Comment 65929

By Undustrial (registered) - website | Posted July 09, 2011 at 23:30:56

I've been in 100 Main more times than I can count for work, and it's definitely showing many of the signs of ageing that were commonplace in City Hall before the renovations.

What stands out far more than any actual form of decay is how out-of-time the building looks. It's a shining example of 60s/70s public architecture, and what seemed delightfully futuristic at the time now appears a little dated. This is a trend which has only gotten far worse since structures like 100 Main were built, with each successive generation of buildings attempting to redefine architectural aesthetics, leaving buildings far younger than me looking "outdated" increasingly quickly.

So why save it? Because when it was built, they still used a lot of higher-quality materials like marble and actual copper/brass panels etc. Newer buildings, tend to use far cheaper materials (ie: styrofoam stucco and stamped sheet steel), since the expectation is that it'll all soon be remodelled anyway. A building like 100 Main poses a lot of challenges, but if done right, the possibilities are a lot more grand.

"Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century." — Lewis Mumford

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