen acres, the plan envisioned 2,184 apartments in nine 14-story structures.
To develop the project, nine city blocks were combined to form three âsuperblocks.â The north block, bordered by West Broadway, West Third Street, Mercer Street and West Fourth Street, was set aside for educational use and NYU would eventually construct four academic buildings here, including the Elmer Holmes Bobst Library . The two blocks to the south were intended for middle-income housing and were sold to the Washington Square Corporation â a syndicate headed by developers Paul Tishman and Morton S. Wolf and subsequently transferred to numerous affiliated corporations. Named Washington Square Village, these two slab-like apartment houses occupy about a third of the site and the ground floors were deliberately laid out along Bleecker and West Third Streets to maintain the existing street pattern and allow north-south access along Greene and Wooster Streets. A third building, as well as an underground parking lot, was originally planned for the south block, between Bleecker Street and Houston Street, but was canceled by 1960. Some sources claimed that the developer experienced difficulty leasing units in the second building, while others contend they abandoned the project for economic reasons, asserting that the Federal government refused to allow a taller third structure without increasing payment for the land.
NYU was quick to act and in January 1960 declared interest in buying the superblock site to erect housing âfor its faculty members and married students and an experimental school for student teachers.â Despite considerable opposition from critics who asserted private builders âwould be glad to pay more than the $10.50 a square foot that NYU would pay for the landâ and that this transaction would cost the city hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost tax revenue, the Board of Estimate approved the sale in September 1960. As part of the agreement, the school was required to develop one third of the site as middle-income housing, with priority given to people who lived or worked in the area. A limited-equity cooperative apartment building was proposed, financed with subsidized low-interest mortgage loans as part of the Limited Profit Housing Companies Act of 1955, commonly called the Mitchell-Lama Housing Program. Since the complex would occupy the undeveloped southern half of Washington Square Village, the schoolâs governing board decided to name the development âUniversity Village.â
I. M. Pei and James Ingo Freed, Architects
University Village was designed by I. M. Pei & Associates. More than twenty-five architects were reportedly interviewed for the job. Pei did not attend the firmâs interview and correspondence with NYU was handled by Eason H. Leonard, who wrote:
The experience we have had in the sensitive design problems relating to housing of all types gives us confidence that we are well-equipped to develop for you a project of significant quality. Our recent work in Urban Renewal has assured us that within the limits of very low construction budgets, much can be done to improve standards of urban apartment living.
Peiâs firm was currently working on four residential developments, including Society Hill in Philadelphia and Kips Bay Plaza in New York City. Both complexes were constructed using exposed reinforced concrete and the New York Times praised the technique for yielding âfresh design.â
Born in Canton, China, in 1907, Ieoh Ming Pei immigrated to the United States in 1937 and studied architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Harvard Graduate School of Design . In 1948 he moved to New York City and became the first director of architecture at Webb & Knapp, Inc., a major real estate development company. Founded under the name 385 Madison Avenue in 1922 by W. Seward Webb, Jr. and Robert C. Knapp, as well as the noted architects Eliot Cross and John Walter Cross, the firm was purchased by businessman William Zeckendorf in 1949. Pei remembered that his boss âwanted to remake the city. We had a shared passion for large scale undertakings.â In recognition of his expertise with residential design, Pei served on the Federal Housing Administrationâs Multi-Family Housing Committee during the late 1950s, as well as the design committee for the Mitchell-Lama Housing Program.
In 1960 â the same year Pei received the NYU commission â he resigned from Webb & Knapp and formed his own architectural practice. Though Zeckendorfâs financial difficulties played a part in the architectâs decision to leave, he later recalled:
I knew that if I stayed within the envelope of the company, I would never get the
kinds of jobs I really wanted . . . My growth as a designer was stunted; I should have
reached my maturity much earlier.
Success and notoriety, however, came quickly to Pei. He received the prestigious Arnold Brunner Prize for excellence in architecture from the National Institute of Arts and Letters in March 1961, followed by the Medal of Honor from the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects in September 1963. Major subsequent works by Pei include: the National Gallery of Art, East Building in Washington, D. C., the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston, the Bank of China Tower in Hong Kong, and the Grand Louvre in Paris. In New York City, he designed the National Airlines Terminal at Kennedy International Airport and the Guggenheim Pavilion at Mount Sinai Medical Center. In 1983 he was honored as the fifth recipient of the prestigious Pritzker Architecture Prize. Though Pei retired from the firm in 1990, he continues to practice as an architect and is associated with Pei Partnership Architects, based in New York City.
Pei selected James Ingo Freed to head the University Village design team. Born in Germany, Freed moved to Chicago at the age of nine. A graduate of the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1953, he studied under the architecture schoolâs chairman Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and worked briefly with the architect on the Seagram Building . Hired by Pei in 1956, Freed participated in the design and construction of Court House Square, including the Denver Hilton Hotel , with colleague Araldo A. Cossuta, and later, served as lead designer on Kips Bay Plaza. During the mid-1960s, he collaborated with Pei on the design of fifty air traffic control towers for the Federal Aeronautics Administration. Planned during the administration of President John
F. Kennedy, like University Village, these slender structures were formed using cast-in-place concrete. Freed received many honors during his career and from 1975 to 1978 was dean of the School of Architecture at IIT. He later returned to New York and was promoted to full partner in 1980. At the time, the firm was renamed Pei Cobb Freed & Partners. Manhattan buildings designed by Freed include: a 32-story office building at 88 Pine Street , a 27-story office building at 499 Park Avenue , and the Jacob Javits Convention Center . His best-known work is arguably the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., dedicated in 1993.
