ArchiCritic: L’Enfant Plaza
21 09 2009Everyone has an opinion on architecture, what’s yours?
By Spencer Lepler
To call The Promenade at L’Enfant Plaza a mall is insulting to such high class institutions as Crystal City Mall and the former SW Waterfront Mall. This pseudo-subterranean plaza is little more than an access corridor filled with federal works rushing between federal buildings, a hotel and the metro.
The architecture might have once been somewhat pleasant, with its gleaming metal band running above the storefronts and decorative marble floors throughout. This was obviously a step up from the white featureless corridors of most government office buildings.
Now the Promenade is just depressing and foreboding; the low ceilings create a dark cramped space which is only opened up in one of the two areas of any architectural interest inside the whole complex, the pyramid (pictured). This large glass skylight is the only place where natural light is brought into the system save for the exterior exits and as such it is one of the few places people linger.
Yet this is a missed opportunity…
Instead of providing benches and tables for patrons to sit, eat and socialize, there is a series of abstracted cubes which are arranges so that they provide just enough space for one person to sit and not be engaged with their neighbors. The other element of architectural interest may have very well been an accident; there is a structural bracing element underneath the hotel which has been converted into a display case. This sudden separation of the corridor into two small walkways separated by a glass wall is surprisingly pleasant.
As far as commercial opportunities go, they are rare. Many of the storefronts are papered over and of those that have tenants at least two had store closing specials advertised. It could be argued that the main anchors to this plaza are Dress Barn, Radio Shack and a United States Post Office branch, which is quite possibly the only time any of these stores has served as anchors. The only nonfood establishment that I saw with a significant amount of customers when I was there around noon on a Thursday was the newsstand outside the metro entrance where Powerball tickets are sold. There was a queue here 10 persons deep.
There is one area where The Promenade is definitely vibrant; lunch only fast food joints. There are a sea of pay by the pound buffet line, a McDonald’s, an Au Bon Pain and a coffee shop. Amongst the multitudes of closed storefronts there appears to have at one time been a Chinese restaurant, but it apparently could not compete with the fast food options. What disturbed me the most was that while each of the buffet lines looked essentially the same, with piles of sticky greasy food of undeterminable ethnic origin all for the low price of $5.95 per lb., they were incredibly busy. In contrast, the newly renovated clean, light and airy Department of Energy cafeteria, which is open to the public and has a series of very attractive buffet lines and to order stations, is not more than a block and a half away and most likely workable into these patrons schedules.
I am really tempted to say that The Promenade at L’Enfant Plaza is beyond hope, but I do have hope. As the often repeated adage goes “start with what you know” and The Promenade at L’Enfant Plaza knows that its a popular destination for the office lunch crowd. With that in mind, The Promenade should rebrand themselves as the downtown Southwest destination for lunch on the go. This would need a renovation which makes the place more inviting by bringing in more natural light, improving the perceived proportions of the space, providing some public space where patrons could socialize while eating their lunch and introducing some green plants. In addition, this space seems ripe for the possibility of a small greengrocer and purveyor of packaged meals, something like a Dean and Deluca or Balducci’s. The crowds that flock here for lunch could use a store like this to shop for groceries and a ready made dinner before heading to the Metro for their afternoon commute. In addition, this could provide an easy to access grocery store for the guests in the hotel above. While it may never be a mall, with some careful planning and aggressive rebranding I really believe that The Promenade at L’Enfant Plaza could be a successful food court and upscale corner store.
Spencer Lepler is an architectural designer nearing the end of the architecture licensing process who has lived in Northern Virginia since 2005. He posts on here and on a semi-regular basis to his blog – selophane.com; he can also be found as a contributing writer on greatergreaterwashington.org. In addition to writing he has a design studio with fellow DC area designer Andrew Merlo – studioSML.com and is on the executive board of Dominion Stage. You can follow him on twitter @selophane and @studioSML.
Another depressing example of what Brutalist architecture does to socialization.
While there at it, tear down the whole thing. Completely anti urban, hostile, and ugly.
Thayer, I’m not sure if you noticed, but he was rather explicitly trying to figure out ways to make the structure work without having to demolish it.
I think there is a starkly quiet beauty to brutalist gems like L’Enfant Plaza, HUD, HHS, The way light and shadow play off the deeply recessed windows, and the brise-soleil sun screens are such a contrast to the glass the whole thing trend of the moment(perhaps in time it too will earn preservation minded fans ; “the LEED inpired turn of the century multi-glazed look”) . I suspect(hope) in time Brutalism will be appreciated much the way love is now lavished on the aesthetically atrocious but charming Old Executive Office building.
I do agree that some sensitive interventions should be done to enliven the place. Human scale landscaping and more interaction between plaza and promenade would be desirable without sacrificing the somber monumentality.
