The Chronicle reported yesterday on Harris County's plans to demolish two of its buildings to make way for another amazing county plaza. Fair enough — the county has a lot of buildings, and apparently we could always use another plaza. The problem is that the two structures that are potentially on the chopping block — the former District Attorneys Building at 201 Fannin and the Family Law Center at 1115 Congress — happen to be two of the most architecturally interesting buildings in the courthouse complex. And given the county's recent architectural tendencies, we can only imagine what's ahead.
The Art Deco District Attorney's Building, designed by Washington architect Louis A. Simon, opened in 1938 as a federal building with a post office inside. In 1978, the county bought and renovated the 10-story building, and it housed the DA's office until it moved to the Criminal Justice Center in 2000. It's not a particularly exciting building, even as 1930s federal buildings go, but it is one of a dwindling number of Deco buildings downtown. As architectural historian Stephen Fox told the Chron, "it is a distinguished example of the architecture of its time." The Family Law Center is a more modern building that dates to 1969; architects Wilson, Morris, Crain & Anderson gave it a ground floor sheathed in floor-to-ceiling glass and upper floors featuring walls of glass recessed behind a cantilevered grid of precast concrete. One of the cool features of the building is that the entire upper structure seems to be balanced on the points of pyramidal steel hinges on top of the ground-floor columns — a light touch on a mostly no-nonsense modernist structure. Fox calls the building "the most distinguished work of architecture in the county complex," and apart from the 1910 county courthouse, we'd have to agree.
So why tear the buildings down? Well, the District Attorney's Building is standing in the way of the block-sized plaza, and county officials just plain seem to hate the Family Law Center. "It really, truly is not an attractive building," County Commissioner Jerry Eversole told Commissioners Court earlier this summer, seeming to overlook the fact that the county administration building, where his own office is located, is far uglier than the Family Law Center will ever be. "I think it's not functional, and in my opinion, Harris County would be better tearing down the Family Law Center and starting over." There's another angle, too:
Water is leaking through gaps between windows and the building exterior, said Mike Yancey, head of planning in the county's public infrastructure department."I don't care if it's ugly or pretty," [County Judge Ed] Emmett said. "It's crumbling. It's falling apart."
Of course, we could make the argument that the 38-year-old building is in bad shape because the county hasn't kept it up, but that's another matter. It sounds like officials have their minds made up: "I don't know anybody who thinks that building is worth keeping," Emmett told the Chronicle.
But there are people who do, of course. Fox is one; fellow architectural historian, UH architecture assistant professor and Houston Mod member Michelangelo Sabatino is another. "Why can't the county deal with more pressing issues than the destruction of its past?" Sabatino asked. I used to live in Boston, and I didn't see any older buildings torn down while I was there." Well, maybe, but we see his point.
The county's plans call for building a new, $85 million family courthouse to replace the Family Law Center and creating an open plaza on the block where the existing Family Law Center and DA's Building are located — that would be right across the street from another full-block plaza proposed for the block across from the new civil courthouse. We're sure the park space would be nice and all, but we don't have that much faith in the county's ability to create a functional plaza: Look, for example, at the small "park" behind the county administration building, the treeless plaza in front of the Family Law Center, or Quebedeaux Park, a pocket park alongside the DA's Building that always seems to be empty. In any case, it's not clear yet whether the demolitions will happen anytime soon: The commissioners will decide Aug. 21 whether to include the project in a bond package that will go before voters in November, and given that there are $1.4 billion in bond proposals, the new family courthouse could get delayed. Keep an eye out.
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