The Scheme
Freed began to plan University Village in late 1960 or early 1961. In Peiâs office, he worked closely with architects Theodore A. Amberg and A. Preston Moore . The design went through several distinct stages and more than three years passed before construction of 505 LaGuardia Place began in April 1964. The building site consisted of the center area of the superblock and excluded the northwest corner of the superblock which was already developed with a one-story supermarket.
NYUâs preliminary scheme contained three buildings that were âcomparable in designâ to Washington Square Village, as well as an elementary school facing West Houston Street. Separated by Greene and Wooster Streets, these rectangular structures were arranged in a single row, from east to west, across the center of the site. By December 1960, however, NYU had completely changed course; it informed the Housing and Redevelopment Board that Pei had a âtentative plan in which he hopes to achieve some sort of community atmosphere with fairly low buildings interspersed with one or two tall structures.â
Freedâs proposal was loosely modeled on Society Hill, juxtaposing structures of different height and materials, including a 16-story cooperative apartment house, a 29-story apartment tower for faculty members facing a plaza, and a âserpentine building of six stories . . . modeled to some extent, on the typical New York City brownstone.â The latter buildingâs footprint was quite large, turning at right angles, starting at Houston Street and ending on Bleecker Street. In late 1962, this design was greatly simplified, laying the groundwork for a scheme which included twin slab-like towers flanking Wooster Street and a seven-story brick residential building, distinguished an L-shaped footprint, facing the intersection of Houston and Mercer Streets. This approach appears to have remained under consideration until December 1963 when NYU announced its purchase of Washington Square Village. This acquisition allowed the school to reevaluate its housing needs and the low-rise building was abandoned and replaced by a third tower. Not only would three identical towers reduce construction costs and streamline the design process, but Freed said this type of plan would leave as âlarge and flexible a land area as possible set aside for future use.â
The addition of the third tower dramatically altered the character of University Village. Not only did aesthetic uniformity result within the complex, but this strategy sharpened the contrast between the buildings and the neighborhood, similar to such pioneering âtower in the parkâ schemes as Parkchester in the Bronx, the Clinton Hill Houses , and Stuyvesant Town in Manhattan. No longer would mirror-image towers flank the former route of Wooster Street but three identical towers would be carefully arranged around a central lawn, with the east section of the superblock, between Mercer and Wooster Streets, left open. This block-long parcel is now occupied by the Jerome S. Coles Sports Center, completed in 1982.
In Freedâs final scheme, the towers were deliberately arranged to turn away from the surrounding streets, particularly West Houston Street, a busy cross-town artery, and LaGuardia Place, which the city had intended to widen below Washington Square. Located near the center of the site, they rise from a slightly elevated man-made platform that raises the south end of the block almost ten feet and hides two parking garages. Landscaping would also be used to increase privacy and enhance the schemeâs floating pinwheel arrangement.
In contrast to Washington Square Village, where the two buildings stand parallel to each other, the buildings in University Village are oriented in different directions, with two towers facing north toward Bleecker Street, and the other, west toward LaGuardia Place. This type of arrangement was pioneered in two earlier Pei projects, first at Kips Bay Plaza, where the two 21story apartment buildings slide in opposite directions toward the east and west, and more closely at Society Hill, where three 31-story towers rise tightly around a plaza. Whereas most Manhattan buildings fit snugly into the grid and address the street directly in a conventional way, at University Village each structure seems independent and was deliberately positioned in an asymmetrical manner around a 100-by-100-foot lawn to maximize views and create general visual interest. In addition, these open spaces act as corridors to frame views of each tower. Pei later remarked:
A city, so far from being a cluster of buildings, is actually a sequence of spaces
enclosed and defined by buildings. This may sound strange but it is the essence of
urban design.
Unlike many âtower in the parkâ projects located in New York City, Freed created a deliberate tension between the buildings and the space they occupy â not unlike the celebrated mid-20th century sculptor Alberto Giacomettiâs City Square in which âfour men stride across a wide plaza, each moving toward the center, yet none apparently directed toward an encounter with one another.â University Village similarly avoids a single axis or orientation, and thus also recalls the spatial experiments of the De Stijl group in Holland during the late 1910s and 1920s, as well as early residential projects designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Such innovative modernist ideas were essential to the final scheme, shaping not only the site plan but also the design of the three towers.
Towers of Concrete
Pei favored reinforced concrete over all other building materials during the early 1960s. His work was typically crisp and elegant and this material defines the character of his mid-career production. A great admirer of the Swiss-born architect Le Corbusier , Pei claimed that in Shanghai before 1944: âThere were no teachers to teach us the new architecture . . . so we turned to Corbuâs books, and these were responsible for half of our education.â Titled the Oeuvre Complete, this self-published series of eight volumes documented Le Corbusierâs development as an architect and his frequent use of concrete construction to create a formal language of abstract sculptural forms. This was particularly evident in his late design for the Unité dâHabitation at Marseilles, which features a 12-story horizontal grid of deeply-recessed cells. During the late 1940s, this project received international attention and the play of large and small openings on the buildingâs facade may have influenced Peiâs subsequent work in concrete, especially his apartment buildings.
