Friday, July 23, 1999
Freedom Center unveils concept
Stadiums won't hide river 'jewel'
BY LUCY MAY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Artist's concept for the Underground Railroad Freedom Center.
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The new National Underground Railroad Freedom Center has been designed to hold its own between the massive sports structures on Cincinnati's central riverfront, the center's architects said Thursday.
Conceptual designs approved by the center's board Thursday offer the public a first peek at the national museum, which many planners consider the centerpiece for the city's redeveloped riverfront.
“This is a place that draws people,” said Ed Rigaud, the center's president and chief executive officer. “It allows them to have some understanding and insight they didn't have before, and gives them a basis for feeling good and warm together.”
The $45 million museum is scheduled to open on Cincinnati's riverfront in 2003. It aims to celebrate the courage and cooperation of the underground railroad, the secret network that aided slaves in their quest for freedom.
Legislation signed by President Clinton a year ago this week made the center the national hub for such research and remembrance.
A rendering of the interior 'welcome' area.
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The designs unveiled Thursday show the 165,000-square-foot
center will comprise three distinct, four-story buildings between Vine and Walnut streets on the riverfront's northern edge. (By way of comparison, the Lazarus store downtown is 184,000 square feet.)
Those buildings will house two permanent galleries and two “story theaters,” where center officials plan to bring history alive through dramatic presentations.
The buildings also will house a tiered, three-story “welcoming center,” cafe, classrooms, research areas and administrative space.
The ground level of the structures will be largely transparent, with tall stone walls embracing the buildings and creating paths between them. Bridges will connect the buildings to each other.
In addition to inviting visitors into the buildings, the transparency is intended to keep the buildings “alive” 24 hours a day, something riverfront planners consider important because of the other activities being considered for the waterfront.
The four-acre block south of the buildings will be a lushly landscaped garden that connects with the buildings and allows visitors to continue their experience outside.
“Part of the objective was to impart a spirit,” said Martha Schwartz, a landscape architect and artist from Cambridge, Mass., who is part of the center's design team. “It's not just another box with exhibits in it. We're ready for more. We're trying to do more.”
Ms. Schwartz refers to the landscaped gardens she designed as the center's “outdoor program.” Indeed, center officials have said from the start they want the museum to extend into the park space south of the building so the learning extends all the way to the river.
The garden will offer “places where families could gather, remember, celebrate and have self-discovery. Places where people can experience the nighttime the way escaping slaves could have,” said Alpha Blackburn, vice president of Blackburn Architects, the Indianapolis firm leading the design team.
It will take five or six months before the details of the design are firmed up, said Walter Blackburn, president of the firm. Center officials plan to release the final design in the spring.
Already, the design of the center has changed several times, Mr. Blackburn said. Some of those changes are the result of discussions with the city of Cincinnati's Urban Design Review Board, which must sign off on the design.
“It's an important public piece,” said John Senhauser, a local architect and a member of the review board. “It is a little gem, and it's sort of right in the middle.”
Or as Robert Oringdulph, director of BOORA Architects of Portland, Ore., put it: “We're kind of the jewel of the heart of this community. We're going to give it couth.”
Mr. Rigaud said he thinks the center will be a place that draws visitors unexpectedly, such as fans coming from Reds and Bengals games, with such features as the “wall of tears.”
The wall will be filled with tiny holes. Out of those tiny holes, tiny droplets of water will flow as if the wall itself is weep ing, Ms. Schwartz said. The water will form a shallow pool, and visitors will be able to touch the water as they contemplate its message of sorrow.
“We want (people) to feel the history,” Mr. Rigaud said. “It's another way to learn. It's a different way of learning.”
In all, the freedom center is working to raise $80 million to $90 million for the project. Of that, $10 million will be used for an endowment. The remaining funds will be used for construction costs, exhibits and programs.
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