“Oasis” Comes to Penn Quarter
13 03 2008Remember those demolition shots we showed you last month from the Penn Quarter on 10th and G Street NW? Well we just got these renderings from the folks at Cunningham and Quill showing us what will be built once the dust settles.
The architects call the building a hovering glass sanctuary in an urban oasis… but we call its a windowless street level design with zero street-facing retail. These type of designs can sometimes be block killers, which is a shame because we really like the upper part of the building. What do you think?
The building has 200,000 square feet of Class A office space as well as Church worship space for 300 congregants of the church that the building replaces. At least the design doesn’t block the windows of the MLK library next door! Another rendering after the jump…
[Photos:Cunningham/Quill]
When I first looked at the rendering, I thought the base of the building was part of the construction zone, I was wondering why they would include that in the rendering? Too bad, I like the rest of it.
glass brutalism?
When I see stuff like this I remember why I chose to study urban planning over architecture, despite the appeal of drawing and building models. Cool looking building, but would it have killed them to put in some retail?
Architects, repeat after me:
“I must not build ARTitecture.
ARTitecture is the block-killer…”
This is a pretty non-descript ugly building. While I agree with the block-killing windowless base comment I have to say that it is architecturally much more interesting than the top and that’s bc they’re being done by different architects. The upper part clearly being just a mass produced big box of blah.
You can’t dismiss that the lower part is a church and that churches are not necessarily block killers. They can also engage the public realm. Not everything needs to be a starbucks or La tasca to reach the public.
I hope.
oops and I forgot…
Dear urban planner. give us architects some credit. Just like Urban planners there are good and bad. Architects weren’t the ones who built huge freeways cutting through our cities in the middle of the century, were they? ; )
Fair play, galmeida.
Although I would argue that most planners this generation, myself included idolize Jane Jacobs more than Robert Moses. Death and Life of American Cities was the book that made me want to be planner. Kind of ironic, since technically Moses was the planner and Jacobs the activist.
So yes, in 1950 it was all about putting highways through cities. Times change…now its all about putting bike lanes through them
[…] room if this rendering is fully realized. While many people have called the building “a windowless street level design with zero street-facing retail” we must say at least it’s going to have some nice […]
The building is cool in that seems to be hovering above its base, but otherwise, I’m worried that DC is getting too many big, glass box buildings. So much of DC’s historic architecture has ornate details, but it seems that half the new buildings being built are just boring boxes. Glass can pop out in some circustamstances, but let’s get a bit more creative!
[…] and street traffic in the evenings. However during the day they can be viewed as block killers, no different than the huge condo and office buildings that have no street retail which are generally […]
[…] the new building going in next to the MLK library in Penn Quarter that we dubbed a “windowless street level design with zero street-facing retail?” Well the foundation has been dug and the site is ready for vertical construction to get […]
[…] have spent considerable time on this site rallying against any and all new projects that have potential to be block killers, but something we haven’t spent much time on is the buildings out there that already are […]
[…] Quarter - New office planed for 10th and G Street (pictured left) is having trouble securing a tenant and the project has been put on hold. […]
This is another (all too common) example these days of a developer knocking down a significant piece of architecture - and then running into problems securing money to rebuild. So you are left with an empty lot until the econmomy turns around.
The old church on this site, and the pretty fabulous building at K and Connecticut, are now gone - to be repalced with empty lots for the forseeable future. That is a crime. What’s also a crime is that the church that was demolished has no permanent home for the time being, and the soup kitchen in its basement that served the local (and now growing) homeless population has been lost.
Developers should have to prove that they have construction financing nailed down before they should be granted a demolishion permit. Now, who knows what will actually get built on those sites? Parking lots for now, I’d bet.
[…] It looks like the “oasis” design that we love so much (sarcastic) wasn’t the only idea in town when the architects Cunningham | Quill were designing the new building for 10th and G St. There were over 12 different form models, some of which look fairly tame compared to the final design they ended up going with. […]