Alien Space

A power plant, and plants (of the kind that one works in) in general, is not really designed to be a showcase. The building is durable out the wazoo, or else it would not be able to contain the machines inside. It is, quite obviously, useful; the building's entire existence is predicated upon its ability to do something for people (in our case, pump steam and some energy to the university). But, whatever one may think of the twin cigarettes always pushing out white clouds and the rest of its facade, the inside of the building does not delight the average man. Perhaps, a particularly excitable engineer of some sort, but not most people.

The trick is, the building really isn't intended for people. At least, not in the sense that the people who work there are why the building matters. Don't misunderstand me, the university would be in shambles if the building's employees decided not to show up tomorrow, but what really matters is the machines they keep in check. The boilers, turbines, burners, and other various instruments inside are why the building is here. They, after all, provide the utility of the building. We need them to power our university and keep our buildings warm.

The design, if one may call it that, of the power plant reflects that. Machines go where there is space for them, and if there is no space, old machines that no longer work are torn out to give them room. The building is navigable by unmarked "corridors" between machines and a spidering network of catwalks and stairs. People can maneuver about the building, but only to right where they need to be to fix something in the machines. On their breaks, and when they are done for the day, employees don't hang out in the pseudo-atrium wherein lie the main turbines. They go to their break rooms, or leave the building and go home, or whatever, into the human spaces carved out of the machines' domain. The building is not for people.

I'm sorry I couldn't take any pictures to demonstrate what I mean, so I'll instead try to explain by guiding you through the stacks of the Math Library, in Altgeld.

Altgeld, also known as Math Castle

Altgeld is a maze of a building. Legend has it that stepping through precisely the right doorways will immediately transport you to corresponding locations in similar buildings on other campuses in Illinois, such as Northern Illinois University or Illinois State or the like. In the middle, there is a post office, but many students find it simpler to just go to the post office further away, on Green Street, because they can never consistently figure out how to get to the Altgeld branch. A set of stairs on the second floor near the lecture hall leads directly to the basement, with no way to access the first floor save for a door with no mechanism to open it. The building feels extremely old. The basement reminds of the bowels of Memorial Stadium long before the DIA dreamed of renovations. The classrooms, for the most part, seem like they could be identical to ones people like Shahid Khan or Thomas Siebel took classes in thirty years ago. And yet, stepping into the Math Library, things begin to have order, especially in the stacks.

The entrance to the Math Library Stacks, behind the circulation desk.

The stacks are, as one might guess from the name, where the library houses their books. Or, at least, most of them; there are a few in other places, but if you come looking for the books your best bet is in the stacks. Just like in the power plant, the main goal of the stacks is to provide residence for the books. Access for people is secondary; yes, people will need to come and find books once in a while, and yes, you have to make sure the books are not being damaged in any way, but really the people coming in and out are not so important as the books themselves.

Books, the true residents of the library

To that end, shelves are crammed together as close as they can be to fit everything. The stairs are designed to take up as little space as possible while still allowing people to get up and down in the process of carrying things (probably more books). Shelves are designed around the great pillars strewn about the room to hold the weight of the lecture hall above. The floors are translucent, providing a surreal environment where light does not come from the sun (that is, from above). Everything about a trip through the stacks gives the message, "You are a stranger here."

The stacks feature tight spaces between shelves and tighter staircases

One doesn't spend time in the stacks if they can help it. There are microfilm readers and desks to sit down with books, but you aren't allowed to take bags of any sort in. If you want to take notes on a book you find, you either carry in everything you need by hand or bring the book back to the human realm of the reading room outside. The idea of the stacks is to hold books, nothing more and nothing less. It is designed with the books' best interests at heart; any human elements come secondary. Just like in the power plant, the space is not for humans. You may merely borrow it from its true residents from time to time.