University Village makes extremely sophisticated use of exposed concrete. It falls under the general stylistic category known as âBrutalismâ for its straightforward use of this material but in contrast to many examples, particularly the late work of Le Corbusier and Breuer, as well as Paul Rudolph, the exterior is noticeably smooth and elegant. Pei developed this technique between 1957 and 1960, while employed by Zeckendorf. He later recalled: âI had a wonderful client . . . who was willing to gamble with me on using concrete and not brick.â Edward L. Friedman headed the firmâs research, publishing a thorough article on the subject in October 1960, just before NYU awarded Pei the commission. Though initial studies seemed to support the continued use of pre-cast concrete , cast-in-place concrete was substituted to trim costs and conform to building codes that encouraged âstructural continuity.â Many challenges were overcome, such as how to control the consistency of the color and difficulties with shrinkage and cracking. Friedman described the nearly-complete Kips Bay Plaza as a âprototype,â while the firmâs soon-to-be built scheme for three towers at Society Hill was termed a ârefinement.â
As construction of University Village neared completion, architect Araldo A. Cossuta, published âFrom Precast Concrete to Integral Architectureâ in October 1966. He, too, was part of Peiâs office and his essay celebrated the firmâs accomplishments, paying particular attention to the Earth Sciences Center at MIT where, as at University Village, load-bearing walls were poured on site to create column-free interiors. He specifically criticized conventional skin construction and how architects sometimes disguise the handiwork of engineers. The goal, Cossuta argued, was to create âreal wallsâ â not curtain walls â through the integration of structure and skin. He maintained that this technique would result in a âreturn to classical simplicityâ and that such plastic forms can express an âexternal-internal continuumâ whereby architects take âpossession of shadows rather than diluting them by reflection.â
A warm, buff-colored concrete was selected for University Village, comparable, depending on the light, to sandstone or limestone. At Chatham Towers in Chinatown, architects used plywood boards to form the exposed concrete, producing a rough and yet interesting patterned surface. At University Village, however, fiberglass molds were employed. According to Friedman, this material was chosen for various reasons: not only was the quality of the results high but fiberglass is easy to assemble, strip, and re-use. Furthermore, various concrete coatings, release agents, and even scaffoldings were evaluated. In terms of cost and quality, he claimed that such research returned handsome dividends. Each section took approximately four-to-eight weeks to set and harden, and overall, construction took six-to-eight weeks less than conventional brick facings.
The three towers display twin sets of gridded facades projecting from a central core. Each floor has four or eight horizontal window openings and a 22-foot-wide sheer wall, separated by a thin slot of flat windows. Located at either end, these smooth windowless walls contrast with the deeply-recessed window openings and reflect light. Each opening is formed by a pair of T-shaped columns that meet over the center of the bay. These columns narrow toward the front, creating a wedge-shaped profile. Between floors, horizontal and vertical joints are visible. These gaps indicate each stage of casting and allow for thermal movement throughout the year. Deep reveals were fashioned to conceal troweled joints.
At the base, the T-shaped columns are considerably taller â more than twice the height of the residential floors. These columns form a continuous entrance arcade along the front facades, similar to Kips Bay Plaza. Shaped like elongated diamonds, they enclose a deep gallery with tan brick walls that flank the glazed outer walls of the lobby. In terms of color and rhythm they exhibit a vaguely classical spirit, suggesting an ancient Greek or Roman temple.
Construction
A ceremonial ground breaking for the first building â Washington Square South East, later known as 505 West Broadway â was held on August 12, 1964, following approval of plans by the Housing and Redevelopment Board and the Building Department. In attendance was NYU President James W. Hester who described the project as âa successful example of community cooperation.â Later that year, in November 1964, the Board of Estimate endorsed the larger scheme, along with various criteria to determine residency in the cooperative apartments. Tenants who had been forced to move were given first priority, followed by people dislocated by similar projects in Greenwich Village. At this time, the Board of Estimate also approved the closing of Greene and Wooster Streets.
Construction started in late August 1964. The Tishman Construction Company served as contractor and Farkas & Barron was the engineer. Amberg, from Peiâs office, served as site architect, overseeing day-to-day operations. The first step was the pouring of the foundations â a four-foot-thick concrete pad covering each buildingâs footprint. More complicated than conventional concrete footings, it required continuous pouring and the delivery process was characterized by the New York Times as having the âprecision of a military campaign.â It was a relatively efficient process and, according to Amberg, the towers rose simultaneously on a âthree day cycle.â On the first day, the fiberglass forms were erected incorporating the steel, followed by a day for pouring, and a day for removing the formwork. Construction progressed on a âstaggeredâ schedule, meaning that the contractor performed one of three tasks on each tower during a given day. The first building was âtopped outâ in December 1964 and by late 1966 the three towers were nearly complete.
Modern Architecture and New York University
Prior to the 1930s, most American universities commissioned buildings inspired by European and Jeffersonian models, including neo-classical and neo-Gothic structures that recalled Oxford, Cambridge, Charlottesville, as well as other historic centers of learning. After World War I, European architects began to challenge this approach, arguing that traditional forms were no longer desirable or appropriate. These ideas attracted considerable support in the United States. The New School for Social Research was one of the first buildings in New York City and one of the first college buildings in the United States to exhibit characteristics of the so-called âInternational Style.â Designed by Joseph Urban in 1930-31, the clean-lined glass and brick facade stood in sharp juxtaposition to its nineteenth-century neighbors. By decadeâs end, several modern-style campuses had begun construction, including Florida Southern University , IIT , and Hunter College . After World War II, this trend accelerated, transforming the campuses of Harvard University, Yale University, and MIT.
