The Berkshire Eagle from Pittsfield, Massachusetts • 6

lluilding Rebuilding Real Estate. New Residential Complex at Williams To Be Dedicated in Sunday Ceremony IViltJiirfi Fijlc, slut day, 25, I9f By EDWARD FARRIXL W1IJ1AMKTUWN Tli nlnB(on (VI High l.hool Ho Urn given number of architectural anards, trovers ul cluster of four rr- crlock re tidrntiul buiidJBK. 04 Akk.nU-, Mr woikrd closely with Uid-nt compound of William College will be dedicated officially to-jnorrow morning at 11-13, Th tAruUlkJd addition to th William Colley ramp ha already born baptized, Th 2SS (ludrnt who will mike thl tVir home from now until June har bee arming Into the building line early last week. It lixiknd much like a mammoth ant firm with steady line of husky young men lugging their personal accoutrrmont from U-, Haul trader Into the giant cerement and brick cave. 1 In Ihclr first few days of scrv- romuilttre which prearnled ituthnt com epU of midcniul arrangements.

A a result of this close association, the buildings reflect the philosojhy and function of the residential house plan at Williams where student, faculty and visitor can meet together Informally, Kach house ha its own mam living room with a fireplace and appropriate furniture for residents and guests. Adjacent to the living room In each building is a kitchenette for preparing refreshments. Five study room i of different sizes In the houses will be used for seminars, meetings, typing aysirtn, T)i faculty member ronnecled with each of the taur util IX xu dilute aophoyuiie advicing will) the house. It will be available to aneiat at and encourage cultural aud social ao tivllcs, and 0 foster nalural association! of faculty and student at meal and other informal gatherings. In designing the rooms, the student expressed a strong preference for privacy.

Mr. Thompson came ap with a plan that givrs each student lit own room which contains a bed, drtk, chair, bureau, bookcase and closet. Most rooms are grouped Into doubles and quad which share a common living room. By opening the doors between the suite Uvlag rooms, group of tx or right can Join together. Tli residential house are named for four distinguished Williams alumni: The William Cullen Bryant House, the Mark Homing Hoove, the Franklin Carter House and the Washington Gladden House.

Bryant has a capinty of 62 atudenn; Hopkins, 72. Carter House, 70; and Gladden, 84. Four Dlnlag Room The fifth building In the com- The first level of thq Greylock Dining Hall features an attractive lounge with piano, comfortable furnishings, a mark bar and Hire seminar rooms. The second floor dining rooms arranged around a central kitchen. While th dining area of each house la a separate entity, the absence of interior wall Mend the antt together, but their unique angle also provide a sense of privacy.

Mr. Thompson used glass ft-tenslvely In all building to take advantage of the magnificent View of tli surrounding mountains. The glass walls in the dining rooms extend 13 feet from floor level to celling. The glass is tinted to eliminated glare. The group of houses la arranged at different levels to conform with the sloping land at Grey lock Corner which 1 on tha western end of th campus.

There Is a large courtyard to the north which will be used a a field for touch football and assorted sports. The entire area Is being landscaped with many mature treee from Mt. Hope Farm being planted around the house. Eventually more than 2M trees and bushes from the farm prop- fir, the buddings hare survived nd other functions Faculty Apartaaewta assorted tt. One enterprising discovered on Monday 77 Mark Hopkins and Wash-that the broad.

pretrd hon- bigton Cladde house have Vi ronal cement beams, that apartments for senior faculty frame the exterior, served Ideal- ,,00,.,. The apartment have ly a 10 outdoor cooler for beer karate entrance. There are also guest suites for special visitors to the campus. and bverwurst sandwiches. Center Cewtiwveny The senior faculty adviser program ll part of the plan to pie has four main dining rooms develop the educational potcnli- and a small dining hall for con- erty will be moved to Grrylock al of the new residential bouse ference luncheons.

Comers. CONTROVERSIAL RESIDENTIAL HOUSES William. College began absorbing atudenl U.i weeL Thera seems to be some difference of opinion among Williams men over the appropriateness of tho design of the Greylock bouse. The aquared-off Adam Memorial Theater in the tipper right hand corner aeema to eaae the transition from modern to traditional. The central building is the combined dining hall serving the dormitories that surround it.

Arcliitrctural Review Williams Art Professor Praises Ncic Complex: Calls It Simple Strong, Immensely Impressive By PROF. W. n. PIERSON Jr. effect Is conditioned by the bands of concrete which stretch stress their natural qualities.

