Thursday Eclectica
Getting to Know your Civic Building and Veterans Plaza
The Silver Spring Regional Center is hosting a “must-attend” event to learn everything you may or may not have wanted to know about the big, arching construction that so rudely displaced our beloved turf. It’s looking kinda cool, actually. Meeting goes down March 23 from 7:00-9:00PM at Discovery Communications (enter from the Wayne/Georgia intersection).
The event is billed as a way to “find out what’s going to happen in the building and on the plaza; discover how you, businesses, and organizations can use the facility; and get information on how to rent, schedule, and access the space.”
Your Silver Spring Photo of the Day
Okay – so it’s not in Silver Spring, but I thought it was worth mentioning. As a Crimson Tide fan, it was hard to beat having front row seats (from which I took this photo) to the East Room ceremony at the White House with President Obama, Nick Saban, and the entire Alabama football team to honor their National Championship. Roll effing Tide, folks! And special thanks to MR for the access.
On a sad note…
A beloved Silver Spring resident and activist, Harry Sanders, passed away today. Harry focused a lot of energy promoting transit solutions for this region, and while he was a big Purple Line advocate, he was active in a vast array of community issues. He will certainly be missed.
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The Regional Center as depicted in that picture looks nice. Let’s hope they landscape it as envisioned. Statuary would be nice, too, especially from local artists.
One of the joys of visiting old town squares in Europe is seeing the wonderful architecture and statues scattered around. We won’t enjoy the same level of architecture, but we can have inspiring art.
Let us also hope that MoCo allows people to eat and drink, including outdoor cafes where adults can enjoy wine and beer al fresco.
I have to admit that the Civic building is looking a whole lot nicer in reality than it did in the renderings. The subtle textures & colors of the wood contrasting with the glass just didn’t come across in the drawings. It is a very cool building that (unfortunately) is surrounded by pretty boring stucco clad other buildings. It’s too bad MoCo didn’t make the developer invest in more quality/variety of materials like they did at Rockville Town Center.
Seeing the big steel girders go up for the canopy has been a fun process to watch. Looking forward to people actually getting to enjoy that space again.
I took a hard-hat tour with a group of SS biz owners ofthe Civic Building in process today. I have to say it has exceeded my expectations and there is an inner courtyard that I plan to take my lunchtime in whenever I’m by that way.
As to “statuary” on the Veteran’s Plaza, I think that idea stinks as I’d rather see it be as an easily changeable/modifiable open area for the outdoor concerts, festivals, etc. Statues sprinkled through out would ruin sight-lines and natural gathering areas. Plus where does the statue parade end? The one big glass art wall they are putting in is dedicated to verterans of ALL US wars. I’d rather not see it become a fight like the National Mall about who gets represented and how much space is consumed by each interest group.
Kathy,
Statuary need not be enormous, and it can be placed in appropriate locations. I also was not referring to war memorials, but art in general. I see no conflict between public art and a public space; in fact, I think it enhances it.
As a tourist in other cities, here or abroad, one of my favorite things to do is find a space where the locals hang out and hang out with them. Hopefully our veteran’s plaza will be one such space. However, you don’t want to just sit and watch, but wander the space, too. That’s where coming across an unexpected piece of art can be a special joy.
Hell, lets have a statue of Goldie Hawn from her “Laugh-In” days. Nobody said that art has to be deadly serious.
Has anybody else noticed that the renderings of the civic building and plaza are bullshit? The one cited on this post doesn’t even include the canopy, let alone show that the canopy actually blocks your view of the front of the civic building. Also, I’m not convinced tha there will be a grassy slope up from Ellsworth Drive to the plaza, unless they do some serious grading before the building opens. I think the images of grass were added to appease folks upset about losing the turf. Finally, those cherry trees in the renderings may look like that in about 20 years, but whatever trees they plant will be much smaller.
Not that I’m not looking forward to the civic building, I am, but who are you going to believe, the renderings or your own eyes?
Brains, I think you might have only gotten the left side of your father’s brain because you aren’t able to understand the perspective from which the rendering in thenpoat was taken. From that position you would see the canopy (at least the way the image is cropped). Also, cherry trees are some of the fastest growing landscape trees, especially when fertilized the way they are likely to be there. It’s not unreasonabe that the trees planted would be the size of those in the rendering within 5-7 years.
The post, not thenpoat (stupid iPhone autocomplete function).
I meant you wouldn’t see the canopy from that angle. Obviously I didn’t get any left brain since i can’t use a mobile phone to post to a blog
If we get some good statuary, I really think something like this should be done. And if it’s too much sacrilege for the work itself, we must inaugurate the plaza somehow in this manner. I will have some blog posts coming with some ideas. All in good fun, of course.
Thayer Avenue,
I am willing to quit my job and lobby full time for the honor of having one of those in DTSS.
Hot damn. It’s on.
Woodsider, there is absolutely no way that a person would not see the canopy when standing in front of the civic building. It juts out and obscures the right hand side and corner of the front. And even if the reason that the canopy is not visible is because the rendering is cropped–well, that gets back to my original point about the images being misleading.
Brains, if you think cropping (or any type of photo editing) is that big of a deal, then you’ll have to be angry at every municipality or developer that built anything in the last 150 years. While you are at it, might as well throw in most consumer products from cars to laundry detergent. The primary view of the civic building is from fenton and Ellsworth and nothing is blocked from that angle. Either way, try to be patient and see the completed facility (anmatd with people) before passing such harsh judgement.
Okay, kids. Play nice.
I have more important things to do than extend this thread any further.
Hey, Eric! Thanks for asking people to play nice! Maybe Jennifer of the deeply missed Silver Spring Penguin rubbed off on you, at least a bit.
By the way, speaking of nice, I am surprised that no one commented on your note about Harry Sanders. He was indeed a very nice person. I encountered him at several meetings, and I wish now that I had sought him out and just had coffee with him. The Washington Post story explained Harry’s vision, and how projects he supported played a part. Wish I had known that sooner.
I find the Purple Line a deeply troubling project. I don’t think Harry or I could have convinced each other of very much about it, but I do wish we had talked. Just one more example of why we should appreciate people while they are still in this life.
Brains – I agree that the canopy/planting rendering and what is there today is just a farce – when you take a step past Baja Fresh I feel like the looming haavy canopy is going to fall on my head – not what I was expecting at all. That said I find the building itself much exceeds my expectations.
Springvale – I love public art and the Waler Art Museum sculpture garden in MPLS would be my dream to transplant here say into Jesup Blair Park. However, the purpose of this plaza is in its name – an open, gathering space.
Nancy N and others – several events in Harry’s memory have been announced and anyone can direct mail me and I’ll pass on the details. GreaterGreaterWashington and other sites have more on his life by those who knew him. In his honor, many of us who were blessed to know Harry are contributing to Purple Line Now benefit which he was working so hard on at the time of his passing.
Hope it’s not too late in this thread for Brains to see, but I owe you an apology. I have been by the civic building construction site ten zillion times from groundbreaking until a few weeks ago. But I walked by yesterday and saw….IT….the canopy that you complained so strongly about. I had no idea that it had grown that wide because as of a few weeks ago, it was only 1/2 that width and I thought it looked great (and was essentially complete). When I read your post, I couldn’t believe that anyone would think that slender canopy would be so offensive. Now I get it because it is about twice as large as I thought it would be. Of course there ARE renderings showing it that large, but I didn’t process it then. Anyway, Crow isn’t as tasty as, say, Woodside rabbits, but I hope you will accept the apology for harping on your opinions and maybe we can disagree on something more substantial another day