NYU embarked on a major building campaign during the late 1940s. To help guide the schoolâs expansion, a Buildings and Grounds Committee of the Board of Trustees was formed in 1952. George F. Baughman, the schoolâs vice president and treasurer, praised their vision:
Without their willingness to take risks, we could do nothing. As an example, because of their enthusiastic aid, we have been able to employ some of the most exciting architects now practicing . . . a cross section of talent representing the best of contemporary American architecture.
Many exceptional firms participated, including Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, Harrison & Abramowitz, and Marcel Breuer. Among them, SOM was responsible for the schoolâs first structure designed in the International Style â the Institute of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. Located near 34th Street, on the east side of First Avenue, it was part of the NYU-Bellevue Medical Center. Construction began in 1949 and the first four SOM buildings were completed by 1956. To provide housing for the schoolâs staff, a plan for NYU-Bellevue Title I was issued in 1953. When the developer failed to obtain financing, Robert Moses invited William Zeckendorf to take over the project and he replaced S. J. Kessler & Sons with his own architect, I. M. Pei, in 1957. Located in full sight of the medical center, on the west side of First Avenue, this well-designed complex positioned Pei as a leading candidate to design University Village.
By 1959 NYU had seven new buildings under construction. The Architectural Record enthusiastically reported: âNew York University â largest in the nation â is matching its size with a building program that calls for thirty-five million dollars worth of construction in one year!â Included were structures designed by Breuer, Harrison & Abramowitz, SOM, and Warner Burns, Toan & Lund.
Bust of Sylvette
At the center of University Village, near the southeast corner of the center lawn, stands Pablo Picassoâs Bust of Sylvette. Thirty-six feet tall and purportedly weighing sixty tons, this colossal cubistic sculpture served a dual purpose â to decorate the lawn and to enhance the schemeâs pinwheel character.
Outdoor sculpture has played an important role in New York City since the mid-nineteenth century. Most early examples were financed by private groups to embellish public squares and parks. Some, like bronze portraits of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln at Union Square, were intended to express patriotism and recall historic events, while others, including Central Parkâs Angel of the Waters served a symbolic purpose, representing common ideas and shared beliefs. Gradually war monuments and memorials began to dominate the public realm, particularly to honor the 25th anniversary of the end of the Civil War. Most were executed in a realistic style, with handsome stone pedestals, echoing the classical statuary of ancient Greece and Rome.
The Bust of Sylvette, however, belonged to an entirely new tradition, one inspired by French modernism and the Art Deco style. At Rockefeller Center, a gilded statue of the Greek god Prometheus was commissioned to adorn the sunken plaza. Located on axis with the promenade that connects with Fifth Avenue, it was conceived to draw people toward the lower shopping concourse and serve as a gleaming focal point or âeye catcherâ within the limestone complex. Other works at Rockefeller Center were notable for employing the modern materials, such as glass block, stainless steel, and aluminum.
This trend intensified after the Second World War, especially during the period when modern architectural aesthetics became part of the mainstream. Industrial materials transformed the appearance of new buildings and new planning concepts would open up Manhattanâs grid with privately-owned plazas. Two pioneering examples, Lever House and the Seagram Building , were conceived as settings for contemporary sculpture. Though no works were executed, major pieces were, in fact, commissioned for Chase Manhattan Plaza in lower Manhattan: a sunken circular garden by Isamu Noguchi and Group of Four Trees , a 42-foot-tall work by Jean Dubuffet.
Pei first developed an interest in modern art during the 1940s. He collected works by Abstract Expressionist painters, as well as sculptures by Dubuffet and Henry Moore. During a 1958 visit to Paris he met the Norwegian sculptor Carl Nesjar , who was returning home from the south of France where he recently introduced Picasso to the technique called ânaturebetongâ or nature concrete. Also known as âBetrograve,â this sandblasting process was developed by architect Erling Viksjö and engineer Svere Jystad during the mid-1950s. Picasso commented: âI am intrigued with your concrete and want to do something with it.â Initially, he made four large wall drawings for a government building in Oslo, followed by a 1961 frieze in Barcelona. Pei told Nesjar:
I have long thought about monumental sculpture in scale with modern architecture,
and I recognize the possibilities of concrete technique. Here and now I am beginning
a one-man crusade to have a monumental Picasso work for one of my projects.
Pei wanted to install a Picasso, possibly from the Sylvette series, in the courtyard of Kips Bay Plaza but his client, Zeckendorf, was not convinced it was essential to the program. He reportedly told the architect: âI can give you fifty saplings or this piece of sculpture.â Pei ultimately chose trees. In Philadelphia, however, the cityâs Percent for Art Ordinance, established in 1959, required that developers incorporate art into their projects. Early renderings for Society Hill illustrate two pieces: an equestrian statue set on a raised pedestal in the central plaza, and what appears to be Sylvette, on a lawn behind the apartment towers. Though neither would be executed, Pei reportedly had a $400,000 budget and instead commissioned bronze sculptures by Gaston Lachaise and Leonard Baskin.
