I think they carry a lot of negative baggage that prevent them from adaptive reuse. Mental health even today is lacking understanding, but the procedures from 100 or more years ago is downright gruesome. Pretty difficult to get past that.
A school district purchased part of an large old institution, almost all the "historic" buildings will be demolished to make way for a new campus.
Abandoned Asylums
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Roderick Grant
- Posts: 11815
- Joined: Wed Mar 29, 2006 7:48 am
I can understand the baggage frightening off a minority who expect to run into ghosts, goblins and things that go bump in the night, but a reuse program would probably include deletion of the lobotomy clinic. Wood is wood, brick is brick, stone is stone. Take one of those huge, solidly built, handsome structures and redesign the interior to provide attractive accommodations, and I doubt many would avoid them because of their past associations with distressed inhabitants.
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Roderick Grant
- Posts: 11815
- Joined: Wed Mar 29, 2006 7:48 am
High ceilings usually mean plenty of room for ductwork.
Why only these types of buildings that seem difficult to recycle? Old buildings are redone constantly. The Butler Warehouse was massive and solid, without significant windows for illumination, solved by skylights. The only limitation on these buildings is imagination.
Why only these types of buildings that seem difficult to recycle? Old buildings are redone constantly. The Butler Warehouse was massive and solid, without significant windows for illumination, solved by skylights. The only limitation on these buildings is imagination.
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classic form
- Posts: 182
- Joined: Tue Dec 05, 2006 6:44 pm
- Location: Kalamazoo, Mich.
Traverse City, Mich. 1885. Northern Michigan Asylum.
https://www.thevillagetc.com
https://www.thevillagetc.com/history/
https://www.thevillagetc.com
https://www.thevillagetc.com/history/
Check out the historic postcard gallery at the end of Dave's second link. And there's this:
https://pennilesspromoters.wordpress.co ... e-commons/
SDR
https://pennilesspromoters.wordpress.co ... e-commons/
SDR
There's no knowing what the effect of time will be...
There's a stately old 1913 building in Atlanta that was once called the Winecoff Hotel. In 1946 there was a fire there which holds the infamous record for the most deaths ever in a US hotel fire (119). Some people were incinerated or asphyxiated, while others jumped to their deaths on the pavement below.
Surprisingly, in a city where most old buildings have been razed and replaced, the old Winecoff was not demolished thereafter. For the next 70 years it fluctuated between being abandoned or some short-lived, ill-fated attempt at reuse which never lasted for long.
I only ever remember seeing it boarded up, looking like a highrise haunted house in the middle of downtown. Spooky. Cursed. Doomed.
Then, about a decade ago, some developer went all in and renovated it full monty, reopening it as a hotel again, this time renaming it the Ellis Hotel.
I often wonder if its current success is due to the passing of the generations who remembered the horror stories of the Winecoff fire, replaced with a generation who don't remember or don't care. Or, maybe it's the current popular culture's attraction to zombies and other things dark & gothic. I think I've heard some young folks talking about it saying, "maybe it's haunted!" in a tone of voice that suggested "wouldn't that be cool?".
(Our cohort Tom from Black Mountain grew up in Atlanta. I bet he remembers the stories about the Winecoff fire.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winecoff_Hotel_fire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellis_Hotel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujWXIrhyeVw
There's a stately old 1913 building in Atlanta that was once called the Winecoff Hotel. In 1946 there was a fire there which holds the infamous record for the most deaths ever in a US hotel fire (119). Some people were incinerated or asphyxiated, while others jumped to their deaths on the pavement below.
Surprisingly, in a city where most old buildings have been razed and replaced, the old Winecoff was not demolished thereafter. For the next 70 years it fluctuated between being abandoned or some short-lived, ill-fated attempt at reuse which never lasted for long.
I only ever remember seeing it boarded up, looking like a highrise haunted house in the middle of downtown. Spooky. Cursed. Doomed.
Then, about a decade ago, some developer went all in and renovated it full monty, reopening it as a hotel again, this time renaming it the Ellis Hotel.
I often wonder if its current success is due to the passing of the generations who remembered the horror stories of the Winecoff fire, replaced with a generation who don't remember or don't care. Or, maybe it's the current popular culture's attraction to zombies and other things dark & gothic. I think I've heard some young folks talking about it saying, "maybe it's haunted!" in a tone of voice that suggested "wouldn't that be cool?".
