AIA Cleveland Urgent Bulletin & Statement

Read the following, taken from an AIA email notice this afternoon:


Cuyahoga County Commissioners to Determine Fate of Breuer Tower

The Cuyahoga County Commissioners will be discussing the demolition of the Marcel Breuer designed Cleveland Trust (Ameritrust) Tower at it's next meeting at 11:30 AM on Thursday, March 29, 2007 at the Board of Cuyahoga County Commissioners Chambers, 1219 Ontario Street, 4th Floor.

All AIA Cleveland Members are invited to attend the meeting and express their views on this matter.

Over the course of the last several months, AIA Cleveland's Executive Board and Committee on Historic Resources has urged the Commissioners to reconsider demolishing the Tower and has called for them to conduct a comprehensive feasibility study of adaptively reusing the Breuer Tower for the new County Administration Center.

If you cannot attend, please call or e-mail your position on this important matter directly to the Commissioners before Thursday's meeting. Their contact information is as follows:

Commissioner Jimmy Dimora
Phone (216) 443-7180
CNJCD@cuyahogacounty.us

Commissioner Peter Lawson Jones
Phone (216) 443-7182
CNPLJ@cuyahogacounty.us

Commissioner Timothy F. Hagan
Phone (216) 443-7181
CNTFH@cuyahogacounty.us


AIA Cleveland Statement

Cleveland, Ohio, January 30, 2007 - AIA Cleveland, a Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, urges The Cuyahoga County Board of Commissioners to preserve and renovate the Cleveland Trust (Ameritrust) Tower.

Designed by the pioneering modernist architect Marcel Breuer in 1971, the tower's prominent location, noteworthy design and contribution to downtown Cleveland's skyline, make the building potentially eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places. As stewards of the built environment, it is our community's responsibility to ensure that significant examples of modern architecture like the Cleveland Trust Tower endure for future generations.

Furthermore, AIA Cleveland encourages the Commissioners to undertake a comprehensive feasibility study of adaptively reusing the Breuer Tower for the new County Administration Center. This study must thoroughly analyze the overall project development costs to the tax payers of Cuyahoga County and definitively justify the decisions made by the Commissioners. In addition, the impact of demolishing the twenty-nine story structure must be carefully considered from an economic, environmental and sustainability perspective. This study, coupled with a creative and transparent design process, will determine if and how the existing building can best meet the County's needs.

Most importantly, we urge the County to engage the community during the decision making process so that all voices are heard on this major expenditure of public resources. AIA Cleveland stands ready to provide the Cuyahoga County Board of Commissioners with assistance and counsel in this most important matter and we look forward to a constructive community dialogue on this issue.

Commissioners to Decide Fate of Tower - Thursday, March 29th

What: Cuyahoga County Board of Commissioners General Meeting
When: Thursday, March 29th at 11:30 am
Where: Cuyahoga County Administration Building (southeast corner of Ontario and Lakeside)

Concerned citizens for the demolition of the Cleveland Trust Tower should attend this very important Board Meeting in which the Commissioners will vote upon razing the 29-story Tower. From the the Meeting Agenda:

"Department of Central Services, submitting specifications and estimates of cost in connection with development of an administrative complex for County government; requesting authority for the Director of the Office of Procurement & Diversity to advertise for bids:

Ameritrust Tower Exterior Asbestos Abatement and Demolition and 1010 Euclid Building Demolition Project"

Meeting is open to the public and will have an opportunity for public discussion. Currently, two out of three commissioners is in favor of demolishing the Tower.

Download the Cuyahoga County Board of Commissioners Meeting Agenda for Thursday, March 29th here (pdf).

AIA Cleveland: Preserve and Renovate

Almost missed this letter written to the Cleveland Free Times in the March 14th issue by Beth Kalapos, President of AIA Cleveland.

AIA Cleveland "urges the Cuyahoga County Board of Commissioners to preserve and renovate the Cleveland Trust (Ameritrust) Tower", suggests a feasibility study into the economic, environmental, and sustainable impacts of demolishing the tower, and encourages the County to engage the community in the decision-making process:

REUSE, RESTORE, RENOVATE
AIA Cleveland, a chapter of the American Institute of Architects, urges the Cuyahoga County Board of Commissioners to preserve and renovate the Cleveland Trust (Ameritrust) Tower.

Furthermore, AIA Cleveland has publicly encouraged the commissioners, in a letter dated January 29, 2007, to undertake a comprehensive feasibility study of adaptively reusing the Breuer Tower for the new County Administration Center. This study must thoroughly analyze the overall project development costs to the taxpayers of Cuyahoga County and definitively justify the decisions made by the commissioners. In addition, the impact of demolishing the 29-story structure must be carefully considered from an economic, environmental and sustainability perspective. This study, coupled with a creative and transparent design process, will determine if and how the existing building can best meet the county's needs.