Sylvette David was nineteen years old when she met Picasso in spring 1953. Approximately forty portraits of her in various media resulted, including the group of five busts that Nesjar viewed at the artistâs Valluris studio, La Galliose, in 1962. Fabricated with folded sheet metal and then painted, each piece was approximately two feet tall. In consultation with Nesjar, Picasso selected which would be most appropriate for enlargement and then produced a photo collage representing the view from Houston Street. Dated April 4, 1967 and October 17, 1967, the artist wrote: âI agree that Nesjar reproduce this sculpture.â A close examination of the collage, however, reveals that during the period between the two dates the sculptureâs location was changed from the west side of the lawn, where it would have been visible from the intersection of Houston and Mercer Streets, to a somewhat more central location, opposite the entrance to 110 Bleecker Street.
In November 1967, while a retrospective devoted to Picassoâs sculpture was being held at the Museum of Modern Art, NYU formally announced the commission. The model for Sylvette was part of the exhibition and Pei persuaded one of the museumâs patrons, Allan D. and Kate S. Emil, to finance it. It was the second sculpture that the family had donated to the school, following an abstract aluminum relief by Rueben Nakian , which originally adorned the upper north wall of the Loeb Student Center . Articles appeared in the New York Times and Time magazine which described the projected Picasso sculpture as âhalf as high and twice as sexy as the Great Sphinx of Egypt.â Alfred Barr, former MoMA director, forecast that it would be the âgrandest sculpture in Manhattan . . . not to mention the tallest pony-tail hairdo in the whole world.â It would be the second monumental Picasso sculpture in the United States â the first being an untitled fifty-foot-tall work executed in Cor-Ten steel for the Chicago Civic Center .
Nesjarâs team worked on Sylvette for five months, from January to June 1968, taking twice the time estimated. He was assisted by two Norwegians, the carpenter Sigurd Fragure and the artist-writer Eric Hesselberg, who served on the crew of the Kon-Tiki expedition in 1947. The New York firm Wieskopf & Pickworth assisted with the structural engineering. It was Nesjarâs twelfth collaboration with the Picasso. Nesjar commented:
This is a collaboration or if you prefer, a translation . . . Iâm like a conductor of an orchestra. The composer gives me a piece of music and then itâs up to me to see what I can do with it.
It was a unique relationship and Picassoâs only criticism of Nesjar was that results were frequently âtoo perfect.â
Freed and Amberg coordinated the sculpture project and, according to Pei, spent nearly a year bringing it to fruition. Amberg briefly lived in a NYU-University Village apartment and worked closely with Nesjar. To prepare the site, a beam and slab foundation was formed, supported by steel beams that rise from the garage. On top of the base, one side of the sculptureâs plywood formwork was assembled, followed by the steel skeleton, consisting of reinforcement bars. The skeleton was then enclosed with a second set of boards to create a water-tight form filled with crushed black basalt pebbles imported from Norway, as well as Hudson Valley traprock. Next, the rock was gently vibrated to achieve maximum density. According to Amberg, Nesjarâs team then drilled numerous ports that were used to inject the form with liquid concrete. This process was repeated several times until the concrete reached the top. After six days, the boards were removed, revealing a smooth, joint-free surface. In the final steps, Nesjar marked the outer surface with charcoal and wax crayon, making minor adjustments to the artistâs original vision for reasons of scale or point of view. He remarked: âI must be the only person in the world who has corrected a Picasso.â Nesjar then used a sandblast nozzle to expose the dark rock, making her face, hair, and shoulders permanently visible.
The Bust of Sylvette was dedicated the universityâs Tishman Auditorium on December 9, 1968. Neither Allan nor Kate Emil had attended NYU but during his speech he described their shared admiration for the school and the âwork it does today.â He also observed:
Picasso is one of the most important artists of our time, and New York should have a major example of his work in this medium. I canât think of a better location for it than New York University, where it can serve education, art, and the public at large.
Reception
University Village attracted considerable attention from the local media but only a few articles in national magazines. Initially, most writers focused on Peiâs innovative use of exposed concrete. The New York Herald Tribune reported in April 1964 that the preliminary design would âyield architectural distinction rarely associated with even more costly buildings.â As the project neared completion, the New York Times took a more neutral position; the complex was called âcontroversial,â with detailed descriptions of the exoskeleton and the interior layouts. Architectural Forum published the most thoughtful and detailed essay in December 1966. Written by critic and photographer Cerwin Robinson, he examined the complex in terms of plan, technique, tenant amenities and neighborhood context. He concluded: âThe three towers are among the least costly Pei has done. They are also among his best. New York has gained not only a triad of landmarks but clear proof that inexpensive housing can be distinguished architecture.â In Fortune magazine, Douglass Haskell featured the complex on a list of the ten best buildings of 1966, placing it under the category where architects engage in a âback-andforth play between a showy sculptural architecture on the one hand and on the other the concept of a reserved repetitive grid.â
University Village was honored with three professional awards. Under the category of residential work, it received a prize from the Concrete Industry Board of New York in December 1966, a Bard Award for excellence in design from the City Club of New York and a national honor award from the American Institute of Architects , both during May 1967. And when the first AIA Guide to NY debuted in 1967, the complex was strongly praised:
Of these three, nearly identical towers, the one closest to West Broadway is Mitchell-Lama middle income housing â undoubtedly the finest in the city, and much better than Peiâs Kips Bay Plaza . . . the result is exceptional for high-rise housing where one can, for a change, grasp the size of the individual apartments . . . from the north they appear as the logical and elegant termination of the progression of recently built, structures.
