References:
Books referenced for this publication that document the architecture of Herzog & de Meuron.

Photo Gallery:

Architectural Context:

When talking about architecture, architects often speak of the success of an architectural design in terms of context. Unfortunately, many architects forget that there is more to a structure’s context than its relationship to adjacent buildings and the site. Herzog & de Meuron understand context to be social, cultural, and architectural. They are even concerned with how their parking garage relates within the experiential context of the ceremony of driving, parking and emerging as a pedestrian onto Lincoln Mall from the automobile. They recognize these various contexts in the design of the 1111 Lincoln Road parking garage, a project with so many complex contextual relationships that they only become clear upon visiting the structure and spending enough time looking and experiencing.

When designing structures within a historic context it is best to either match the historic style of the architecture as close as possible, or to design a structure that is of “the spirit of the times” (zeitgeist). Upon visiting the 1111 Lincoln Road development, it became clear that the design of the parking structure is foreign in style and form to the surrounding collection of 800 structures located in South Beach’s Art Deco Historic District. There is nothing formally contextual about the 1111 Lincoln Road parking structure. It stands by itself, as if it is better than its architectural neighbors. It has an attitude, a demeanor that suggest it does not care what you think of it, because it knows it is better than all of the other buildings that you have ever parked in. Herzog & de Meuron avoid the pitfalls that have plagued other architects, by understanding that architecture has to be sensitive to its context, but does not have to look like it. The 1111 Lincoln Road parking structure contrasts with its architectural context in nearly every way imaginable.

The sharp angles of the concrete structure contrast with the streamlined forms of the expensive parked automobiles and neighboring Art Deco structures. The historic forms of South Beach are solid masses that have been carved away, while the parking structure is a delicate exoskeleton, allowing light and air to penetrate deep into its core. While the neighboring Art Deco structures are concerned with surface, Herzog & de Meuron create a structure that is composed of line and edge. The poured in place concrete forms are left raw and exposed to the elements, in contrast to the brightly painted buildings found on every block.

The parking structure of 1111 Lincoln Road is part of a complex of three buildings: Apart from the existing SunTrust office building there is a two-story building designed by Herzog & de Meuron, with a SunTrust Bank branch on the ground floor and four large condos on the second floor. The two-story building has no visual relationship to the parking garage. The solid white box blends in with the existing context, so as not to weaken the image of the parking garage. The modern SunTrust office building is a poured in place concrete structure, but it is painted white in an effort to differentiate old from new. The parking structure ignores these buildings architecturally, and pulls away from them. The floor plates of the parking garage rarely respond to the floor plates of the existing office building. The stairways that connect the two structures are delicate interventions out of necessity, and recede into the shadows of the two structures. The existing SunTrust office building was upgraded to contain additional retail space at the ground level that matches the retail at the base of the parking structure, but a conscious move was made by the architects to use color and a construction joint to differentiate the portion of the concrete canopy that belong to the old and the new.

Herzog & de Meuron take a stand in the design of their parking structure, clearly delineating new from old, denouncing Miami Moderne in favor of an architecture that is responsive to the social, cultural, and experiential context of our time.

Master Curator:

Visionary developer Robert Wennett, who sees himself more as a master curator than a developer, envisioned 1111 Lincoln Road as a structure that would be a destination for art, commerce and culture, he imagined a building that patrons would experience while driving, shopping, living and being entertained. He visited with ten architecture firms from around the world sharing his vision, but it was not until he met with Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron that he knew he had found his architect.  After commissioning Herzog & de Meuron to design the structure, the three would work intimately on the project for the next five years. Wennett did not stop with commissioning a world renowned architect to design a building, like any distinguished curator, he realized that an exhibition cannot rely on a single work of art. The building includes signage by Wolf-Olins, an iron rods art installation under the stairs on Level 2 by Monika Sosnowska, as well as featuring retail spaces such as a Taschen bookstore, a Y3/Adidas boutique, and a Nespresso outlet, which all function as miniature galleries for commerce. The details of the building, which are the result of the joint technical efforts of Herzog & de Meuron and local architect of record Charles H Benson & Associates, Architects, PA become works of art that even cause non-architects to pause and admire. Wennett allows his exhibition of design and art to spill out into the plaza in front of 1111 Lincoln Road, the design of which is the result of a collaborative effort by Herzog & de Meuron and Raymond Jungles, a Miami based landscape architect, which features interactive public art by New York artist Dan Graham.

