Greenfire Reveals New Design for Geer Building Site that Retains Historic Storefronts
Talk of Greenfire's new design for the Geer Building site has been swirling around downtown for about a month now, but Kevin has posted renderings on the new design on his site. You can read more details about the development at his site.
Kudos to Greenfire for rethinking plans to demolish 120-122 West Main St. and 119 Parrish St. to build a large office tower. The new renderings show that at least the facades of the buildings appear to have been retained, and the street-level mass of these buildings is extended to the west by new 'storefront' construction. Thus the architectural fabric of downtown Durham is reinforced, rather than further diminished.
Looking northeast from Corcoran and West Main.
(Courtesy Bull City Rising)
Looking southeast from Corcoran between W. Parrish and E Chapel Hill.
(Courtesy Bull City Rising)
Looking southeast at the 100 West Parrish St. storefronts from W. Parrish and Corcoran.
(Courtesy Bull City Rising)
It's always very hard to tell with these multi-angled modernist structures how they are going to 'fit' based on the renderings. I'm impressed with the general plan, though - create urban height and mass, while also paying very close attention to the pedestrian-scale form and activity.
I'm struck, actually, how much it reminds me of a modern form of the Washington Duke Hotel, once one of Durham's signature architectural buildings that stood diagonally opposite the location of this new structure across the West Parrish and Corcoran intersection. (The original design of that building, anyway - the 60s saw an unfortunate bricking-in of the base of the building, eliminating the storefronts.) I'm impressed by the marriage of 'what works' with a creative aesthetic in a form that echos Durham's own architectural history.
I somewhat doubt that they will retain the entirety of the 120-122 West Main and 119 West Parrish buildings. To an extent, it becomes an exercise in futility to fight over the middle-of-the-block masonry of a structure gutted by fire. I do think 122 West Main is in better shape than the other contiguous structure, and I hope they'll be able to retain some of the original architectural elements. Given the condition and the persistent teetering-on-the-edge-of-demolition with these structures, if we can retain/repair the facades and a decent portion of the remainder of the building, I'm frankly relieved.
While I could quibble with aspects of the design that wouldn't be my preference, I think the rendering shows a very impressive balance between what Greenfire needs to build in order to attract tenants, historic preservation concerns, and urban planning/streetscape concerns. If anyone actually thought that my objections to Greenfire's previous plans had something to do with my day job, it didn't; this is the kind of change I was hoping for. I very much hope they succeed with this.
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15 comments:
I'm not a fan of Big Shiney Cubes construction, but this building design is (surprisingly) pleasing.
I was probably too harsh on it in the comments at Kevin's, but I still say it looks like a building aiming for LEED certification, but with all of the solar aspects pointing the wrong direction. At the very least, the artist's renderings are pretty ridiculous with the sun shining from the north.
I think this is a good design, I am all for keeping the historic storefronts, I think it actually adds to the charm.
Michael,
If you're looking northeast from Corcoran and Main, what you are seeing is the southwest side of the building. No?
John
John,
I presume the first image is supposed to be night time. Look at the other two. The second shot is, unless I'm extremely mistaken, taken looking from the CCB/Sun Trust plaza, fairly close to the bull. That should be looking roughly southwest across the Parrish/Corcoran intersection. Parrish runs parallel to Main, going roughly WNW-ESE. The upper wall with the sun glare on it, therefore, should be facing roughly due north. In other words, it should never see any sunshine at all. Look also at the shadow on the Self-Help building in the background across Main St. Now look at the second image -- the south side of Parrish St. -- with all north facing walls, is lit up with bright sunshine.
Now, again, I could dismiss this as just a confused renderer (and that alone is enough to give me a chuckle). But look at some core architectural elements. On the north side of the building, a secondary glass curtain wall is set out from the fourth to sixth stories -- in the second picture, this extends about 10 feet or so past the corner of the building. I've only ever seen this as a "green building" technique to prevent high solar loading and an internal greenhouse effect. You put a second wall of treated glass out from the structural curtain wall, where the sun will hit during the hottest part of the day. But why on earth would you put that on your north-facing wall? Finally, look at the third picture again -- there's a section of glass that's set out from the rest, with some sort of rounded, clear plastic tubing at the bottom. Now, this could be a lot of things, but to me it looks like either a solar air pre-heater or a solar water feature. BUT WHAT THE HECK IS DOING ON THE NORTH-FACING WALL?!?!
Again, I could be wrong about this, and since everyone else seems to like the design, I'm not going to make much of a fuss. But at the very least, the sun is in the wrong place in these renderings, and at the worst, the whole building was designed by an architect with some cool ideas but the map turned upside down.
>>The second shot is, unless I'm extremely mistaken, taken looking from the CCB/Sun Trust plaza, fairly close to the bull. That should be looking roughly southwest across the Parrish/Corcoran intersection. <<
Nope, that should be looking southEAST.
I haven't tried to put the pictures together. That building is way too complicated for me to figure which end is up. I'm just going by the captions. In the first picture if you are at the corner of Main and Corcoran LOOKING northeast, then the building facing you is facing southwest.
