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Agnes Arnold Hall: Some Problems

Architecture & Planning

 

Kenneth E. Bentsen, Agnes Arnold Hall (1968), south elevation

Kenneth E. Bentsen, Agnes Arnold Hall (1968), south elevation (Photo Eric E. Johnson, by permission)

In recent posts I expressed admiration for the formal aspects of Agnes Arnold Hall, but anyone who works in this building knows that it has some problems.  Most of these problems stem from a single design flaw—the architect’s decision to open the building to the outside, much like a garden apartment or a motel. Thus the lobby and corridor areas have but modest protection from the elements.  This is a viable design strategy only in Hawaii and other places with a balmy climate.

Wind gusts blew through the open corridors at the upper levels of the building with such force that the university had to close the north-facing openings with glass. This was only a partial fix, and students changing classes in the winter still feel the cold as soon as they step outside the classroom.

Agnes Arnold Hall, open corridor at upper level, c. 1972. In background PGH and Hilton Hotel are under construction. (Photo Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers)

Agnes Arnold Hall, open corridor at upper level, c. 1972. In background M.D. Anderson Library has original facade while PGH and Hilton Hotel buildings are under construction. (Photo Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers)

Originally, visitors to Agnes Arnold Hall moved through the lower levels on escalators. Because of their many moving parts, escalators are maintenance headaches even in the controlled conditions of a shopping mall.  When they were exposed to humid outdoor conditions as they were in this building, they didn’t last very long.  Eventually, the university got tired of fixing them and replaced them with stairs.

Agnes Arnold Hall, lobby  looking up at escalators from basement level, c. 1972 (Photo Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers)

Agnes Arnold Hall, lobby looking up at escalators from basement level, c. 1972 (Photo Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers)

Agnes Arnold Hall is entered from a bridge over the basement courtyard.

Agnes Arnold Hall, view of basement courtyard spanned by entry bridge, c. 1972. (Photo Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The open courtyard at the basement level was a brilliant idea and looked great, but it resembled a bathtub during heavy rains.  Flooding during Tropical Storm Allison (2001) forced the university to install mechanical floodgates at the entrance to this lower level.

Agnes Arnold Hall may have so many problems because Kenneth Bentsen was such a good designer. If you build the same thing over and over again, you learn by experience what works and what doesn’t work.  That’s why dull, boring buildings seem to have the fewest problems.  But within their profession, architects are encouraged to be innovative, to be different, to push the envelope with their designs.

When you do something different, by definition you don’t have much experience with how it will work in practice.  That’s why the most architecturally significant buildings often have the most problems in daily use. Some new ideas are not good ideas, but you don’t know that until you try them.

We reward architects who take risks because that’s how the discipline of architecture advances.  At least that’s the theory.  So architects will continue to admire buildings like Agnes Arnold Hall and their users will continue to loathe them.  We invite you to continue your study with the Architecture & Planning collections at the University of Houston Special Collections.

Agnes Arnold Hall: Influences

Architecture & Planning
Kenneth E. Bentsen, Agnes Arnold Hall (1968), south elevation

Kenneth E. Bentsen, Agnes Arnold Hall (1968), south elevation (Photo Eric E. Johnson, by permission)

In a recent post I analyzed the formal aspects of Agnes Arnold Hall.  Like other buildings, it is a product of its time. Looking closely, we can see that Kenneth Bentsen interpreted some new ideas about composition and building layout that emerged in the early 1960s.

Agnes Arnold Hall owes more than a little to a well-known building at the University of Pennsylvania, the Richards Medical Research Building (1961) by Louis Kahn. The Richards was one of the most influential designs of the 1960s. Why? Prior to this, modern architects often expressed the building as a perfect geometric shape—usually a box and often a glass box. The usual practice was to place support services such as restrooms and stairwells in the center with the human occupants on the outside near the windows.

Louis I. Kahn, Richards Medical Research Building, University of Pennsylvania (Photo, Richard Anderson)

Louis I. Kahn, Richards Medical Research Building, University of Pennsylvania (Photo Richard Anderson by permission)

Kahn’s big breakthrough was to pull the support services out of the central core and place them on the outer edge of the building. There the services, housed in tall brick towers, became an important part of the building’s overall design (no more box!). Likewise, in Bentsen’s building the corridors, stairwells, and elevators are on the outside where they contribute to the design.