The nearly complete towers, along with NYUâs Weaver Hall, were likewise part of the AIAâs 1967 exhibition of âoutstanding architecture of the last 100 yearsâ built in New York City.
A decade later, in 1979, New York Times architecture critic Paul Goldberger described the three towers as âdignified and sophisticated . . . In a city with hardly more than a handful of decent postwar apartment houses, these stand out. Peiâs ability to bring rhythm and texture to a facade that is just a grid of concrete is absolutely superb.â Critic-cartographer John Tauranac commented in Essential New York that the towers were âCrisply designed [with an] attention to massing and detailing that many âluxuryâ houses ignore. The tenants get their moneyâs worth, as do the passing pedestrians.â Architect-historian Robert A. M. Stern later praised the complex in New York 1960, calling it âanimated, sculpturally vigorous yet human-scaled design.â And in Manhattan Skyscrapers, a 1999 book devoted to mainly office buildings, Eric P. Nash praised University Village for exhibiting an âelegant synthesis of many strains of modernist design.â Calling the complex a âfine composition,â he observed that it displays a âkinetic sense of energyâ in which âthe flow of space is almost palpable.â
When Freed died in 2005, many writers paid tribute to his career, particularly Terence Riley, curator of architecture at the Museum of Modern Art. Among the various buildings he called out in the obituary in the International Herald Tribune, University Village was cited as being one of âthe most refined examples of modern design in all of Manhattan.â
Subsequent history
University Village looks much as it did when NYU faculty began to occupy the schoolâs two buildings during late 1966. Most of the cooperative apartments were sold by October 1965 and the owner-tenants began to occupy the third building in April 1967. Both NYU buildings were renamed in 1974 to honor a major donor to the school, Julius Silver, class of 1922. Trained as a lawyer at Columbia University, for many years he advised Edwin Land of the Polaroid Corporation. A free-standing metal plaque installed on the north side of the plaza acknowledges his substantial gifts to the school, as well as horizontal metal plaques attached the walls inside each buildingâs arcade. The diagonal path, connecting the central plaza to Bleecker Street, is not original and probably was added during the 1970s or 1980s. Many of the freestanding lighting fixtures, except those near 505 LaGuardia Place, date from the 1980s or later. Overall, the concrete exteriors are in a remarkably good state of repair. Some patching, however, is visible, particularly on the north facade of 505 LaGuardia Place.
Description
University Village is located in the southeast section of Greenwich Village on two tax lots bordered, in part, by LaGuardia Place, Bleecker Street, and West Houston Street. The south half of the site has been raised to create a level platform for the three buildings. Beneath the buildings are two parking garages, reached by separate concrete entrance ramps on the north side of West Houston Street. The east ramp, serving both NYU buildings, is located close to Greene Street. Painted steel tubular railings are attached to the top of the concrete walls that flank the ramp. Along part of the top of the east wall is steel fencing. The west ramp, located between Wooster Street and LaGuardia Place, serves the 505 LaGuardia Place garage. Steel fencing is attached to the upper portion of the concrete walls that enclose the west garage entrance. Pedestrian access to both garages is provided by sidewalks, lined with steel fencing, leading to single, hollow-metal doors; the doors are located on the west side of the east garage, and on the east side of the west garage. Both garages have metal roll-up doors. Immediately to the west of each garage ramp is a sanitation area. Both sanitation areas have locked gates, concrete paving and low concrete walls surmounted by steel fences. The western sanitation area has sheet metal attached to the inside face of the fence.
A paved drive, located along the former Wooster Street links Houston and Bleecker Streets. From Houston Street, the original purplish-pink, granite-block paved drive separates 110 Bleecker Street and 505 LaGuardia Place. This drive turns east, passing the entrance of 110 Bleecker Street, and then north, passing 100 Bleecker Street, and then east again, bordering the central lawn/plaza. Planted with grass, the level plaza is square in shape, with rounded corners. Adjoining the corners are arrow-shaped metal drains set into concrete. At the southeast corner of the lawn is the Bust of Sylvette, as well as a small brass plaque on a low concrete pedestal identifying the artist and donor. Historic concrete curbs curl into the granite road bed, with three curb cuts leading to the west drive. Concrete bollards, original and mostly in good condition, are scattered around the sidewalk that adjoins the road. Along the north sidewalk is a low concrete bench with a slight cantilever on both sides that extends from the northwest corner of 100 Bleecker Street to the east side of the west drive . Toward the west end of the sidewalk is a pair of bronze-colored metal flagpoles. Between the flagpoles, a freestanding metal plaque set into a concrete slab describes the NYU buildings.
