Categories
other thoughts work

Longmont City Hall

[Today’s run: maybe 1.5 miles]

I’m working for a few days in the Longmont city hall, Longmont, Colorado.

It is an interesting building.  It has an interior “mall” space with openings to the offices of various departments.  The building itself is cast concrete with brick fill.  It has kind of a fortress/pagoda style about it.  From the outside it is somewhat imposing.  But from the inside it looks like two or three large masses almost completely separated by glass, including some extensive skylight areas.

The joint pieces are very ornate, multi-layered cast blocks.  I don’t think they add any particular structural functionality.  On the interior they tend to complicate the drywall partitions.  And I get the impression they have had to employ anti-bird strategies in some areas to keep the pigeons from enjoying the multitude of little ledges.  Having said all of that, it sure has a lot more character than a minimalist approach.

There are a variety of windows.  Some parts have little portholes and other parts have large expanses of glass.  I expect that was probably to suit the original purposes of the interior rooms.  But some of the usage patterns have changed, so it can be a bit funky when one office has a great view and the next office has an itty-bitty porthole.

It is on a beautiful small campus area shared with the library and some underground parking.

This is a secondary entrance on the east side.