When
Renaissance Square is built — and more than half of the needed $230 million
in funding is already lined up — it will have an immeasurable effect on
Rochester’s downtown.
For
good or ill, the project will alter the character of downtown’s architecture.
Both
of the finalists for the design of Renaissance Square — LMN Architects of
Seattle, and the Boston-area Moshe Safdie and Associates — have substantial
experience designing performing arts centers (and to a lesser extent education,
transportation, and mixed-use buildings). Both have designed similar buildings,
and those projects have become tourist attractions in their own right.
But
without seeing the designs first (as in the redevelopment of the World Trade
Center site in lower Manhattan, for example), it’s tough to know what to
expect. All we have to go on are previous projects and reputations.
Those
reputations notwithstanding, designing a building that’s both a unique
attraction a good fit will be a challenge.
“If
it’s innovative, it goes out of style very quickly; if it’s conservative, it’s
not attention getting. That seems to me the dilemma whenever anyone builds
anything; you make your choice even for a single house,” says Jean France, a
retired University of Rochester architecture history professor.
“That’s
the major dilemma. And I think they are going to find quite a problem trying to
do that.”
Another
local architect, Barkstrom and LaCroix’s Roger Brown, shares those concerns.
The designer of Corn Hill Landing says it’s important that Renaissance Square
“is going to be a good design and that it’s going to reflect the community and
the surroundings and that it isn’t going to be an ego kind of thing. Because if
it is I think it could be a real detriment to the project.”
The
answer to those concerns will come in the work of one of two architects.
LMN
Architects
Mark
Reddington, who is handling Renaissance Square plans for LMN, has plenty to say
on the subject (“I could probably talk for an hour about that,” he joked.)
For
him, the use is what drives the design.
“We
certainly would look at the characteristics of the city, the texture of the
buildings, the scale and massing, the light and the climate, and the way people
participate with indoor and outdoor spaces, which would be different in
Rochester than, say, San Diego or Seattle or other places. Every building looks
carefully at all of the local conditions and develops the signature statement
as a way to engage the local quality.”
If
it’s done right, says Reddington, “this is the kind of project that really
catalyzes the development at the urban core. It could be an anchor project that
really stimulates a lot of other things.” Those are the types of projects LMN
seeks out, he says, for exactly that reason.
“When
it’s done and it’s operating efficiently and the shows are coming in and it
becomes a real community gathering place, there’s a lot more impact than people
predict,” says Reddington. “This first dream is a dream; the reality of it is
far more inspiring than a dream.”
Moshe
Safdie and Associates
Warren
Mathison, Safdie’s point person for Renaissance Square, views use and design as
inextricably connected. But when asked specifically about the dilemma France
poses — uniqueness vs. compatibility — he credited the vision of his firm’s
founder.
“It’s
Moshe,” he says. “Moshe designs in a way which leaves buildings, in the best
possible terms, timeless. They’re not of any particular school of thought;
they’re more a reflection of the need of the project and the environment it’s
in.”
Safdie
himself explains his vision this way: “I don’t think there’s a contradictory
question here between having a building that fits and reinforces life in
downtown and being a signature piece; I think they reinforce each other,” he
says. “You make a design that’s very extrovert, that’s very inviting, that
draws you in from the street but doesn’t siphon off activity on the street. It
becomes very open and inviting to everything that’s around it.”
Mathison
and Safdie both cite the goal of rebirthing a neighborhood as something that
attracted them to this job.
“We
have a history of working on projects that have as at least part of their goals
the renaissance of an area, which obviously this project has because of its
name,” Mathison says. “The catalyst that comes from a project like this can
certainly spread to adjacent areas. We’ve often had that effect on places.”
His
boss is on the same page.
“Most
of our downtown projects just spin off a complete rejuvenation of the district,
and the more appealing and attractive the design as an icon as an expression,
the more it draws people because they know about it and if you’re really good
at it and lucky it’ll become a tourist attraction in its own right,” says
Safdie. “The most important part of the puzzle is to get the right program. And
you’ve got the right program, in the way that this has been formulated.”
Is
Rochester ready?
So
Rochester’s getting a “signature civic building” downtown. But will we be ready
for it?
“Well,
I’m not that sure,” says France. “It seems to me that the fact that [it] will
be innovative may have a certain amount of, shall we call it, advertising;
people will come to see [it] specifically. But this is not a city that always
loves the unusually far out. I just don’t know.”
For
Brown, it all comes back to the design. Avant-garde or otherwise, people will
react positively to a good design.
“If
it feels good to the public and it attracts the public, it’ll be successful.
It’ll compel them to want to experience it. And more than just once,” he says.
“That’s why an urban design background is important, because urban design
speaks to bringing life to the street. So the more the architect is aware of
that and sensitive to that, I think, the more successful the project will be.”
This article appears in Mar 2-8, 2005.