Oasis in the Blizzard

It's about this time of year that freshman from warm places like California and India realize that Urbana is a cold, cold place. It's hot, too, in the summer, but right now all anybody can focus on is how cold it is. The birds have long gone; the leaves fell and are gone, the grass is yellow, when not covered by snow. To get to class, people bundle up, find secret passageways, and walk through other buildings in their attempt to stay warm. Inside is where you find your warmth.

Several buildings on campus feature an atrium or some other large space. The Eagle's Nest, of course, looks out on the atrium of Temple Hoyne Buell Hall. DCL has a huge open area where they built an entire new building around the old one. Lincoln Hall's entrance features a huge space where the stairway leads up to the theater. But, the one that stands out to me is Beckman Institute's courtyard.

Beckman Institute, front entrance.

In most other atrium spaces, attention is drawn to the grandiosity of the space. Standing in Temple Hoyne Buell Hall, sheer walls on all sides and the metal screen draw the viewer's eyes up, to see the massive figural void the building creates. DCL's main floors follow THBH's second and third floor bridges to draw attention to the space below, and have catwalks above to raise your eyes to. Lincoln Hall's stairs draw your eyes up, and you see great columns surrounding you that rise up as well. But, Beckman Institute has lampposts. There are potted plants and art pieces, all at eye level. A cafe sits at one end of the building, with a small hubbub around it. The space is more of a complement to the real attraction, everything around you.

The interior courtyard of Beckman Institute, facing towards the cafe.

The interior courtyard of Beckman Institute, facing its eastern entrance.