Most importantly, we urge the county to engage the community during the decision-making process so that all voices are heard on this major expenditure of public resources. AIA Cleveland stands ready to provide the Cuyahoga County Board of Commissioners with assistance and counsel in this most important matter, and we look forward to a constructive community dialogue on this issue.

Beth Ann Kalapos

President, AIA Cleveland


Because there has been an influx of new traffic to the Design Rag since the last post, listed below is an incomplete compilation of recent articles and discussion regarding the Cleveland Trust Tower (in no particular order):

The Design Rag
Taxpayers Against Breuer Tower Demolition
Poor Marcel Breuer.
Reviling the Buildings of Our Parents' Prime
SAVE the Cleveland Trust Tower
Historic Breuer Photographs
Dignification
Ugly is Only Skin Deep
SAVE
When "Ugly" Distracts - Cleveland Trust Tower

Farewell, Marcel - Metropolis Magazine
To Be or Not to Be - Angle Magazine
Art museum values style the County wants to junk - The Plain Dealer
Proposal to demolish Breuer-designed county office... - The Plain Dealer
County considers razing Breuer-designed Ameritrust Tower - The Plain Dealer
Point of no return - The Plain Dealer
Reuse, Restore, Renovate - Cleveland Free Times
King Cuyahoga - Cleveland Scene
Raze or Renovate? - GreenCityBlueLake
Tower Power - GreenCityBlueLake
Saving the Breuer Tower - GreenCityBlueLake
Steven Litt says County is going wrong way... - realneo
Commissioners pick architects for admin building - Crains Cleveland
Cleveland Trust Tower - Urban Ohio
A Public Forum on the Breuer Tower - CSU College of Urban Affairs
Breuer Building Forum; Bias Abounds - Improvised Schema
The Breuer - Speak Up If You Want to Save It - Improvised Schema
Breuer's Cleveland Building - Save or Demolish - Improvised Schema
Save the Cleveland Trust Tower - Blog on the City
When should we preserve old buildings? - TOI Studio
I can't go one day without... - TOI Studio
Irony. This is an example of irony - TOI Studio
At least reuse some of the dang thing! - TOI Studio
Cleveland Trust Tower - ClevelandSkyscrapers.com

Taxpayers Against Breuer Tower Demolition

This tri-fold brochure from "Taxpayers Against Waste" was sent to The Design Rag and has recently been circulating around Cuyahoga County (I apologize for any difficulty in viewing):

Storefront Art Opening: Influence + Imposition

The art of architectural design isn't displayed in galleries with enough frequency. It may be the volume of budget-driven construction that leaves little time for deeper explorations into design, a "brain-drain" of Cleveland's creative minds that leaves a scarcity of individuals who look at the art of architecture as more than a consumer product, or simply a failure of current architecture design and theory to be accessible to an audience larger than the community of subscribers to Architectural Record magazine.

It may be some of these reasons, or none of them, regardless, it will be a boost to the exposure of architectural design in Cleveland with the exhibition of four local designers' work called Influence + Imposition opening at Cleveland Public Art's storefront next Thursday. As the Artists' Statement describes:

"Influence + Imposition is an exhibition of the documentations and speculations of four young Cleveland designers engaging the built environment.

Sean Burkholder, Patrick Hyland, Jonathan Kurtz, and Bradford Watson have all recently returned to Cleveland after pursuing graduate design educations outside of Northeast Ohio. All work, design, teach, and make locally."

To read the Artists' Statements and Biographies download the PDF document or visit Cleveland Public Art's webpage.

WHAT: Cleveland Public Art open house for Influence + Imposition

WHEN: Thursday, March 29th at 5:30pm

WHERE: Cleveland Public Art - 1951 West 26th Street

Poor Marcel Breuer.

The March 2007 Metropolis Magazine article "Farewell Marcel" suggests the likely loss of Marcel Breuer's Cleveland Trust Tower in downtown Cleveland. The Cleveland tower's days "may be numbered" says Steve Rugare of the Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative. "Part of the problem," author Kelli Kavanaugh writes, "is that while Breuer is hailed as a master, the public has not always had such a warm relationship with his work."

Thankfully, the article describes the difference in opinion of commissioners Tim Hagan and Peter Lawson Jones for the ability of the existing building to become 'energy efficient' and 'green.' Peter Lawson Jones, "the only one of the commissioners still open to saving the structure, doesn't buy [that the tower doesn't meet the requirements of green architecture]." He argues that "preservation is inherently more sustainable than demolition and that retrofits could enhance its efficiency."