Agnes Arnold Hall also shows the influence of Paul Rudolph, another important architect of the period.  He helped popularize the style known as “Brutalism,” with its monumental concrete buildings. Best-known was his Yale University Art & Architecture Building (1963).

Paul Rudolph, Yale Art & Architecture Building (Photo Sage Ross, Common License)

Paul Rudolph, Yale Art & Architecture Building (Photo Sage Ross, CC BY-SA 2.5)

Rudolph’s buildings were extremely complex. Occupants negotiated frequent level changes, as every floor seemed to be a mezzanine to another floor. The Yale A&A was said to have 37 different levels on 9 floors. And like Kahn’s building, some of the towers on the outside held stairs, elevators, and restrooms.

Yale Art & Architecture Building, section view (The Paul Rudolph Archive, Library of Congress)

Yale Art & Architecture Building, section view (The Paul Rudolph Archive, Library of Congress)

In a small way you see some of this spatial complexity at Agnes Arnold Hall. Escalators (now stairs) thread their way through a four-story lobby area that is open to the outside. The lobby flows into an open courtyard at the basement level, and visitors enter the building over a bridge that spans this courtyard. But Rudolph’s influence is also apparent in the way the concrete is finished. Most of Bentsen’s building is faced in brick, but at the basement level the concrete retaining walls of the courtyard have what is called a “corduroy” finish. This was Rudolph’s trademark (look closely at the Yale building).  After the concrete walls were poured and the forms removed, the workers attacked the surface with a jackhammer. Instant texture.

The Kenneth E Bentsen Architectural Papers, housed at the University of Houston Special Collections, are currently being processed.

Agnes Arnold Hall

Architecture & Planning, University Archives

Let’s follow recent posts about Kenneth Bentsen’s Philip G. Hoffman Hall (PGH), with a look at his Agnes Arnold Hall (1968) next door.  Like PGH, Agnes Arnold is a good modern design and its success has much to do with Bentsen’s use of contrast.  An important principle of architectural design, the contrast between thick and thin, heavy and light, solid and transparent enlivens a building’s form.

Kenneth E. Bentsen, Agnes Arnold Hall, University of Houston (1968), south elevation (Photo Eric E. Johnson, by permission)

At Agnes Arnold the vertical lines of the towers contrast with the horizontal lines of the stacked classroom levels. The texture and color of the brown brick towers contrasts with the smooth white spandrels and railings. The solid brick contrasts with the transparent glass. Agnes Arnold Hall is also effective because of its layered façade, which is much more sculptural than Bentsen’s very reserved PGH design. Here the architect achieves this sculptural effect by placing the corridors on the edge of the building and opening them to the outside. The surface is cut away and you can see deep within the building.

Frank Lloyd Wright, Fallingwater, detail, Bear Run, PA (1936)

Frank Lloyd Wright, Fallingwater, Bear Run, PA (1936), detail. Photo J.P. Otto, all rights reserved.

You see these same formal principles at work in another successful modern design where contrasting lines, colors, and textures animate the façade of Frank Lloyd Wright’s famous house, “Fallingwater.”

Agnes Arnold Hall is entered from a bridge over the basement courtyard.

Agnes Arnold Hall is entered from a bridge over the basement courtyard. Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers

Architects are encouraged to design in three dimensions, not just two. They are intrigued by the idea of space that flows through the building vertically as well as horizontally. You see this in the three-level lobby of Agnes Arnold, where the ground floor is open not just to the level above but to the level below as well. In addition, the building is entered from the south over a dramatic bridge that spans the open courtyard at the basement level. From the street the building appears to rise from an open pit.

The Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers are housed in the library’s Special Collections department and are currently being processed. Pictures of Agnes Arnold Hall and other campus buildings are available in the University of Houston Buildings Collection of the UH Digital Library.

Lucian T. Hood Architectural Papers

Architecture & Planning, Digitization
HOOD.P104

Lucian Hood, House on Sandy Cove Drive, Houston,1961, Digital Collection

The Lucian T. Hood Architectural Papers have joined the UH Library’s Digital Library collections.  Lucian Hood (1916 – 2001) was an important Houston architect who made his reputation as a house designer for the rich and famous. During the 1970s and 1980s he had one of the largest and best-known residential design practices in the city.