In pictures, you see the bridges that cross the chasm of the courtyard to connect offices to lab space. But, standing inside the building, you feel more as if you are in a Californian pedestrian area (oxymoron that may be). The temperature is nice. The lampposts and art give it a sort of art deco feel. The cafe invites you to stop and chat with an old acquaintance. In short, the designers of the building want you to forget that the moment you step out of the building, your ears will begin to lose feeling from the wind and the cold (or, in the summer, that a wave of sweat will immediately wash over you from the humidity). They wanted to recreate the great ability schools in more appealing climate zones can take advantage of their ability to do things outside, by creating a false outside space that will never be rained or snowed upon. It's the condition of a midwestern university that they will go to such great lengths just to make a perfect "outside" area.

~~~~~

As a slight continuance of the discussion of the undergrad library, I leave without comment the inscriptions above two buildings on (or, at least, very near to) the main quad. Above Gregory Hall, the journalism building, an argument for the liberal arts side of the debate raging in the library courtyard, and above Davenport Hall, originally the agriculture building, an argument for industrial education. Refer back to "Palpitations of the Heart" for more details on this.

"A true university must be a fountain of learning as well as a school of instruction."
Quoting President Gregory, original president of the university, on the building named after him.

"Industrial Education prepares the way for a millennium of labor." - Turner
(President Gregory's opponent in the debate between industrial education and liberal arts)

 And finally, a few picture reminders of the trip as a whole: the main quad is a beautiful place...

The main quad, as seen from Foellinger Auditorium.

The main quad, as seen from Anniversary Plaza.

...despite some odd characters who join the table. Think of FLB as your crazy uncle, who you could never not invite to Thanksgiving, but he still doesn't quite fit in.

This odd building still has the red brick common everywhere on campus,
but is "designed in the style of the times." (Foreign Language Building)

Sometimes, people make mistakes, as in here on the side of Gregory Hall (just off of the Main Quad).

Why is that door there? Who is that for?

Lastly, instead of a grand entrance to welcome everybody to the north end of campus along the main axis, we have a piece of artwork and a huge wall.

The north end of the main axis inside Beckman Institute.
Not a grand entrance like on the other side of the building, but rather, "Colored Ribbons."

The northern entrance to the university, as seen from within the great wall.
(There's nothing here)

Sanctuary and Sensation

Safety is an aspect of architecture that I've never lent nearly as much credence as I ought to have. Imagine a grand, tall set of stairs. They are reasonably wide; you could likely fit three people standing shoulder-to-shoulder. They are supported by a set of tall pillars. They do not curl around on themselves; that is, the stairs are not circular in any way, and so you do not see anything above you or below but for the pillars. Even more frightening, there is no form of handrail on them at all. How would you feel about trying to walk up or down them? It would certainly spook me, at least the first few times.

I was picturing something like the stairs in the background of this picture.
Fantasy settings seem to hate the idea of handrails.

In Temple Hoyne Buell Hall, the center set of stairs, directly beneath the Eagle's Nest, does not suffer from any such problems. There are, as are almost certainly required by safety code, handrails, but more importantly, there's a giant metal screen directly beside them. The importance of the screen is, in some sense, that it makes you feel protected. Those with a fear of heights don't need to worry about ascending these stairs. As you climb them, you feel as if you are in a room completely separated from the atrium just outside, because if you aren't trying to look through the screen, all you'll see is a great silver wall of sorts. You know you're going up, if only because you feel a little more tired than you should for taking simple steps, but there's no slowly receding ground to see reinforce this idea. The screen makes you feel safe.

The metal screen in THB, with the Eagle's Nest top-right and the speaking platform dead center.

Sometimes, though, safety is boring. People want something... a little spicier. And so, architects might draw something to give the feeling of something unusual or dangerous. Again, in Temple Hoyne Buell Hall, the faculty offices are connected to the architectural studios by these magnificent bridge-like structures. I say bridge-like because they're fairly simple and the entire thing is indoors anyways, but they are assuredly there by design. As you step out from the relative safety of the office area, you immediately notice the great void to your left and right that constitutes the building's sizable atrium. Here, as opposed to the staircase under the Eagle's Nest, somebody afraid of heights would have some cause for concern. You're fairly high up, and though there are some pretty sturdy handrails to keep you from falling, you still feel the danger of the potential drop. The building has safety, yes, but excitement as well.

Grand bridges traverse from the realm of the faculty to the realm of the students.

Architecture calls for both the desire for people to be safe and secure as well as the desire for people to be thrilled. You want to make sure people know that standing in your building is not something to be afraid of at just the same time that you want people to want to come to your building because of the excitement they feel in it. In everything, there is balance; so too is it with architecture.

As an aside, I'd like to make two brief points on the entrance to the Architecture Building. First, it reminded me very much of the building I called a second home for the past three years, Uni High (University Laboratory High School, on Springfield and Matthews). Specifically what caught my eye were the pedestals out front with large bowls; at Uni, one could frequently find them filled with questionable artifacts, like a ratty old jacket or somebody's lunchbox. There's also the "trees" framing the door and the "pop-out" effect of the doorway itself on the two buildings. Second, on the niches above the doorway that once held statues, I'm sure they've been empty for quite some time, long before the construction of Temple Hoyne Buell Hall. After all, it took a student digging through the archives to find a picture that still had the statues there. But, now that the School of Architecture has officially left the building for THB, it's almost like the voids above the door speak to the departure of the original spirit of the building. Just some idle thoughts brought from standing in the cold in improper dress, I'm sure.

The entry way to Architecture Building, with missing statues above the door

A similar scene far away in north campus.

Palpitations of the Heart

The University of Illinois, then known as Illinois Industrial University, was founded in 1867. Its first president was a man named John Milton Gregory. With Gregory, we see the foundations of the antagonism that even today stands, between the liberal arts and more "industrial" endeavors. At the time of its founding, the people of Illinois envisioned the University as a place to focus on industrial education. Gregory, however, citing the Morrill Act of 1862 that had apportioned the land for the University, intended to balance this curriculum with the liberal arts tradition commonly associated with universities of the time. He was forced to resign after thirteen years marred by this debate, in 1880.

But Gregory successfully brought liberal arts to the University. In addition to his grave, found between Altgeld and Henry Administration Building, Gregory's legacy to the University can be found in several places. On the seal of the University, a book lies open to pages reading "Agriculture, Science & Art" (emphasis mine). Five years after his resignation, the University changed its name (to "University of Illinois"; "University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign" wouldn't come until 1982, presumably to distinguish the flagship campus from those in Chicago and Springfield), in order to reflect its more holistic nature than rote industrial education. And, of course, the main of three distinct subcampuses would come to what is now the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

