For Immediate Release: April 17, 2007
Preservation Engages Modernism in Milwaukee's Third Ward
Milwaukee, WI - In the last 10 years, Milwaukee's historic Third Ward, a former industrial area on the Milwaukee River, has been transformed into a thriving urban destination complete with art studios, galleries and schools, offices for other creative professionals, restaurants and housing. With the sensitive renovation of the Marine Terminal Building, by HGA Architects and Engineers, Inc., Milwaukee, the district also acquires its first piece of modernist residential architecture: HGA's stunning two-story, steel-and-glass addition to the historic Terminal Building.
Placed on top of the three-level former warehouse, the glass-clad rectangle is a major vertical addition that houses modern, two-level town homes with 20-foot-high glass walls and doors. A nine-foot setback around the perimeter of the addition creates a continuous terrace, from which owners can enjoy dramatic views of the Milwaukee River, Third Ward Historic District and Santiago Calatrava's addition to the Milwaukee Art Museum. HGA's addition to the Terminal Building brings the total size to 200,000 square feet, which includes 84 new housing units on floors two through five (a total of 158,000 square feet) ranging in size from 1,200 to 2,675 square feet.
The majority of the structure's commercial 45,000-square-foot first floor is now HGA's new Milwaukee headquarters (30,000 square feet). The firm's new space is ideal for its continuing growth.
"We needed to find a footprint large enough to provide space for our 120 person office as well as future staff, and we wanted to be close to downtown," said HGA Principal Cherie Claussen. "This site allowed us to do two things - continue our commitment to Milwaukee's urban city environment and design a solution for ourselves that fostered our sense of collaboration and communication."
The first level also includes offices for the Mandel Group (10,000 square feet), the developer for HGA's townhouse addition and the urban lofts or "flats" created on levels two and three of the existing building. Along a new glass-fronted arcade on an urban corner of building's first level, former loading-dock doors open into a nine-foot wide corridor of eateries and coffee shops; in its materials and proportions, the arcade mimics the glass-and-steel addition above it.
Because of the Historic District's federal National Register status, HGA had to acquire approval for the modernist addition from the Third Ward Architectural Review Board. "It was challenging, but we made it happen because the addition doesn't conflict with the Terminal Building's historicism; it enhances it," explains Jim Shields, AIA, project designer, HGA.
Building on Historic Precedent. Constructed in 1919, the Marine Terminal Building was a destination for Great Lakes freighters hauling goods up and down the Milwaukee River. The freighters would pull up to the building's docks and unload directly into the warehouse, where the goods were then reloaded onto carts and trucks for their next leg of transport. In the 1980s, the building's use as a boat-to-truck shipping terminal ceased. A commercial printer and an industrial-brake manufacturer occupied the building for a time.
While the long structure is simple in construction, it possesses several unique features. The building "has a slight bend in it that mirrors a bend in the river," Shields says. In addition, the Terminal Building has handsome steel-sash windows, which are being replicated where necessary in aluminum. Inside, the concrete-frame building is crisscrossed with a grid of giant capital columns, with tops that flare into a dramatic mushroom shape.
Because the columns were coated in white lead paint, HGA issued an order for lead abatement throughout the entire building. Sandblasting and cleanup revealed "beautiful original concrete columns,"Shields comments, whose authenticity HGA retained. "There's something ancient and majestic about these marching rows of concrete mushroom capitals," Shields says, "so the columns became a strong architectural feature of the building."
In the HGA offices, the architects offset the walls so the columns emerge like freestanding sentinels; the columns are also uplit for dramatic effect. On floors two and three, where the warehouse space has been renovated into lofts, spaces between nine-foot columns were combined to create a width of 18 feet and 6 inches that generated a module approved within the residential industry. In the condo units, HGA also elected to leave freestanding columns.
On the building's street level, HGA converted a series of truck berths with overhead doors into a glass-fronted arcade, with coffee shops and restaurants, whose doors can be opened on temperate days during spring, summer and fall.
"We've turned the loading dock into an open-air arcade, so the memory of those truck portals isn't lost," Shields explains. The dock's original industrial rain canopy, which hung on black-iron rods, will also be restored. "We tried to treat the historic building with respect," Shields says. The firm was also able to exercise its commitment to sustainable design. As they began the Terminal Building project, HGA took part in a pilot project to determine the final criteria for this LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) building type. Once completed, the HGA office will be a LEED Silver office.
Marrying Modern to Historic. To ensure a seamless architectural connection between the 1919 structure and the 21-century addition, HGA designed a new glass wall along the back of the first-floor arcade that's set back nine feet-just as the addition is above. Moreover, because the new glass wall occupies the same vertical plane as the setback addition, "it appears as if this new glass addition on top actually drives down through the building to the back of the arcade," Shields says. In its design, the new glass-and-steel addition also preserves the rhythms of the original building's facade of vertical and horizontal lines.
The addition's two-story town-home units feature 20-foot-glass walls overlooking the city or the river, with glass doors that open to the rooftop terrace. Inside, the one-, two- and three-bedroom town homes feature exposed columns, open two-level stairways, loft rooms, hardwood floors, granite countertops and stainless appliances. In their orientation and views, design and finishes, the town homes are "truly thrilling units," Shields says.
Heated parking for the entire building is housed underground in the structure's basement. While the Marine Terminal Building's original piers and docks have rotted away, HGA is designing and installing a new river walk. Direct lake-access boat slips will be available for purchase. "The relationship between modern and historic has to be carefully studied, and in the end there needs to be a contrast between the architectural styles, but it needs to be a precise contrast," Shields adds. The Marine Terminal Building's renovation and addition accomplish just that.
:: Marine Terminal Building, HGA Great Lakes Office
HGA Contact: Julie Luers (612) 758-4000 e-mail JLuers@hga.com
Media Contact: Susan Evans, Evans Larson (612) 338-6999 e-mail susan@evanslarson.com