The sturdy structures have also survived a barrage of enliclans from both town and gown camp. There are thoae who object to the rugged, modern lines because the general arohitectu-ral theme of the typical New England College'' has been grossly violated. And there are proponents who Insist the trim modern buildings represent an interesting transition between the traditional and the modern. It fa a controversy that will go on until the day come when necessity dictate the arrival of a campanion piece gomewhere else on the campus. 1 This is the largest single con-.

structlon project yet undertaken at Williams. It was done as part of the 1962 decision by the board of trustees to assume respoosibi- lity for providing housing, dln-i- Ing and social facilities for the entire undergraduate body. The decision was prompted by the historic move at Williams eliminating Greek letter fraternities. As a result of this dramtic move, Williams has established some 12 residential houses. Sev-r- en are located former frater-.

nity house which have been made available to th college. One former fraternity house has been converted into a new language center, another will house administrative offices, still an-other is to become the town hall I or Williamstown, BCC Architect Benjamin Thompson, senior partner for The Architects Collaborative (TAC) of Cambridge, was the architect for the Grey-Jock cluster. He is also chairman of the Department of Architecture at Harvard. He has been retained to design the proposed Berkshire Community College in He has done extensive work for other New. England schools including Andover, Brandeis and Clark University as well as the Ben- materials and structural method.

Even the steampipes are give a rote in this visual drama, la every room except those on the top floor, where the pipes terminate, they are set back In a recessed channel in the brick wall, painted black, and clearly visible as an essential part of tha anatomy of the buildmg. At the same time, their dark tonality and shining texture, In contrast with the warm rough surface of the brick, adds one more element of surprise and delight to the visual ensemble. Structure is the physical substance of architecure which encloses its vital internal parts, and to a large degree the specific character -of any building is determined by the nature of its structure. But every building is also built for a purpose, and in the case of these residential houses it was to accommodate the practical, social and educational needs of 288 Williams un- from bearing wall to bearing uall and provide the headets over the recessed glass window panels. The short dimension of these bands is determined by the fact that they contain the' depth of the coffers as well as the thickness of the floor.

At the top of each building this concrete slab is permitted to encircle the entire structure as a crown; and it is thicker than the others because it embraces, together with the coffers and roof slab, a low concrete parapet which encloses the roof area and screens its many projections from below. These horizontal bands of concrete, like the bones and muscles of the human body, are dynamically joined with the vertical brick bearing walls to form the basis of the proportional system of the buildings. At the same time, like the outstretched arms of one of the greatest On Sunday, Sep(. 21, Williams College will dedicate its new Greylock residential houses, a grouping of five major buildings designed by Benjamin Thompson of The Architects Collaborative in Cambridge. Mr.

Thompson is also the architect who was recently commissioned to design the new Berkshire Community College in Pittsfield. The buildings in Williamstown are the most ambitious architectural project yet undertaken by the college, and because they are so vitally a part of the current residential transition which is strengthening the whole character of that institution, community interest in the project has been keen. Its completion inau- WPre made by placing plastic gurates a new and exciting era' tubs upsid-e down 0(1 the pri. in the long and venerable histo- mary staging. Steel reinforcing ry of Williams.

More than'that, j-odg were placed between and the new buildings stand proudly above the tubs so that when the and confidently as the most vir- concrete was poured, to a level lie, the most imaginative and of several inches above the tubs, Primary support Is provided by brick bearing walls. This identifies the new buildings at once with several older structures on the campus sriiich, until 1850, were all built hi precisely this way. Carried on these walls, however, at each floor level, is a reinforced concrete coffered slab. This device replaces the wooden frame floors of the earlier buildings and unifies the Greylock bouses with the best in contemporary building technology. They thus become an effective synthesis between the old and the new.

The recessed coffers, which form the ceilings of each floor. most sophisticated works of architecture on the campus. Now these are strong words. They are at sharp variance with other equally emphatic critical Taflu MUSCULAR AND BOLD were the word used by William Prof. W.

H. Pierson to describe the cantilivered staircase that leads to the second floor dining facilities in the central building. The nigged handrail and the naked load-bearing brick wall express the architects theme of niggedness which is seen in the other buildings in the complex. Critics maintain the buildings are a drastic departure from the Williams concept. pieces of sculpture of all time, dergraduates.

To this end, com-the bronze figure of Poseidon, P. statial units have been di-recovered from the sea off Art- vded and subdivided, arranged emesia, they reach from support piled one on top of the other pouit to support point in a mag- jfj coherent organic scheme, nificent display of physical pow- he primary division is the open observations whiCh I have heard vealed this system (hroughout er- The effect is one of enor- expressed recently. Such terms the buildings. On the inside, the mous enersy P01fd 111 arrested IT as prison" and factory" have coffers are not covered by a action. been thrust at me with fierce in- false ceiling but are left open, ppnt th.

vronmm.i dignation and I have been told like the beams and joists of the There are no undigested Geor- Theatre to dinine social and that some good citizens of our 17th century houses Colonial gian frills here; no false wooden educational functions community are detouring to America, thus creating a series Boric columns furtively conceal- The Cadillac in Paints ing from the world that it is the concrete posts Inside them, and not they themselves, that are acually doing the supporting; there are no wooden clapboards The dynamic open arrangement of these five buildings was inspired by the Williams cam- -pus itself. The college, as it has of deep wells which not only add a sense of height to what are otherwise relatively low ceilings, but also provide recessed panels for the lighting. Further to clarify the structure, all the bearing walls on the avoid facing the new "monstrosity" at the Greylock corner. Such expressions are wholly in the American tradition; a building which does not provoke a reaction, favorable or unfavorable, would hardly be worth our uselessly nailed to the surface of over the years, has devel- a reinforced concrete wall. The oped in a random fashion deter-concrete slabs and brick walls mine(i largely by the pressure of are the structure, clean and une- needs and available land.