The book on the seal names the three (or two, and attempted one) quads along the main axis:

Agriculture, Science, and Art

These three "subcampuses," as I call them, belong, naturally, to the three aims laid out in the book above. Agriculture: the "South Quad," home to the College of Agricultural, Consumer, and Environmental Sciences. Science: "North Campus," home to the College of Engineering, as well as two somewhat disjointed quadrangles (Beckman and Bardeen Quads). Art: the "Main Quad," home to the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences. These three subcampuses are such entirely because, to the people who populate them, there is frequently no reason to ever leave one's original in favor of another. To put a personal spin on it, a friend of mine, considering housing options, had immense trouble deciding on an apartment north of Green Street or an apartment near Krannert, because although he had more friends in the Krannert area, he hadn't had a single class outside of North Campus since his first semester.

But, what's quite peculiar about these three subcampuses is that, besides their distinctness, they come together to form something quite special. A great line, a meridian of sorts for the University, straight north and south, about which the three main aims of the University laid out on its seal hold office. They form the main axis of the University, along which sit such notable buildings as the Illini Union, Foellinger Auditorium, the Undergrad Library, Beckman Institute guarding the northern entrance, and the Stock Pavilion guarding the southern entrance. This axis forms the center of the Main Quad and the South Quad, and the main pathway leading from Bardeen Quad to the center of Beckman Quad.

Foellinger Auditorium through the legs of the bell tower along the main axis

Stock Pavilion through the legs of the bell tower along the main axis

The heart of a research university, as Professor Hinders put it, is in its library. In a sense, it makes a simple logical sense; for one, in order to do much of one's work, especially outside the industrial education, one must research what's already been done and thought. A grad student of the humanities would likely spend an incredible amount of time perusing the stacks of literary discourse analysis as part of their learning. In another sense, even the industrial academics are performing research that will wind its way into the library, in hopes of inspiring some new line of research by doing so. The collection of knowledge that is a library is literally the heart of the University, pumping ideas instead of blood to and from even the furthest extremities (*cough* National Soybean Research Lab, I'm looking at you *cough*).

The heart of campus, the courtyard of the undergrad library

And where better to put said heart than right along our main axis? It's even fairly close to the middle, especially if you account for the fact that campus also extends east/west once you reach the bell tower in the middle of the South Quad. The heart is placed, by happy accident or brilliant and extensive planning, perfectly to play as magnet for the campus, keeping everything tied to a central core.

From this angle, the roofs of the "temples" (or as I'd call them, bar magnets)

seem to point directly at the base of the bell tower.

It's also, thanks to the quirks of its location next to the Morrow Plots, a fascinating rehash of the argument dating all the way back to the University's founding. You see, in order to keep from shading the field, the building could not tower over the campus and provide visual reference to the pulsing, beating core of our University. It had to be built down, it had to dig into the earth and parts unknown, to provide the space a library needs. However, the heart of the campus still needed to feel somehow important. And so, a great big hole in the building was planned and burdened with two purposes: one, to keep people from feeling like moles, cut off entirely from the world above (its the same reason Noyes has a nominal courtyard with only some industrial-looking vents and a view of the sky; everybody wants to have a window where they work); and two, to serve as figural core of the University.

It's truly fitting that this core is a void, and not some towering building. In truth, the University doesn't quite know itself what belongs there. The rehash I alluded to earlier is of the argument that sullied President Gregory's tenure at this University in its first thirteen years. Today, of course, there is still some level of that antagonism on campus. To simplify, let's only consider the three groups party to this conflict. There's the engineers, residents of North Campus, who believe they bring the most notoriety and prestige to the university through high rankings and notable alumni. There's the people of liberal arts, residents of the Main Quad, who uphold what, ostensibly, makes the University a university. Lastly, there's the agriculturalists, who are the true origins of the University and still probably bring it the most money. But, though there is some rivalry between Engineering and ACES, these two form the old industrial education that Gregory sought to balance out with LAS's liberal arts. Which of these two groups holds the most importance or should dictate the direction of the university is still being fought out, with the courtyard of the Undergrad Library as the wound in the earth to mark their battlefield. Did you know that there are four different inscriptions in the walls of the courtyard? Below, I've taken pictures of them, and if you cannot see the words I've also taken the liberty of transcribing them in the captions:

"The real object of university education is to furnish preparation for efficient social service"

"Books are alive to the man who knows how to use these sources of inspiration and power"

"This court is dedicated by the Class of 1916 to the memory of Edmund Janes James, President 1904-1920

"Let this be a holy place for the human spirit consecrated to the forces which magnify the soul"

We begin, facing the south and the Stock Pavilion, with the opening argument of industrial education: "The real object of university education is to furnish preparation for efficient social service." They believe that a university shall only need to bring in and pump out people trained to most effectively better the state that (ideally) funds her. Presumably, this would be through extensive training in their own field, to the point of mastery, and setting them loose with a mission. Turning clockwise to the west, we have a more simple testament to the library's nature as "place where books are." What surprises me somewhat (though I understand the donors intent on highlighting the importance of their role in this building) is the inscription to the north, along the main axis, as simple dedication of the building. Instead, we find that liberal arts's opening statement, in some ways admittedly a mirror of the inscription to the west, is to the east: "Let this be a holy place for the human spirit consecrated to the forces which magnify the soul." Though this could be taken to mean that the library should be like a temple, I'd read it instead as talking about the University as a whole. Liberal arts believes that a university does more than push out highly trained civil servants; rather, it should help better the men and women who pass through its halls in both mind and soul! All parents seem to talk about time at college as a time of self-discovery, and university education seems somewhat inefficient still if its aim is merely to impart technical knowledge. There is instead an expense of effort to help students, frequently doing a lot of things for the first time, come to learn about themselves and their place in the world.

This is what I see as the true importance of the Undergrad Library, at least architecturally. It stands, as inverse monolith, to remind students and faculty who pass it by of the fight for the core of the school. It's particularly interesting that, instead of sitting precisely in the middle of the main axis, somewhere on the Main Quad, it sits nestled directly between the Main Quad and the South Quad, the homes of the original two participants of this fight. It does not seek to pass judgment on who is winning or may win in the future (aside from the subtle dig of moving the liberal arts inscription off of the main axis). It is, as a library should be, there to edify us, to ensure we remember this great war of culture.

