GLENWOOD VILLAGE HALL AND TOWN SQUARE COMPETITION mark shapiro
The competition called for the design of a Village Hall, a Town Square and ancillary commercial space in order to provide a civic focus for the town of Glenwood, Illinois. At present the town, a bedroom community for Chicago, lacks a defined public realm.
THE SITE
The site is comprised of most of a block bordered by Main Street to the south, Rebecca Street to the east, a railroad track to the west and the existing Police Station to the north. Main Street has some commercial activity while Rebecca Street is residential. An existing water tank is located on the Northern part of the site and an Historic Barn, now a restaurant, is located in the south west corner. Although plans are not yet definite, a commuter train station is planned along the right of way to the north of the site.
THE PROGRAM
The Village Hall is to house a Community Room, a Mayor's office suite and department offices. (9,0 00-10,000 sq. ft.) 13,000 square feet of office space that can be rented and later used for Village Hall expansion are required. The site is to accommodate 50,000 square feet of privately developed office and retail space. 315 parking spaces are required. Future pedestrian access to the train station should be allowed for.
STRATEGY
A bar of retail and office space defines the western edge of the site. A loggia along the eastern edge of the bar will link Main Street to the future rail station. This stoa-like structure separates the remainder of the site from the railroad right of way and acts as a backdrop for the Village Hall and a partial definer of the Town Square.
The Village Hall is pulled back from the corner of Main and Rebecca Streets and its south-facing loggia defines the northern boundary of the Town Square. Double rows of trees along Main and Rebecca Streets complete the definition of the Square. The Square is paved and has a block of shade trees. A Cafe Pavilion and flagpoles announce the square on Main Street. Parking is provided along the railroad right of way and to the north of the Village Hall.
The Village Hall is intended to be read as both a monumental object and a definer of the Town Square. The Village Hall is organized as a clear block around a courtyard. The edges of the courtyard have been eroded and it is open, providing a link from parking to the Town Square. The monumental loggia gives, to what is an extremely modest building mass, an appropriate civic scale and acts as a permeable screen that reveals the internal disposition of the elements of the Village Hall. The rentable office space is located along the eastern edge of the court and can be independently accessed. The Multipurpose Room, to the west, is directly accessible from the loggia and is given a unique profile so as to identify it as the most public element of the Village Hall. The Village Hall is in an axial relationship to the existing water tower. This strong axis is simultaneously reinforced, by the location of the mayor's office and entry, and denied, by the location of structure and the routing of pedestrian movement around a pool in the courtyard. A steel structural frame is clad in a brick that is typical of other public buildings in the area. The loggia and Multipurpose Room have standing seam metal roofs.
It is intended that these strategies will produce a building and public space that will be both formal and monumental (civic) and informal and open (populist).
