Current use: |
Bookstore (textbooks, cards, MU merchan-dise and other items). |
Location: |
5th. Avenue, adjacent to the west side of the Memorial Student Center. |
Designers: |
Grant & WTW Architects, Maryland. |
Completed: |
1999 |
The building faces entirely the 5th Avenue, looking south. Its plan is a quarter of a circle with a tall western end that is echoed by a narrow eastern end, adjacent to the Memorial Student Center. The building back faces to the inner campus but it denies all relationship, as its walls are continuous, curved and almost windowless. The building is internally connected with the Student Center.
The façade central part is a wide glass window with three brick doorways that performs a profile-background play with transparency and opacity. The tall western end marks the 5th. Avenue entrance, and above has a convex curtain wall, enclosed within a thick brick wall. An oversailing band that follows the convex-square pattern of the plan covers this part.
Brickwalls are based upon yellow stone rendering only in the first floor; above it they are red-brown colored. The intention of taking advantage of the Southern façade, opening it to bring sunlight to the building interior matches with the intention of having a vast shop window facing 5th avenue.
The general design of the building looks unprejudiced regarding its neighbor, the Memorial Student Center, because of its varied features, apt to commercial needs.
|