~~~~~

A few asides and other things I found interesting about our walk on the South Quad besides what I've already written. The walkways along the South Quad use trees to tighten the great expanse of the quadrangle, as well as to give them a cathedral-like air. Originally planted exclusively with elms that stretched ninety or more feet in the air, they now are lined by a mix of trees closer to fifty feet, presumably so that not all the trees would die at once as happened when the elms were ravaged by disease.

The trees along the walkway barely seem to arc towards each other,

creating a tight space that doesn't feel so oppressively large.

The bell tower, in addition to lying along both the main and military axes, also perfectly frames them. This you might have been able to see in the earlier pictures from the Stock Pavilion and Foellinger, but the legs of the tower form corridors along the axes, as pictured below:

North (main axis)

East (military axis)

South (main axis)

West (military axis)

And an interesting story to add in as well, relating to the military axis of the University. If you've ever wondered why local college radio 107.1 has the letters it does (WPGU) as opposed to the more logical choice of WPCD for 88.7, Parkland College's radio station, the answer lies in what we discussed gave the military axis its name. W, of course, prefixes all radio and television broadcasters east of the Mississippi (generally speaking; K is its counterpart to the west); PGU stands for Parade Ground Unit, as 107.1 originally eminated from a broadcasting unit in the parade grounds way back when it was actually known as such! Fun fact for you.