The attention. Furthermore, these inside are left in their natural same observations are not with- brick, while the nonbearing But the qualifying point must be made for although, in truth, Pratt and Lambert may be the Cadillac in paints it is available to you at only Chevrolet" prices, at the local distributors, i Kolmans Berkshire Wall- i paper and Paint, 439 North Street. A catchy slogan is ef-fective because it gathers up such a wealth of mean-11 ing in just a few words. There are those, for ex- ample, who refer to the 1 Pratt and Lambert line as the Cadillac of paints pointing up, of course, the recognized superiority, of the line. Call Or Stop In Fcr Information And Estimates On Insulation Fcr Year Huiii3 KELLY LUMBER Inc.

9 TeL 447-7354 897 Crane out a certain truth. Some of the walls have the smooth surface quivocal, revealed without pre- result has been several clusters most straightforward and vigo- of a light wallboard and are tense in all their power. It Is buildings, loosely related to rous buildings to come out of held away at their extremities this uninhibited show of physcal another, and separated by our complex society have been Frorn the bearing walls by a strength which gives the build- intruding areas of open space, prisons and factories, and these slight recessed channel. At no ings their uncompromising mas- Consequently, the Williams comparisons, even-though in- point in the entire complex is a it is this same campus has a diversified lnfor-tended as derisive, do in fact nonbearing element permitted spirit, this same display of mus- mal character which was typi-emphasize one of the most im- visually to interfere with the cle, which has been carried by cal of most New England col- essential strength of the bearing the architect down to the smal- leges during their early years, elements. jest details of the buildings.

Pro- This concept of planning was On the' exterior, the coffered portions are bold, textures are never seriously challenged in slabs' assert themselves with su- rough, and everywhere materi- New England untik the introduce preme logic In the horizontal als are used in such a way as to tion at Yale, during the early 20th century, of the pseudo- Gothic quadrangles built In imitation the medieval college quadrangles of Oxford and Cambridge. This claustrophobic nonsense fortunately never reached Williams and something of the varied and fluid space of the New England landscape still mediate and impressive aspects of the Greylock houses, its intense uninhibited masculinity. The Greylock residential houses were designed first of all for the young men who will live in them. They are meant house a large and varied group 1 1 of aggressive, vigorous males Ieared at I SUCUOljOt JllC Yale who are plunging into all the excitement and promise of the present, questioning, curious, Prof. William H.

Pierson professor of art at Williams, author of the architectural re- He recently returned from TOTAL HOME COMFORT Modernize Your Heating With A A rJ OIL BOILER Steam or Hot Water With Tankless Water Heater and Prevajls 0,1 Ihe campus. In a lectured efsitive response to this fan- seen coton the col there ec Grey lock houses has positioned his university puddings with similar spatial all the both Yale he re-ja. in masters BATHROOM KITCHEN demanding, but always on the move and scornfully impatient with sham and pretense. These young men, do not wear and knee britches. Ben Thompson has met this challenge boldly.

First, the undergraduates themselves have had a significant voice in determining what their needs are. Through the Student Committee on Physical Facilities, many useful suggestions were communicated to the architect and much of the character of the buildings was determined by these suggestions. The decision to give each student his own private room for sleeping and working, was the direct result of a recommendation by the student committee. Thompsons own sensitivity also led him to work in a way responsive to the need. In appearance, the buildings.are sim pie, strong and immensely ex pressive.

Proportions are heavy shapes are dearly defined, surfaces are rugged. In part, this view of the Greylock residential six-month tour of Australia buildings at Williams College, is New Zealand where he on American dvllization as through the arts. He was on a Carnegie Travel Grant. He lectured before and "public audiences in major centers and cities in countries. He is a graduate of the School of Fine Arts where celved a professional degree i painting in 1934 and a degree in fine arts in 1936.

also received a masters in art history from New University In 1941. and a of philosophy degree in art from Yale In 1949, Prof. Pierson served as professor of Architecture Massachusetts Institute of in 1952 and as a of art for the John Hay Summer Institute in Humanities from 1959 to He was executive secretary the Carnegie Study of the of the United States from I960. He ve arefully been incorporat CALL US FOR FREE ESTIMATES ed in the arrangement, and additional planting, planned by th architect- himself, is being brought in to augment the existing foliage. Following the rise and fall of the land, the foar houses are Irregularly spaced across the slope, while the dining hall, as the common focal point of the group, occupies low position toward which all spatial activity flow, and from which degree York doctor history visiting at Technology professor Fellows the 1964.

359 North St. MEMBER 1 1 'UffCTW L. R. Sveatland, Inc. 190 SOUTH ST.

24 HOUR SERVICE 443-64S1 TtTTrip 1 1 i. of design generates. The dining Arts 1936 to Williams Professor Praise Continued ta Next Pag.