Washington has so many neighboorhoods that reflect the spirit of the time in which they were built, and the city is large enough to preserve and adapt the best examples of each era. The same mentality that in the past has lobbied for the razing of beloved structures like the Old executive office building, The Old Post office, and Union Station comes around against Brutalism.
JD, I had noticed. Thanks for clarifying that point to others though. I’m not sure the complex can ever truly “work”, so if throwing good money after bad is the strategy, I wish them lots of luck. IMHO, “careful planning and aggressive rebranding” will never change the overall design, which is the real problem.
I’m not a fan of SW in general (from 395 north to the Mall) and L’Enfant Plaza solidifies my negative impression of the area. The original city grid has been shreded beyond repair (C, D, and E Streets SW all are blocked by something and VA and MD Avenues SW are train tracks) and the massive Department of Energy building looms over Independence Avenue and wrecks 10th Street (don’t even get me started on 9th St). Then you come to L’Enfant Plaza which doesn’t fit … low ceilings, no natural light, nothing open after business hours. It should be a desitnation (VRE, FOUR metro lines) but it’s not.
The feeling of the entire area is garbled streets and freeway overpasses. I’d like to see everything taken out, the grid restored, and start over from scratch. Can’t be any worse than when they gutted it the first time…
Another pointto consider is how the structure only caters to those who are to the North of the structure completely cutting off SW, there aren’t even any entrances tothe underground on the south side. This has always led me to believe it was only designed with the office workers in mind not those that are around the complex.
I’m no fan of brutalism, but I do love the HUD building. On a crisp winter day, the light really evokes that space odyssey vibe. Throw in a Bjork track and I’m in heaven.
Destroying SW to redo it over again is the same sin that was already committed, just because it happened before doesnt make it good policy. Alterations can be made to address the faults while still preserving the elements that work.
L’Enfant Promenade (the grand avenue) was meant to connect the DOE with a new national aquarium located across a “Ponte Vecchio” that would connect Banneker Park to East Potomac Park. The plans were always to weave the various elements together, but somewhere along the line big plans became a faux pas, or reality set in or the winds changed(take your pick) and the project stalled out.
My argument isnt in favor of L’Enfant plaza style planning for the present so much as a respect for, and a preservation minded rehabilatation of it, as an artifact, and because the city is large enough to allow a pluarlism, a diversity of architectural form. It is representative of a particular time and place; this is the Architectural expression of the “New Frontier”, the “Great Society”, and should stand in esteem alongside the Mc Millan Beaux-Art Classicism, or even the Steamboat Gothic of Reconstruction. At mid 20th century this is how they “built for the ages”.
Besides in many ways the Metro is the connective tisssue between seemingly disparate neighborhoods, and certainly was a factor when alot of this was planned.
“Destroying SW to redo it over again is the same sin that was already committed, just because it happened before doesnt make it good policy” While I agree with that in general, I don’t think L’Enfant Plaza and all of SW is equivalent to the original fabric that was torn down. It’s like saying a sit-in protest is equivalent to a riot. Both may be forms of political protest, but one is much mor injurious than the other.
One dosen’t have to take the reaction so many have to brutalism, rather just read the intention of one of Brutalism’s originators, LeCorbusier. He was anti-street, anti-city, and anti-human in his own words. That has nothing to do with the City Beautiful period when beauty was so important as a goal they put it in the name. That’s not to say people won’t have real affection for these buildings, only that it’s nonsensical to equate this period in architecture with others in terms of goals.
I wouldnt say it is nonsensical. The Radiant City movement was not meant to be anti-human, it meant to seperate functions in an attempt to create a new form of urbanism, one rooted in the use of technology to create a (presumably improved) new way of life. In that regard it is completely comparable to other periods of architecture.
If it failed it was because the goals changed(now we value streetlife), but at mid-century it was believed desirable to seperate the automobile from the pedestrian. The city was percieved as dark, polluted, crowded. Stark stand alone skyscrapers were an attempt to alleviate the dark canyons of highrises built adjacent to each other. The infill spaces were meant to be parkland(as demonstrated in the more successful SW residential areas.)
City Beautiful was more about imposing exteriors and overbaring axes than it was about creating places for people. Most city beautiful buildings are government or transportation related; if the contribute to the streetlife it is because they were adapted to do so later. They often suffer from the same architectural disconnects as modernism- they are seperated from the street by imposing staircases, often their first floors are solid, rusticated bases with little opportunity for storefronts. The difference is they are clothed in the garb of 2000 years ago which grants them a legitimacy in most people’s eyes not to be found by slabs of concrete.