Experiential Context:

On entering the parking garage it becomes clear that everything about the structure is designed to enhance the experience of parking. While driving through the structure, every turn captures a different view of the city; every ramp aligns your vehicle toward a seemingly framed piece of the Florida sky. The shape of the structural columns enhances the views of the city, pulling the eyes outward. The connection of the viewer to the city is reinforced by the architecture. After a few moments you will find yourself forgetting to scan for a parking spot, and instead exploring the city, awaiting new views that are revealed while driving through the structure. The structure responds to the city and its context in a way that differs from other structures in the city. It forces drivers to interact with the city in a way that is unique to 1111 Lincoln Road. It is this exploitation of the ceremonial experience of parking that makes it unlike any other parking structure.

After parking your automobile, the structure will urge you to pause and look out at the city. While waiting on the elevator, the sculptural stair tempts you to explore upper and lower levels; it tempts you to explore the city. Typically parking garages are repetitive vertically, featuring a consistent vertical ten foot rhythm. Herzog & de Meuron have the luxury of exploiting the verticality of the parking structure which creates a different experience at each level. It is a garage with a view and light.

Social & Cultural Context:

Herzog & de Meuron have managed to create an architectural form instilled with the spirit of Miami’s South Beach. The automobile is an undeniable symbol of status and wealth in America. The display of one’s prosperity is the whole reason Miami and the Art Deco style exists. Miami during the 1020’s in its boom could be equated to the Dubai of today. What car do you drive? How much money do you make? What designer labels are on your clothes? This is the culture of Miami and these are the things that matter. The Art Deco style in Miami was the result of the wealthy searching for a means for displaying their wealth in the homes they lived in. Herzog & de Meuron understand this, and create a structure which is as much a monument to the automobile as it is a billboard for displaying wealth. The garage is a stage for the celebutantes of South Beach to display their wealth and gain the attention of tourists that visit the mall. The structure is undeniably South Beach.

All Muscle . . . almost

Jacques Herzog describes the 1111 Lincoln Road parking structure as “All muscle without cloth”.  Spending any amount of time in Miami will validate the accuracy of this statement as a description of South Beach and its culture. Skin is an acceptable form of expression in South Beach, but the problem is that the statement by Jacques Herzog is not an entirely accurate description of the structure. From the stylized photos that have been published in various magazines the structure appears to be ALL muscle, but once at the site, 1111 Lincoln Road is revealed to be a body builder in a tutu. The beauty of the parking garage is its structure, which seems to bulge and flex in all the right places, at times responding to structural forces, and at other times responding to other forces such as emphasizing views of the city from within, and even enhancing the movement of the automobile itself.  The muscles are great, but unfortunately the tutu is not. The metaphorical ‘tutu’ of the structure is the retail space at the ground level. The angled columns of the parking garage abruptly stop at the second level of the building. The ground level lacks the sculptural spirit of the rest of the building. The structure would be more convincingly complete if the angular columns were permitted to continue down to the ground, creating retail spaces that engage the structural forms in a similar manner that the restaurants and penthouse units are treated. Instead, the muscular structure sits atop a glass box, and the iconic angular columns have been substituted for conventional circular columns and a continuous storefront system of glass and metal. A disconnect between the structure above and the retail at the ground level is the result of a compromise between the architecture and visibility requirements demanded by the stores leasing the retail space. The structure can be viewed in its purest state when looking at the building from the north, as the angled concrete columns are allowed to continue down the back of the structure down to the ground.