While the merits of its design could be challenged (and it seems as though the local architecture community is generally apathetic towards its significance), the environmental and economical advantages of saving the structure will be the points at which the community could best rally around to challenge the decision of two out of three commissioners.

Click here for tower images at ClevelandSkyscrapers.com.

Grapefruit League

Back to posting, after a brief tour of Spring Training baseball in central Florida.

Home Opener for the Tribe is Friday, April 6th at 4:05pm against the Seattle Mariners.

House: Case Study Cleveland, No. 2

Lets take a quick trip back in time...

In 2002, SPACES Gallery presented House: Case Study Cleveland, an exhibition and competition that reexamined the goals of the original Case Study House program in Southern California for a Midwestern, post-industrial city. The basic premise of the Case Study House program was to create superior, architect-designed housing for typical American families.

9 teams presented their designs for an exhibition and competition at SPACES Gallery, of which the winning design would be built on a city-owned lot in Cleveland's Tremont neighborhood and put for sale on the open market.

PLY Architecture, based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, was the ultimate winner of the competition and Architecture Record wrote the following about their Case Study house and PLY's current body of work (August 2002):

“In the exhibition, we tried to show the flexibility of this house, so we laid out the furniture for four different families,” said Craig Borum, one of the four principals (left). “To try to make it accessible and understandable, we chose pretty well known families: We chose the Cosbys; we chose the Cunninghams from Happy Days; we chose Jack, Chrissy, and Janet from Three’s Company; and then we chose The Andy Griffith Show. So we had a single parent. We had three adults sharing a dwelling. We had a full nuclear family with a home office—the Cosbys. And then we had a kind of traditional family with Fonzie living over the garage, which is exactly where Fonzie would live in our house.”

The Cleveland Case Study House was designed as a series of premanufactured loft spaces that can be placed on top of a custom base. The upper floor can be used as bedrooms, home offices, or rental space. The ground floor is equally flexible. “The only thing that’s defined on the ground floor is the kitchen,” said Karl Daubmann, another one of the principals (top right). “Everything else is just a large room or a small room or a medium-size room.”

The construction for the First Prize entry was anticipated to begin in the Spring of 2004. Unless I have stumbled upon the wrong location, it seems the entry was never built (please drop a message if I am incorrect).

The Cleveland Case Study concept is as relevant now as it was in 2002. While a shame that the first house was never constructed, city land bank properties still exist in gentrifying urban neighborhoods such as Tremont, Ohio City, and Detroit-Shoreway. While the rebuilding continues in these neighborhoods, the City of Cleveland sees a steady stream of new housing construction which either recalls an outdated tradition, poorly functions, or simply isn't built well.

The Design Rag suggests that the exploration continues with Case Study Cleveland, No. 2.

archiBlog Portal

archiBlog has been added to the "Designblog" sidebar. archiBlog is a "portal of blogs about architecture." The site proves convenient for viewing a variety of blog posts and articles drawn from hundreds of sources - its main page is a virtual "daily digest" on architectural news and opinion from the blogging world.

Among the Cleveland area design blogs referenced on the archiBlog international design network are: Blog on the City, Improvised Schema, TOI Studio, and the Design Rag.

archiBlog is a great example of a well-conceived aggregator for architecture opinion and news. I would suggest that over time the Cleveland Design City network could be designed to have the same success for accessing regional design commentary, news, and criticism.

Flats Falling Down

Wrecking crews have arrived to the East Bank of the Flats where Scott Wolstein has proposed a $230 million residential and retail development, a project in which the City of Cleveland, the Port Authority, Flats Oxbow Association and Cuyahoga County have all placed their support behind.

While the City has issued demolition permits for eight properties north of the Main Avenue Bridge, half a dozen property owners still control parcels within the boundaries of the proposed development. Not surpisingly, demolition has started on the old Joe's Crab Shack directly across the street from a couple of the holdout properties - Larry Flynt's Hustler strip club and Heaven and Earth night club. Barring legal action that would prevent demolition, the former entertainment district will soon be flattened, excepting the handful of holdouts.

While I respect the commitment of the involved entities, I will reserve futher opinion on the project until I see evidence of new construction. My only suggestion until then... if there comes a day in the next several months where immediate plans for construction are postponed due to whatever unsurmountable circumstance (it has certainly happened before in the last decades), scatter a little grass seed, plant a few trees, and allow the public to enjoy this new riverfront open space.

Below, along Old River Road, the properties ready for demolition:

Looking from the West Bank of the Cuyahoga, buildings soon to be demolished...










...and the existing East Bank to remain