As someone who works in L’Enfant plaza (6+ years), and commutes by foot to a 5-year old condo in SW, I have high, but guarded, hopes for the area. L’Enfant plaza in its current form is beyond hope; a truly depressing space to walk through daily, let alone find anything fresh or nutritional for lunch if you happen to not plan and bring one. As the author points out, six vendors will be going out of business this month – what business would even entertain opening up something new? I can’t imagine how thin the profit margins must be!
Unless some brilliant stroke of urban planning reshapes the area between L’Enfant Plaza and National Stadium south of 395, the area will continue to be marred by wasted space used primarily five days a week interspersed by low-income housing and the unfortunate affect that has on crimes of opportunity or vandalism. This would never happen in a European capitol city.
Man, if you think that all that separates the brutalist civic creations from the City Beautiful complexes, I don’t think we are going to agree on anything. And if you can’t even acknowledge the failures of the modernist era, how is one to move forward from there. Finally, don’t buy into every narrative some intellectual bully is shoving down your throat. “The city was percieved as dark, polluted, crowded”
Says who? People interested in tearing them down for their meglomaniacal visions? People don’t change that much from generation to generation, even my clothing is a garb from the 1920′s. Tres chique, non?
It was always destined for greatness, but always failed:
As initially planned, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts would have stood at the end of L’Enfant Promenade where Banneker Circle currently stands. The Kennedy Center would then be the anchor for the development of a retail corridor along L’Enfant Promenade. However, the project’s main developer, William Zeckendorf, filed for bankruptcy during the construction of the plaza, forcing the Kennedy Center’s sponsors to find a new location. (They ultimately found a site in the Foggy Bottom neighborhood, although the abrupt relocation delayed its planned opening by three years.)
The site containing Benjamin Banneker Circle and Park was proposed at various times to be the future location of a baseball stadium or of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. As a result, the D.C. Preservation League listed the park and circle as one of the most endangered places in the District of Columbia in 2004.[2] The stadium (Nationals Park) was later constructed in Southeast Washington. The museum will be built on the National Mall.
In addition the National Children’s Museum was supposed to be built in the Plaza, but that has now gone to the National Harbor.
You are probably right that we wont agree on anything, but I think you are misunderstanding me, I didnt say “The city was dark, crowded, etc.”, I said there was a perception at the time of that, and that is true. And the contemporary flight to the suburbs confirms that at the time many people wanted to escape the city to acheive some “light and air”. That was one reasoning behind these new forms that sought to displace the street wall, to bring light and air to the city.(I mention this becuase this is what they were trying to do at the time, I grant they created other problems) I think it is important to acknowledge it becuse it is often assumed that it was merely an excercise of the modernist Architect’s ego that resulted in these designs. And it implies that the the ecclectic Architects were somehow selfless in their designs and produced works of superior humanity. I suggest that was not neccesarily the case, their buildings can be as overpowering and imposing but are cloaked in a familiar vocabulary, Corbu and others sought to employ the principles of the past in new forms. I do reject that it was mere megalomania or somehow inherrently oppressive. “Megalomanic visions” is a subjective term, I mean City beautiful apes the forms of the Caesars, an arguement can be made that megalomaniacs were involved in that. And one could argue that the egos of McKim, Mead and White were on a par with Corbu.
One place where they were wrong was in suggesting that everything should be replaced with this(I have always thought Corbu replacing Paris with the Radiant City was more provacative than serious anyway) And in the 21 st century these artifacts can coexist alongside each other.
I think it is telling that no one goes around building Beaux Arts palais anymore either, in fact they do “sensitive” adaptaions that do not detract from the original artistic expression. For example, the Reagan building while successful planning is boring architecture, neither good modern nor good classicism, a flat version of the adjacent Federal Triangle. And the irony is it was done by some of the same people who did L’Enfant Plaza years before. But that’s okay because it respects the vision of the Federal Triangle.
I didnt say the Radiant City was the same/equivalent as the City beautiful movement, I was comparing the scope of their respective ambitions and their attempts to improve the built environment. And in that regard they are of similiar historical importance.
I do acknowledge the failures; I am arguing in favor of sensitive rehabilation, not new L’Enfant Plazas, and frankly I love City beautiful buildings as well, I don’t believe that to appreciate different approaches excludes any of them. My appreciation of “Brutalism” in no way detracts from my appreciation of neoclassicism. However I think it is important to evaluate any design/movement from their intent as well as ther success and failure, an inclusive examination, not merely an “enlightened” hindsight. What I object to is the defacto notion that neoclassicism is good and noble, modernism bad, I think an arguement can be made that it is more complicated than that and that you can recognize it’s deficiencies while appreciating and preserving it.
[...] public space more in need of a makeover than L’Enfant plaza. We have spent some time debating the short comings of the retail promenade in the past, and now it seems like our prayers are being answered. JBG companies is planning a $40 million [...]