When inside the parking garage, visitors are tempted to explore the garage vertically; they are inveigled by the seductive qualities of the sculptural stair and the framed views of the city. The garage does very little to engage the public at the street level, one would expect that Herzog & de Meuron would have designed the base of the structure to provoke users to explore the parking garage in the same way that they are encouraged to explore the parking garage while in it, but this is not the case. The pedestrian entrance to the garage and the sculptural stair are recessed in the shadows of the building at the ground level, discouraging entry into the structure. The ground level does not possess the same quality of lightness and transparency as the parking garage that sits atop it. This connection between the base of the structure and the parking garage is the one flaw of 1111 Lincoln Road. If the storefront had been broken, and the muscles of the parking garage been allowed to flex into the plaza, the building, plaza, and overall experience would have been better for it, inching that much closer to completely realizing the designer’s concept.

The above article was featured as the cover story in Bauwelt no 21.10 and in the Summer issue of Florida/Caribbean Architect Magazine. I would like to thank Charles H Benson and Robert Wennett for taking the time out of their busy schedules to answer my questions about the project, and for providing their valuable insights into the process involved in producing 1111 Lincoln Road. I would also like to thank Bauwelt for taking a chance on an unknown blogger, and Florida/Caribbean Architect for publishing this article.

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History: Do, or Do Not

The original de Young Museum opened in 1895 as a result of the construction that took place in preparation for the California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894, now called Golden Gate Park (see photo gallery below for photo of the original de Young Museum). The original de Young Museum aged poorly and over the years the structure slowly fell apart. Finally in 1989, the Loma Prieta earthquake severely damaged the building, and plans were made to construct a replacement structure. In 1999 a competition was held for the design of the replacement museum, among the finalist teams were architects Tadao Ando, Cesar Pelli, Antoine Predock, Rafael Viñoly, and Herzog & de Meuron whom were selected as the winners of the competition. From the very beginning the design for the new museum was the subject of controversy and criticism. Its appearance was accused by its critics as being a “huge shed,” an “Internet start-up company,” an “aircraft carrier,” a “Howard Johnson’s of the future,” “atrocious” and “ugly,” but it would not be until construction for the Herzog & de Meuron designed de Young Museum was completed on October 15th 2005 that its critics would be silenced.

The de Young Museum and Golden Gate Park have a unique history, but unlike Renzo Piano’s design for the California Academy of Sciences building, which is sited across from the de Young Museum on the other side of the park, the Swiss architects decided to take a fresh new approach and relieved their selves of such historic constraints. The only similarities between the previous museum and the new one is that they share the same site. It is important to note this, because by ignoring the past and starting fresh, the new design for the de Young Museum becomes timeless. Timeless in that its presence suggest that it has always been and will always be. Entablatures, colonnades and pitched roofs have been omitted, suggesting that the structure is without influence from history and may in fact be a relic from prehistory. Herzog & de Meuron chose to ignore the history of the site in search of something greater, and they found it.

The de Young Museum is not as polished as a Zaha Hadid or Frank Gehry design, it is also not as flamboyant. The museum is a ruin by design, and is intentionally clumsy and graceful at the same time. The de Young Museum is a deceptively complex building. Deceptive, because at first glance the structure appears as a simple monolithic form. Like the stepped pyramids of Central America and the pagan temples of antiquity the de Young Museum consists of variable readings: From afar the form is simple, monumental and timeless, but as one approaches the structure the building’s ornamentation begins to reveal itself as the delicate details become apparent only when close to the structure. The structure is beautifully detailed and few exterior conditions are left unresolved. The de Young Museum is devoid of any kind of historic or contemporary style, and until one enters the interiors, it seems that Herzog & de Meuron have come very close to creating a building with the same kind of timelessness as a Louis I. Kahn building or a rare modern masterpiece.

Image 1: The simple forms rest upon the ground as if an extension of the landscape, suggesting that the de Young Museum has always been.

Photo Tour: Take a tour of the de Young Museum by viewing the photo gallery below:

Materiality, Texture and Pattern:

The copper rainscreen that sheaths the building is the result of an experimentation in using the technology of our time, to create an effect that is reminiscent of the craftsmanship and sensitivity to detail from the past. The mantra of Herzog & de Meuron is to focus on using common materials in an uncommon way. There is no finer example of this than the de Young Museum. Regardless of whether you ‘like’ the design or not, there are few structures in the world that come close to such an orchestration of a singular material in the design of a building’s skin. The skin of the building is impressive because of the technique used by Herzog & de Meuron and their ability to come up with a unique language for a singular material, which is not only beautiful, but resolves nearly all of the museum’s needs.