The north lawn parallels Bleecker Street and extends east from the drive to the eastern edge of the site. The closely-planted trees are likely to date from the time of construction. The lawn also contains non-historic lighting fixtures, including U-shaped pole lights and pole-mounted flood lights. A diagonal concrete path, starting near the northwest corner of 100 Bleecker Street, extends northeast through the north lawn, ending near the Bleecker Street sidewalk. The east lawn, adjoining 100 Bleecker Street, extends south to a concrete path, from the siteâs east boundary. Between this path and Houston Street is a seating area featuring a broken spiral of concrete benches. At the southeast corner of the site, between the seating area and east garage ramp on Houston Street, is a playground enclosed with original concrete walls, featuring a concrete bench, ramp, and circular sandbox set into the ground and a circular tree planter. The south central lawn, between 110 Bleecker Street and Houston Street, is bordered by a steel fence on the east, west, and south. It is also enclosed by a non-historic chain-link fence extending from the east facade of 110 Bleecker Street to the playground. An original concrete taxi call light is located at the southwest corner of the south central lawn, near Houston Street.
South of 505 LaGuardia Place is a lush private garden, enclosed by a steel fence. This garden, as well as the buildingâs rear facade, is visible through the fence. Located within the garden are two original lampposts. Proceeding north from Houston Street, along the shaded path between the private garden and the âTime Landscapeâ , is a wide concrete staircase with four metal railings that ascend east into a mews or passageway, passing 505 LaGuardia Place on the right . This passage has three original painted metal light poles, each with five glass globes. The other lighting fixtures along the plaza and sidewalks are non-historic and feature slender steel poles with U-shaped supports that hold covered square-shaped down lights. Where there is grass, they are set on concrete cubes, the rest are bolted to the sidewalk. Along the north side of this passage is a low concrete bench that encloses a planting bed. Directly north of the stairs, the west end of the bench becomes the top of a concrete wall, to which the raised historic metal numbers â505â are attached. At the east end, the bench curves and meets a rectangular base on which a steel fence has been installed. Non-historic metal signs are installed on the face of the bench. From this bench, a sidewalk extends north along the west side of the former route of Wooster Street. Here, non-historic U-shaped lighting fixtures and trees alternate. A high steel fence separates the sidewalk from a planting bed with a second row of trees, as well as a low concrete wall that separates the complex from the space used by the adjacent supermarket driveway. A chain-link fence is installed on top of this wall.
Adjoining the central plaza, to the east, south and west are three 30-story apartment buildings. Located near the center of the site, this trio rises in isolation and stands taller than the various buildings that surround the site. Each tower is defined by grids of deeply-recessed windows executed with exposed concrete. Wider than deep, each projecting facade has four or eight windows, flanked on one side by a row of narrow windows, as well as a sheer wall of concrete divided into vertical panels. Each bay consists of two sections: the upper one incorporates a pair of sliding aluminum windows, and the smaller lower section, a ventilation grille. At the ground story, the primary facades have deep arcades that lead to lobbies, and the secondary facades have large windows set above raised bases. Small recessed openings at the basement level are filled with louvers; most of the louvers at 505 LaGuardia Place are original, while most of those at 100 and 110 Bleecker Street are non-historic. Other non-historic elements include: flood lights mounted to many of the basement louvers and parapets, metal mesh boxlike fences which enclose recesses at the ground floor; sheet-metal signage; and security cameras.
The exterior wall of the lobby of 505 LaGuardia Place faces north and is set behind an arcade. There is a short step within each bay, except at the east end, which has been converted to a ramp. The cement pavement within the arcade is divided into rectangles; joints separating the rectangles are aligned with the columns. The step riser at the two center bays has been painted yellow. The east and west walls of the arcade are faced with tan brick. On the west wall is the historic â505â sign with raised digits. The ceiling incorporates a row of original recessed lighting fixtures, aligned with the center of each bay. The entrance consists of a projecting pavilion with concrete side walls, brown-colored aluminum framed windows and two inward-opening glass doors. The pavilion is flanked by recessed plate glass windows on either side. A service entry located to the west end of the arcade has brown-painted metal doors and a sheet metal transom. A non-historic security camera is installed at the east end of the arcade on the upper wall. Original â505â signs with raised digits are located on the northeast corner of the north facade and at the northwest corner of the west facade.
The exterior wall of the lobbies of 100 and 110 Bleecker Street are similar to 505 LaGuardia but are not identical, with larger sheets of plate glass to either side of the entrance pavilion. Horizontal metal strips have been added in various locations near the ground to protect the glass. The walls to the right of both entrances are faced with tan brick. Attached to these walls are the original raised numerals that indicate the buildingâs address â100â and â110,â as well as a circa 1970s metal plaque indicating âSILVER TOWERS, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY.â The shallow ramps that enter through the arcade are not original and probably replaced a single step. Most of the lighting fixtures in these arcades are not original, nor are the low granite benches on either end. Original service entries with metal doors and sheet-metal transoms are located on the west side of 110 Bleecker Street and the south side of 100 Bleecker Street.
- From the 2008 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report
Nanpu Bridge at night, Shanghai, China
Sold by Getty Mar 2017 for Arm (United Kingdom (Great Britain)).
from the museum's website:
"Terunobu Fujimori insists that his buildings should by-pass any architectural style that has developed since the Bronze Age. The charred pine exterior of this elevated teahouse resembles the tough, blackened shell of a beetle. It expresses an avant-garde attitude to architecture that somehow aspires to a primitive state.
The dramatic process of burning the timber panels provides a textured and tactile surface - an extreme materiality. It also preserves the wood and extends the lifetime of the building.
