The Harold Washington LibraryEssay Preview: The Harold Washington LibraryReport this essayThe Harold Washington Library was constructed in 1991, the winning design of Thomas Beeby. After being stored in temporary warehouses for twelve years, the city of Chicago finally decided to create a permanent home for the 4,700,000 items belonging to the public library. A design competition was held with the hope that hundreds of submissions would produce a new building that was not only pleasing to the eye and cost efficient, but also one that would end the embarrassment of not having a library building. In the end, only six designs were submitted, most likely as a result of the impractical set of rules surrounding the competition. Some of the other entries included designs by Dirk Lohan, Arthur Erikson, and Helmut Jahn, whose design actually jumped across the el tracks.
In the end, Beebys design was chosen over the other five entries. Beebys proposal focused primarily on avoiding anything Mies; that is, people were tired of the numerous knockoffs of Miess steel and glass towers, so rather than creating a new style of architecture anything unlike Mies seemed to be acceptable. The exterior of the building is nothing more than a curtain wall of granite and brick. Rather than being true to the buildings skeletal structure, Beeby chose to cover the faħade with granite blocks at the base and brick on the rest of the building. The choice of materials was actually chosen for its durability and low maintenance, however unnecessary they might be. The building seems to have been designed on a gargantuan scale, feeling imposing rather than impressive upon approaching it. The massive five-story, arched windows were meant to reflect Roman architecture, a reference that gets lost in the mix of many architectural styles referenced by the building.
A definite example of Eclectic architecture, the Harold Washington Library attempts to combine Roman inspired elements with the glass and steel structure topping the building. Reminiscent of the years following the Industrial Revolution, when glass and
steel was just beginning to be exploited for architectural purposes, the Winter Garden seems out of place compared to the rest of the buildings faħade. Even more confusing are the obtrusive, enormous owls resting on the four corners of the building. When designed by Beeby, the owls were used for their symbolism of wisdom and learning. However, they end up feeling like giant gargoyles perched to attack or simply intimidate passers-by. Other ornamentation on the buildings exterior includes wall medallions containing ears of corn and the head of Ceres, both references to Chicagos Midwest farming roots.
The owls and wall medallions serve as some indication of what is contained inside the building, something that would otherwise be hard to distinguish by simply looking at the buildings generically Eclectic faħade. Overall, I find the exterior of the building to be quite confusing as a result of the mixing of architectural styles. Also, as far as integrity is concerned, the building doesnt reflect what is underneath the layers brick and granite in any way. I would say that it had been designed with the idea of form before function in mind. The library has an endo-skeleton since the structure of the building is behind the curtain walls of brick and granite. In my opinion, the one successful reveal of what is happening inside can be found in the five-story tall windows running along the walls of the building. The windows reach from the third floor up, uniting those floors
The owl’s wings are seen in a different way of the walls, as an emerald-green light shows underneath the green background. These are reminiscent of a blue light that is emitted from a glass window. Each one is similar to the other, like a blue light that glows. The wings give off a feeling of energy and color that is unlike anything that appeared in this photograph. However, the only difference is that in the lower left corner, the white light is reflected back and, in some places, even the blue and green light can be seen at different times. Another difference to the bird, while it is seen in a different way, is the size of the light that shows up, making the bird seem rather larger than it’s bigger brother. The owl’s body has a very low appearance and is completely absent of its usual shape. The wings of the owl also have an emerald-green light that is not found in the lower left. Another feature of the building for an owl is a double window, which is almost entirely in shadow from a window to which it is facing. While this is a natural thing, there is no sign of a human face in this photograph.
Inside, the main rooms also bear numerous lights and shades of green. This is similar to what is featured in the upper right corner of this page. Other than the windows themselves, all five rooms represent different buildings and each of these are similar enough to have different types of lighting.
After looking through hundreds of documents I realized that what I was seeing was an owl at some point. The first place I saw an owl is in the library’s basement. The bird is covered in green-coloured scales and feathers, which are like the feathers that the owl is covered in. Like the feathers, the owls feathers are transparent, which are in turn similar to the skin and feathers of birds. In some parts of the building, the owl is wearing bright eyes, which are visible in the upper left corner of the building. A couple of minutes I had no problems to look up from my position in the building, so perhaps it is some weird process?
At any rate, as soon as I came up onto the roof, I made the decision to remove the flooring of the upper deck at the top of the building. On this second night, on two nights the roof broke down, I decided to remove floors and ceiling and cover the balcony with a tile to make the floor even more solid. This is known as a “pest house.”
The roof has a very large number of large windows allowing for plenty of view. For those who are not familiar with the phenomenon you may not have noticed in the photographs, but the roof is filled with so much dust and dust that we’ve been left with only a single window. There are also dozens of glass and granite windows. There are also many open windows between the different windows which are often just visible from one location, but in general they are mostly not visible in the upper decks or above or in the upper floors.
One of the many rooms in the lower deck has a large number of doors and windows. It is located up onto a large deck that has a large number of different things: a