It is impossible to discuss the texture of the facades of the de Young Museum without talking about pattern, the two are beautifully merged together creating a surface that appears to be disintegrating right before our very eyes. Although the structure appears to be disintegrating, the concept behind the design of the exterior was to create a skin with many layers that would manipulate light similar to natural occurrences in nature. The idea for the texture and patterning of the copper skin came from Jacques Herzog on a site visit he took pictures in Golden Gate Park of the effect of sunlight filtering through the leafy trees of the park. This effect is successfully realized in the built structure, and is evident when viewing the building from virtually any vantage point.

The construction of the building is nothing short of a construction marvel. A computerized engineering system enabled the 7,602 panels that make up the skin to be individually cut, punched and embossed. A total of 950,000 pounds of copper was used, making it the largest copper-clad building in the world, which presents many environmental problems left unaddressed by the designers, which is discussed below. Another problem with the design of the copper structure is that the canopy that was meant to cover the outdoor cafe, leaks copper dust and tainted copper runoff onto patron’s food and cafe furniture. A permanent temporary structure has been placed under the canopy, and serves as a blemish on the structure’s exterior, see photo gallery.

Diagramming de Young:

Although the structure appears simplistic, one begins to understand that the simple moves that are executed in the design are embedded with information that may not be apparent at first glance. The structure can be reduced to two primary elements, vertical and horizontal. The horizontal responds to the order of the park and the gridded system that remains dominant from 1894, which is represented in Diagram 1 by cooler colors. The vertical rises out of the order of the past, but responds to the larger order of the city grid, represented by warmer colors, because the 144 ft tower connects the museum to the larger context of the city. The simple architectural tactic of twisting the tower to align the two orders is an example of the amount of skill used by Herzog & de Meuron in the building’s finite ornamentation. The twist aligns the tower’s upper floors with the San Francisco street grid, visually locking the design into the distant skyline. The courtyards serve both to bring the park into the museum and to assist with wayfinding.

Diagram 1: The order of the plan for the California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894 and the order of the city are resolved by the simple twisting of the tower, which ornaments this connection. There is something poetic about the major move of the structure connecting the park to the city. The red lines correspond to the overall city grid of San Francisco, and the blue lines respond to the regulating lines of the park. From afar the tower appears to be conforming to the city, and when viewing the museum up close it appears to conform to the park, yet when park patrons look at the tower the influence of the city is present whether they know it or not.

Diagram 2: There are three primary circulation routes that connect one side of the park to the other. All of these paths terminate into the de Young Museum, but what is interesting is that the de Young Museum aligns with the outer edge of the eastern axis, while the terminating paths appear at first glance to be random. The positioning of the museum becomes clearer in Diagram 4.

Diagram 3: The fissures that are highlighted in red, are used to denote entry points into the museum. The fissures breakup the southwestern and northeastern facades into a tripartite arrangement, and where the masses are separated nature is allowed to flow into the building, and at other times create large than life terrarreums. The museum reads as if a solid mass that is being eroded away, and at others it reads as if three solid masses that flow in and out of eachother. Regardless of the reading, the ordering lines that shape the mass do not flow into the site, and in plan the structure appears rigid and confined. If the building were allowed to flow into the site, the same way nature is permitted to flow into the structure, the building would appear more harmonious with the site.

Diagram 4: The ordering system that controls the location of the building is highly sophisticated. The order of the city at the macro level is the key controlling factor in the twisted position of the observation tower, as depicted in Diagram 1. The tower itself is controlled by multiple complex relationships on the site, which are not apparent at first glance, see Diagram 2. Rather than forcing the building to accept the order of the existing plaza, Herzog & de Meuron manipulate the the existing order with a very creative solution. The three primary routes of circulation that connect one side of the park to the other, are denied, the designer of the park places an emphasis on the perpendicular axis with the placement of three circular courts. Herzog & de Meuron use the circular courts as points of reference. The centroid of the tower is triangulated by transposing a line parallel to the city grid and one parallel to the park grid on the two subordinate circular courts. The intersection of these two transposed lines is the centroid of the tower, again the tower connects the city to the park. The regulating line parallel to the city grid, becomes the main axis of the museum. The procession along this axis takes a visitor into the interior yet exterior entry court, then through the main entry doors, where patrons are greated by the ticketing counter, and are then given the option to buy a ticket and view the musuem or bipass the ticketing counter and head directly to the heart of the tower.