>>Parrish runs parallel to Main, going roughly WNW-ESE. The upper wall with the sun glare on it, therefore, should be facing roughly due north.<<
That's not the Parrish St. side. That's the Main St. side.
The glass wall in the second image does face north, on the West Parrish Street side. I actually think the sun glare on the eastern portion of this face wouldn't be erroneous for early morning, particularly in the wintertime. Having become a bit of an observer regarding when the sun hits certain buildings, you can notice at certain times of year that the morning sun does illuminate the north sides of the buildings on Parrish and Main St., because of the way the sun rises towards a low angle in the sky. (I'm no expert on this, but it happens.) So the sun on the Parrish St. buildings and on the eastern portion of the north face, for a an early morning shot, seem fine. I don't see how the western portion of the face would be illuminated if it were angled away from Parrish St., though.
The first shot seems correct to me for a sunset, illuminating the west-southwest side of the building.
GK
I guess some people need more to do with their time. Nit picking about shadows in a drawing seems like you are looking for something wrong to complain about and if that's all you have I say GREAT JOB GREENFIRE! Let's get the ball rolling.
Frankly, I think this design looks like a contemporary update of the Washington Duke Motel, what with the rectangular light green facade pieces and the "bent rectangular" upper floors footprint. [Sorry, I don't know the technical terms for any of these elements!]
Preservation Durham's John Compton mentioned tonight that the service entrance for the building will be located on the Main Street side, and the primary entrance on the Parrish Street side -- which helps support the revitalization of the latter. And a logical choice if the Parrish Street Museum is placed in this structure.
Hey, lay off, anon! This is what you do when you get a degree in geography!
(And John, I actually meant southeast. Too much direction typing.)
Gary, you could be right about the early morning, but as I pointed out on Kevin's blog, on the view of the Parrish St. streetscape, there shadows in that shot are pointing due south, which doesn't happen. (And John, look again -- that's the Parrish St. side pretty clearly.)
And yes, I realize that I'm making a bunch of noise about a largely irrelevant issue. Well, sue me.
Michael,
I never even noticed the sun in the second picture until after my second post. Of course, #2 is Parrish St. I was always talking about the great ball of fire reflected in picture #1.
And don't apologize to that umbrageous anon. Frankly I think it's fun to drive people like him nuts. So I might as well put a little more wormwood in his wine. Like Gary, I'm glad they are preserving the traditional storefronts, but that said, the total effect is odd: like wearing black wingtips with bermuda shorts. To my eyes, the ground floors and the upper levels don't harmonize very well.
Maybe in reality it won't seem so stark. One can hope.
John
While wholeheartedly a fan of the function of DPAC and the new "Intermodal" Transit Facility, I am not a fan of glass boxes with strange angles and cantilevers. These buildings are going to look as dated as the FirstSouth Bank, Self Help Credit Union, former Duke Power Collection Center, Durham Center and others in just a few years.
Why not use some of the elements from the storefronts being saved on the building itself?
I applaud Greenfire for taking this approach, although I remember some Herald Sun editorials suggesting they do so after they announced plans to raze... so can't give them total credit here!
lwn
Worrying about whether these glass buildings will look dated or not hardly seems to be the point. Almost every building looks dated at some point in history. And if it's allowed to stay intact, it's often later lauded.
I'm not saying Greenfire shouldn't strive to build a "timeless" building. But if that doesn't happen, I'll be happy with a building that will last, is energy efficient, preserves the historic character of its neighbors, and is the proper scale for its location. I have no idea about the first two items, but I think it does a pretty good job with the last two and it's by no means a hideous design in my opinion.
Ask me again in 40 years and I might have a different opinion. And I might even find the FirstSouth building attractive 40 years from now...
NOOO! Way too ugly! Why not reuse the beautiful metal casement windows from University Apartments???
I'm not sure if a larger image of this exists online, the scale looks a little large to me.. but not out of the question.
The concerns I have revolve around the lack of any residential and parking.
Downtown needs more residential (affordable) to have an impact on the vibrancy and safety we all want. Projects that are exclusively office space yield a 6pm ghost town.. Ok there will be some improvement from those going to dinner but not like residents would have IMHO.
I also question the parking solution. From what I can tell, the primary solution relies on expanding parking availability at the East Chapel Hill St. lot. If memory serves me, this is part of the big Greenfire plan and includes even more office and some residential. When you count the existing parking on that site, add space for this office tower and space for whatever is proposed for East Chapel Hill St. and you are talking a massive building. It my view it will overload that site and have a negative impact on that area.
Given the interdependence of these large projects, I certainly hope the city doesn't approve one without clarity on how the others fit into the big picture.
Certainly a smaller structure could be built on the old Woolworth site that supports it's own parking needs.
If the decision is to proceed, then the projects need to be sequenced such that parking is addressed first to avoid impacting existing businesses.
I would much prefer that the City owns the parking problem and ensures there is balance across the city for available options. I don't think ECH can be the main solution. Parking is arguably a utility that any city needs to provide to facilitate growth.
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