Fujimori sees the structure as a site for a quintessentially 'English' version of the traditional Japanese tea ceremony. Teahouses often act like pieces of clothing. They are compact spaces that wrap around us like extensions of our bodies. Visitors enter the structure by climbing a ladder barefoot and squeezing through a narrow hatch - a profoundly physical process that momentarily distracts us from our surroundings.
Many of Fujimori's teahouses are designed to re-configure our views of the surrounding landscape. Similarly, 'Beetle's House' offers visitors a unique perspective on this day-lit gallery."
Night view of the Minatomirai waterfront district as seen from Bankoku Bridge. The bridge was originally built in 1903 and survived the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake. The current span was rebuilt in 1940. The bridge name, Bankokubashi (万国橋) means “bridge to 10,000 countries” reflecting its early importance to the flow of international trade through the Port of Yokohama.
The Library, built in 1910, is the oldest government built structure in the Longmire Historic District.
At 14,411 feet, Mount Rainier is the highest volcanic peak in the Cascade Mountain Range. Mount Rainier National Park is the nation's 5th National Park. It was created in 1899. It is a land of exceptional beauty, containing lowland valleys, waterfalls, alpine scenery and more than 25 glaciers. There are also two historic hotels located within the Park.
This built structure is named by "Dongdaemun" which is the wall militarily to protect the Imperial Palace from the outsiders. I don't interested in whether that is true or not. this gate is located in the east area from the main imperial palace "Gyeongbokgung".
The Paddington Zone substation is a purpose designed and built structure dating from 1926, built by the Municipal Council of Sydney. Paddington was the first suburb to receive electricity, via an earlier substation in Young Street (No 9, now demolished). Placement of that earlier substation as dictated in part by proximity to the Royal Hospital for Women and its need for electric power. Substation No 342 was built during the phase of rapid expansion of the electricity network in the mid-1920s and has been subsequently extended on a number of occasions.
Source: New South Wales Heritage Register.
The waiting room was a small brick and stone built structure with a slate roof and a wooden door overhang. There were four windows with two at the front and one at each gable end. Each gable end also had a small round window to allow light into the attic space. There was only the one door giving access to the building.
The inside would have been plain internal brickwork and painted, originally cream/white then green (by observing the laters of paint) with seats around the walls. A large frame containing public information would have been mounted on the wall immediately in front of the door upon entering. The wooden elements around the doorway still retains their bright red paintwork.
Please see front page of the Set for general information on the Athlone-Mullingar line www.flickr.com/photos/23885771@N03/sets/72157624392741649/
Thank you for reading.
Stuart.
The Ayalon Institute was a secret ammunition factory disguised as part of a kibbutz to fool the British back in the 1940s. Jewish people used the factory in their efforts to fight for the independent state of Israel. Organizers went to extreme measures to build and sustain this secret factory within the kibbutz. Between 1945 and 1948, the Ayalon Institute produced more than 2 million 9mm bullets.
During the British mandate, the Jewish people began planning ways to make machinery and guns to fight for independence. While manufacturing guns didn’t prove to be that difficult, it was very challenging to make bullets for the guns.
So, a group of Jewish people decided to build a ammunitions factory under a kibbutz, which is a communal area of land designed for a specific purpose, such as farming. The area was near a British base. In 1945, the group built structures on the surface that resembled a kibbutz and in about three weeks, they built an entire ammunitions factory eight meters underground. The factory was about the size of a tennis court.
The factory stopped operating in 1948, three years after being built. In 1987, the factory was restored and turned into a museum that is now open to the public.
This 210 Foot Monument was built in 1933 with monies bequeathed by Lillie Hitchock Coit to beautify the city she loved. Frescoes were painted in the interior of the newly built structure by local artists funded through the United State's government's Public Works of Art project. This plaque is placed by the Recreation and Park Commission, October 8, 1983, to mark Coit Tower's 50th Anniversary and its designation as an historical landmark.
Coit Tower, sitting in Pioneer Park atop Telegraph Hill, was built in 1933 by architects Arthur Brown, Jr. and Henry Howard, at the bequest of Lillian Hitchcock Coit for the purposes of beautification of the City of San Francisco. The 210-foot tall, unpainted, reinforced concrete, Art Deco tower resembles a fire hose nozzle. However, even though Lillie Coit was a big supporter of the city's fireman, contrary to urban legend the tower does not serve as a memorial in wake of the 1906 earthquake. Over 250,000 visitors come to Coit Tower annually to take the elevator ride up to the 360-degree observation deck, which sits 179-feet high and 542-feet above sea level. There is a small studio apartment on the first level of the tower, which was originally used as lodging for the structure's caretaker.
The interior is decorated with murals, mostly done in fresco, carried out by 26 artists under the auspices of the Public Works Project. Executed in 1934, the muralists, who were mainly faculty and students were supervised by Ralph Stackpole and Bernard Zakheim. Artists included Maxine Albro, Victor Arnautoff, Ray Bertrand, Rinaldo Cuneo, Mallette Harold Dean, Clifford Wight, Edith Hamlin, George Harris, Robert B. Howard, Otis Oldfield, Suzanne Scheuer, Hebe Daum and Frede Vidar.
Pioneer Park, one of the first dedicated parks in San Francisco, was established atop Telegraph Hill in 1876. Telegraph Hill earned its name from the marine semaphore telegraph which was posted there in the 1850's, providing notification of arriving ships.
National Register #07001468 (2007)