There is yet another regulating line that controls the placement of the structure, and that is the transposed line that is projected outward from the central circular court. When traveling along this route toward the de Young Museum there is a point at which the regulating lines intersect, which happens to be where the entry pad is located and along the sidewalk that flanks the street.

Diagram 5: The copper roof is highly visible from the de Young Museum’s observation tower. Herzog & de Meuron wisely chose to design the roof in a way that is consistant with the rest of the museum. The seams of the copper roof create an interesting pattern, which evokes images of a terrain or a topographic survey,the lines suggest that the building emerged from the site. Unfortunately these roof contours do not engage the site, and end at the limits of the building. A series of horizontal lines continue in the front yard of the museum, but these lines do not engage the structure and are not as active as the lines that pattern the roof.

Diagram 6:The fissures that divide up the mass create courtyards, over-sized terrariums and also mark the entry points into the structure, but where these fissures end and the masses rejoin, Herzog & de Meuron have chosen to detail the same condition differently in each case.

This clever manipulation of reference points and regulating lines continues throughout the structure, and if permitted more time I would love to analyze the structure further producing even more diagrams, but I am afraid I that must come at a later date or I’ll never finish this article. For more information, diagrams and photos, I strongly recommend reading: The de Young in the 21st Century: A Museum by Herzog & de Meuron. Although the design is beautiful, that is only the first part of the article. The rest of the article deals with the sustainable issues associated with using copper in architectural design, specifically at the de Young Museum, where the quantity of copper used is unprecedented.

The Copper Killer:

If Renzo Piano’s Academy of Sciences building is one of the most sustainable structures in San Francisco, then the de Young Museum by Herzog & de Meuron is one of the most anti-sustainable buildings in San Francisco. Ironically the two structures sit directly across from each other. What makes a building anti-sustainable? Anti-sustainable buildings are structures which are poisoning the environment, not in the same way that many treehuggers argue that all modern buildings do, but anti-sustainable structures are super polluters that are far more dangerous than their sustainable counterparts are good.

The most beautiful feature of the de Young Museum is its copper skin, is also its most deadly. Copper runoff is a significant problem in cities like Palo Alto and San Francisco. Palo Alto has completed a significant amount of research on the topic of copper runoff, and this research will be used as a basis for determining the amount of copper runoff created by the de Young Museum. Since Palo Alto is only 30 miles away from San Francisco, it should be sufficient in illustrating the magnitude of the problem caused by Herzog & de Meuron’s design for the de Young Museum.

Copper runoff is such a severe problem in Palo Alto that an in January of 2003, Palo Alto issued an Ordinance that Prohibits Copper Roofing Materials. Below are two of the most interesting facts found in the document:

The amount of copper released per year from copper roofs in the RWQCP (Regional Water Quality Control Plant) service area is estimated to be greater than the annual industrial copper discharges to the RWQCP.

An incremental increase of 1000 square feet of copper roofing can lead to, by itself, a copper concentration in a creek during an average rainfall that equals the chronic toxicity criteria established by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The above ordinance references a document entitled Architectural Uses of Copper: An Evaluation of Storm Water Pollution Loads and BMPs. This document discusses the results of a study that examines the impact of copper on stormwater pollution. The study was completed by the City of Palo Alto’s Regional Water Quality Control Plant. In this study it is found that approximately .1 grams of copper is released per year, per square foot of copper roofing in the Palo Alto area, which I reverse engineered from the examples in Exhibit 13 of the Architectural Uses of Copper document. Exhibit 14 of the Architectural Uses of Copper document also estimates that approximately 298 lbs of copper are released from roofs, gutters, and downspouts in the Palo Alto RWQCP service area each year.