(Our cohort Tom from Black Mountain grew up in Atlanta. I bet he remembers the stories about the Winecoff fire.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winecoff_Hotel_fire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellis_Hotel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujWXIrhyeVw
We have a vacant street-railway power station here, in the Fillmore district, which has remained empty for nearly forty years. In today's Examiner a letter-writer suggests that the building might serve as a museum to house a collection of old, ancient and antique fire-fighting apparatus, which quite recently received coverage in the papers as an entity long without a home, the engines and pumpers presently housed in various temporary locations around town.
https://sf.curbed.com/2014/2/17/1014294 ... e-and-turk
Only time will tell if this suggestion for use receives any better a response than did any of the previous ones . . .
SDR
https://sf.curbed.com/2014/2/17/1014294 ... e-and-turk
Only time will tell if this suggestion for use receives any better a response than did any of the previous ones . . .
SDR
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Roderick Grant
- Posts: 11815
- Joined: Wed Mar 29, 2006 7:48 am
Monuments to political points of view that have fallen from favor tend to be obliterated. There may be some leftover Lenin and Stalin statues in the ex-USSR, but probably not many of them. That there are hundreds of Confederate monuments throughout this country is surprising. I guess I never take notice of the various pigeon roosts 'round about. I would be in favor of getting rid of all statues that are not aesthetically pleasing, political or otherwise. Stone Mountain must have been more beautiful without the sculpture?
The most curious of the lot is the equestrian statue of Simon Bolivar in NYC. He seems to have been an estimable man in his day, although one can only guess what he would think of the state of things in Venezuela these days. And the NY statue is not without its charm. But what does he have to do with this country that merits a prominent presence in NYC or DC?
The most curious of the lot is the equestrian statue of Simon Bolivar in NYC. He seems to have been an estimable man in his day, although one can only guess what he would think of the state of things in Venezuela these days. And the NY statue is not without its charm. But what does he have to do with this country that merits a prominent presence in NYC or DC?
I know the exact statue of Bolivar you are talking about, right at the southern end of Central Park.
Yes, curious indeed, would love to know the story.
New York is really such an international city though.
The current confederate monument issue is interesting to me.
Jackson and Lee were big heroes of my childhood,
when war was a beautiful game that I played with my
cousins behind rocks and trees
on the hilltops in Virginia.
Moving those statues to battlefields might be the thing to do.
Richmond will have a HUGE issue here...
Monument Avenue in that city.... will need a "compromise solution"
Yes, curious indeed, would love to know the story.
New York is really such an international city though.
The current confederate monument issue is interesting to me.
Jackson and Lee were big heroes of my childhood,
when war was a beautiful game that I played with my
cousins behind rocks and trees
on the hilltops in Virginia.
Moving those statues to battlefields might be the thing to do.
Richmond will have a HUGE issue here...
Monument Avenue in that city.... will need a "compromise solution"
Of miniscule relevance but coincidental nonetheless, I was in a local history museum yesterday and ran across this dinner plate from the previously mentioned, ghost-infused & deadly Winecoff Hotel.
The plate is festooned with cotton blossoms, surrounding a wagon wheel enclosing various local architectural works, most all of which have by now been torn down rather than preserved, an exception being near the top where we see the state capitol and perhaps what appears to be a statue of a soldier, who's days are probably numbered.
The plate is festooned with cotton blossoms, surrounding a wagon wheel enclosing various local architectural works, most all of which have by now been torn down rather than preserved, an exception being near the top where we see the state capitol and perhaps what appears to be a statue of a soldier, who's days are probably numbered.
Local political and social big-shot Willie Brown suggested in his column yesterday that Confederate equestrian statues remain, with their riders removed. This brings up the question of how such bronzes are constructed; I suspect that, like stone statuary, the rider and his horse are monolithic -- something "Da Mayor" may not be aware of . . .
Perhaps he was being facetious.
SDR
Perhaps he was being facetious.
SDR
A bronze sculpture is not monolithic like solid stone, but it is of a single piece. Think of one of those hollow chocolate rabbits you may have received in your Easter basket if you had one of those as a kid.
Given my understanding of Renaissance practices, casting bronze sculpture was a clever process where the core armature might be clay or some other less expensive material, then the surface destined to be the finished bronze is a layer of wax, which is then covered with more clay.
They get all that in place, then using tubes (integral to the configuration) they melt out the wax and pour molten bronze in which takes the place of the wax layer.
http://www.gobronze.org/from.html
Anyway, that's a long explanation of why you can't just whittle away at a bronze man sitting on a bronze horse.
Given my understanding of Renaissance practices, casting bronze sculpture was a clever process where the core armature might be clay or some other less expensive material, then the surface destined to be the finished bronze is a layer of wax, which is then covered with more clay.
They get all that in place, then using tubes (integral to the configuration) they melt out the wax and pour molten bronze in which takes the place of the wax layer.
http://www.gobronze.org/from.html
Anyway, that's a long explanation of why you can't just whittle away at a bronze man sitting on a bronze horse.