Hood earned his architecture degree from the University of Houston in 1952. He studied under such prominent architects as Donald Barthelme, Sr. and Howard Barnstone. Among his classmates were Burdette Keeland, Jr. (UH 1950) and Kenneth E. Bentsen (UH 1952), both of whom went on to distinguished architectural careers. The Barthelme, Keeland, and Bentsen papers are among the important Architecture and Planning collections held by the library’s Special Collections Department.

HOOD.P75

Lucian Hood, Memorial Creole Apartments, Houston, 1966, Digital Collection

Early in his career Hood designed both commercial and residential buildings but by the late 1960s had switched to residential architecture exclusively. His work is well represented in the affluent River Oaks, Memorial, and Tanglewood neighborhoods of Houston. His houses were usually traditional in style and were notable for his attention to the many traditional details that brought the designs to life.

The Lucian T. Hood Architectural Papers are the largest of Special Collections’ Architecture and Planning collections. Covering the four decades from 1961 to 2001, the collection encompasses approximately 900 projects. Unfortunately, most of Hood’s early work from the 1950s was lost before the library acquired the materials.

Lucian Hood, second floor plan of residence, Houston, 1983, Lucian T. Hood Architectural Collection

Special Collections often receives requests for copies of the Hood drawings—usually from patrons who own a Lucian Hood-designed house and want copies of the architect’s original plans. The department welcomes the chance to make the Hood drawings accessible online, but because of the enormous size of the collection, only a small part has been digitized. The Digital Library has the projects from the 1960s, but more may be added in the future. Until then, patrons seeking copies from the Lucian T. Hood Architectural Papers should contact the Special Collections Department for assistance.

The Hole in PGH

Architecture & Planning, Collections, University Archives
The portal or breezeway in the center bay of Philip G. HoffmanHall. Photo by the author

The breezeway in the center bay of Philip G. Hoffman Hall. Photo by the author

The recent post about Philip G. Hoffman Hall (PGH) failed to answer an important question:  Why does it have a big hole in it?  As with most cosmic questions, the answer to this one is that “it’s all connected.”  In this case, PGH and its hole are connected to the change in the university’s master plan in the mid 1960s.

1967 aerial view shows UH buildings arranged around several formal axes [UH Photographs Collection]

UH Campus looking east (1967). Note street between Anderson Library and Ezekiel Cullen Building.  UH Photographs Collection

The university’s original 1930s master plan provided for the buildings to be laid out very formally at right angles along a series of axes and esplanaded streets.  From important buildings like Ezekiel Cullen and M.D, Anderson Library, this offered unobstructed views to Cullen Boulevard. The university redesigned its master plan in the 1960s to replace these long vistas with smaller, people-oriented places.  The result was Anne Garrett Butler Plaza and the nearby Cullen Family Plaza.

Before the change in the master plan, a street ran through what is now Butler Plaza and passed between the Ezekiel Cullen Building and Anderson Library. See the 1967 aerial view of the campus. University planners decided to remove the street to create the plaza, and this required a new building opposite the library to provide a sense of enclosure.

Philip G. Hoffman Hall, Section view. Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers

PGH, section view. Agnes Arnold Hall in background. Note storm drain below breezeway. Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers

But below the street was a major city storm sewer, and an easement prevented them from placing a building over it.  Their solution was a building with a large hole in the center that left the area over the storm sewer open, providing access if it is ever needed. In the construction view below, looking to the southeast, excavation for a basement stops short of the center of the building.

Philip G. Hoffman Hall Construction [UH Photographs Collection]

Construction of Philip G. Hoffman Hall (c. 1972) UH Photographs Collection

Most people think the breezeway in the center bay of PGH is just a cool design feature—and it is—but that’s not why it’s there. Necessity is the mother of invention. The Kenneth E. Bentsen Architectural Papers are housed in the library’s Special Collections department and are currently being processed. Pictures of PGH and other campus buildings are available in the University of Houston Buildings collection of the UH Digital Library.

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