.1 grams of copper runoff per year, per square foot of copper does not sound like a large amount of copper, but wait until you see how much copper Herzog & de Meuron actually used. Copper is used everywhere by Herzog & de Meuron, covering a roof area of around 139,930 sf, this number is significantly less than the façade which is composed of approximately 193,750 sf of copper. That is a total of 333,680 sf of copper! Why is this number so important? Copper runoff is a function of rainfall and surface area of copper. Using the data from Exhibit 13 this equates to 33, 368 grams of copper runoff per year or 73.5 lbs of copper runoff per year! The de Young Museum accounts for 25% of the copper pollution of all of Palo Alto, which is a truly frightening statistic. The above numbers for roof and façade copper coverage were taken from the de Young Museum project profile on the TECU website. Currently there is no system in place to remove copper from the runoff before it is discharged into the environment.

Copper and the Environment:

Water runoff from copper surfaces should not be a deterrent from using copper in your designs, and there are a number of strategies outlined in the document entitled Architectural Uses of Copper, but what remains unknown is the ability of vegetation to permanently capture copper from runoff over time. It is well documented that other harmful metals like lead remain in the soils that absorbs its runoff for many years. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) warns that structures with exterior surfaces that were sealed with lead paint have contaminated the adjacent soils and that the only way to correct the problem is through remediation. The same is also true of soils that contain high concentrations of copper. Ingesting large quantities of copper can have serious health problems. One of the best websites that I have found on the internet that outlines the effects and issues associated with copper toxicity in drinking water is found in an outline for a course at Guilford College. Another valuable document distributed by the EPA is the Lead and Copper Rule: A Quick Reference Guide, which outlines health complications caused by copper exposure and serves as a quick reference for exposure levels that can be harmful.

Location & Contact Information:

If you ever find yourself in the San Francisco area, this is a must see structure. Don’t forget to check the website for Free Museum Days.

Golden Gate Park
50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive
San Francisco, CA 94118
Telephone: (415) 750-3600

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References:
Books referenced for this publication that document the architecture of Herzog & de Meuron

Herzog & de Meuron Architekten:

Unless you have been living in a cave somewhere in Afghanistan for the past ten years, it is likely that you are familiar with the architecture of Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron. Herzog & de Meuron are the design principals and creative forces behind the architectural firm Herzog & de Meuron Architekten. The architecture of Herzog and de Meuron has drastically evolved since the completion of the Tate Modern renovation in 2000, which proved to be a defining work in their careers and lead to the duo’s international fame. Herzog & de Meuron’s work has evolved in parallel with their fame. Their sensitivity to architectural context has evolved to respond not just to the built environment of a building’s site, but to social, cultural and experiential contexts as well. Their architectural forms are the result of process and function, and not influenced by style or a heavy handed design signature.

In the beginning their architecture possessed a high degree of sensitivity to context, and their design intervention was barely perceptible from project to project. The new merged with the old seamlessly.  Current Herzog & de Meuron projects respond to their context in a different manner. The design for 1111 Lincoln Road clearly delineates old from new, however the project favors other contextual relationships instead. 1111 Lincoln Road can only exist in South Beach, although its form is foreign in appearance, it is derived from social, cultural and functional contexts, not architectural.

The evolution of Herzog & de Meuron’s work is what makes following their career exciting. It is rare for an architect to discover a process that leads to fame and success, but it is even rarer for a firm to reinvent their approach after finding fame, and the public loving them more for it.

Photo Gallery:

Tate Modern:

Prior to the completion of the Tate Modern by Herzog & de Meuron in 2000, a competition was held in order to find a solution for renovating the old power station. Herzog & de Meuron’s proposal was selected for its sensitivity and preservation of the existing structure. The details and forms generated all seem to respond to the existing spaces, and make the building and experience better with their addition. Now I am not going to delve deep into an analysis of the Tate Modern, but only want to note that the project represents an example of a similar project to 1111 Lincoln Road, but was completed earlier in Herzog & de Meuron’s career. Like the Tate Modern, 1111 Lincoln Road is an addition/adaptive reuse project, the context is historic, and the site is highly public, yet the architects provide a solution for 1111 Lincoln Road and Tate Modern using two completely different approaches.

