State officials: Office project should be visually appealing

Design to be presented at Capitol tonight

By Adam Wilson | The Olympian • Published February 26, 2008

Buildings in a $260 million state construction project that would extend Capitol Campus will be highly visible, and planners want to make sure the public likes what it sees.

State officials advised architects Monday about the "skin" of three buildings planned on the Capitol Campus in Olympia. The buildings will be visible from the heavily used interchange that links Interstate 5 with the campus.

A public meeting on the proposals is set for tonight at the Capitol. The Legislature placed the project on a tight timeline last year, when it included funding for it in the capital budget. Construction on the new home for the Department of Information Systems is scheduled to begin this summer and end within two years.

For inspiration, project leaders examined the "spatial sequence," "shadow lines," and "articulation" of the columned buildings that house the Legislature and Supreme Court. But those buildings are supported by their stone-and-brick walls, which in some places are 3 feet thick.

Modern steel frames will hold up the new offices, so architects looked for new ways to follows the classic pattern: a definite bottom, middle and top on each building, and no flat, glass walls.

The group advised the architects from Seattle-based NBBJ to change their design toward one that will include more stone and less metal and glass, to match more closely office buildings such as the Insurance Building on campus.

"It strikes me that the stone means so much on the rest of the campus," said Secretary of State Sam Reed, noting that the Capitol and surrounding buildings are clad in locally mined sandstone.

Sen. Karen Fraser, D-Thurston County, might be a member of the Capitol Campus Design Advisory Committee and chairwoman of the Senate's construction budget committee, but she admitted Monday she was no architectural critic.

Looking at the crosshatch of metal and glass on one plan, she said, "That first one strikes me as looking plaid."

"Overall, the buildings seem somewhat boxy," mused Fred King, an architect on the design committee.