Context: Do, or do not. There is no blending.

I have always been a firm believer that if you are designing a new building on a campus or in a historic district that there are only two ways of approaching such a problem. You either need to design a building in the historic style of the context, or you need to design a structure that clearly indicates that it is of a different style or time period. I hate blending, and I hate architects that cannot commit. It seems that many architects try to blend existing styles with new styles when adding onto existing structures, and never commit to taking a do or do not approach. Without a do or do not approach, the new and old architectures are compromised, and the final product becomes a muddled mess. An anti-blending approach does not mean that the new structure should not complement the existing. This also does not mean that the new structure should not respond to existing orders or structures, on or adjacent to the site. Whig Hall by Charles Gwathmey is a excellent example of an addition to an existing historic structure, some might call this blending, but I strongly disagree. When analyzing the form of Whig Hall, it becomes quite clear which parts of the structure are new and pre-existing. The structure as it stands today is more exciting and actually better, because of Gwathmey’s design for the addition. Whig Hall is an example of an addition in a different style than the original structure. The new responds to the existing orders and constraints of the preexisting structure, and is again similar to the problem solved by Herzog & de Meuron in their design of the Tate Modern. (See the slide show above for reference photo of Whig Hall and Tate Modern).

Herzog & de Meuron are taking the do not approach to a completely different level in their design for 1111 Lincoln Road. Rather than create a design that denounces the existing historic context, yet still in response to the existing architectural orders, they completely denounce everything that has to do with the existing historic context and order. There can be no confusion between new and old when visiting 1111 Lincoln Road.

1111 Lincoln Road:

1111 Lincoln Road is part of an addition and upgrade to the existing SunTrust office building, which is a Brutalist concrete relic from Miami’s modern past. At first glance, 1111 Lincoln Road looks like a new museum or a swanky new condo building just beginning construction, but in reality the structure is nearly complete. The site sits along South Beach’s popular Lincoln Mall, which is a pedestrian friendly avenue for shopping, food, drink, entertainment, and now parking.

(text under revision)

office space

Herzog & de Meuron have managed to create an architectural form which is instilled with the spirit of Miami’s South Beach with their design for 1111 Lincoln Road. The automobile is an undeniable symbol of status and wealth in America. The display of status and wealth is the whole reason Miami and the Art Deco style exists. Miami in its boom could be equated to the Dubai of the 1920′s. What car do you drive? How much money do you make? What designer labels are on your clothes? This is the culture of Miami and these are the things that matter. The Art Deco style in Miami was the result of the wealthy searching for a means to displaying their wealth in the homes that they lived in. Herzog & de Meuron understand this, and create both a monument to the automobile and a billboard for wealth. The garage is a stage for the celebutantes of South Beach to display their wealth and gain the attention of tourist that visit the mall. The structure is undeniably South Beach.

Outside of their response to context, Herzog & de Meuron did do a few things that went against standard norms for parking structures. An interesting detail is the treatment of the striping in the garage. It appears in the renderings that the concrete will be painted white, while the striping is black. Another interesting formal gesture is the vertical rhythm of the parking garage. Typically, parking garages are repetitive vertically, featuring a consistent vertical ten foot rhythm. Herzog & de Meuron were granted the luxury of exploiting the verticality of the parking structure and create a garage unlike any other.

If I had to sum up the design of the structure with two words it would be contrast and juxtaposition. The structure contrasts with nearly every element on the site, and the angular forms and geometries serve as a nice juxtaposition against the curves of the automobiles and the Art Deco buildings. 1111 Lincoln Road is an example of a mundane building typology, reexamined with a fresh set of eyes. For more information about this project, check out the 1111 Lincoln Road Blog.

On a side note I read a review on Eikonographia, and the author questioned why Herzog & de Meuron did not place the garage below ground.  I found the comment to be funny because unlike other cities found around the world, Miami is built on a swamp, which means that the water table is very high and that you will find few basements or underground parking structures in Miami or Florida for that matter.

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