Proposed life sciences center in Brown’s Jewelry District campus in Providence. (TenBerke)
Brown has released the design of its umpteenth medical research center in Providence’s Jewelry District. It looks just like every other building of its sort, a bland, inoffensive glass and steel nonentity designed by TenBerke, with interiors by Ballinger, encumbered with a bulky name comprising the chief donor and his wife.
The William A. and Ami Kuan Danoff Life Sciences Laboratories building with its seven stories and 300,000 square feet may be nothing to write home about from an aesthetic perspective, but Brown has assembled an announcement that informs readers of the design’s interlocking multiplicity of research purposes and capacities. The announcement is a veritable Rubik’s Cube of medical/administrative rhetoric.
Brian E. Clark, of Brown’s media relations department (the writer, it may be assumed, though it does not say), may be congratulated for the fecundity of his creativity. His first paragraph reveals its flavor. It reads as follows:
Grounded in the concepts of innovation, connection and flexibility, Brown University’s planned facility for integrated life sciences research is designed to convene scientists across multiple fields of study to solve complex, interconnected health and medical challenges.
But Mr. Clark has omitted a few words! No matter, there they are leading off the second paragraph: “state-of-the-art”:
State-of-the-art laboratory spaces illuminated by natural light, a street-level education lab accessible to the public, and plentiful interior and exterior gathering spaces are among its signature elements, as illustrated in architectural renderings released on Thursday, Sept. 12.
That pretty much sums it up, doesn’t it? But wait! There are still 26 more paragraphs to be read!
It is a sad commentary on a building’s design that an architecture critic can find nothing at all to say about it. Maybe the critic is to blame. I presume that my friendly rival Will Morgan will produce a more informative piece shortly for GoLocalProv, which stands in these days for my former employer, the Providence Journal.
Increasingly, the Jewelry District is refashioning itself to look more and more like the Danoff building, and in the not too distant future every building in the Jewelry District will be indistinguishable from the Danoff Building. Kiss the Jewelry District’s historical character goodbye. Is there a process for undesignating a historic district once it has been so designated?
Architecture Here and There 
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It looks like a scientific research building (which it is) and has a dynamic form and a solid handsome materiality. It nicely opens up to the prominent corner at Ship Street and has great landscaped areas near Richmond.
Overall, this is a nice building.
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To true, Dick! – David
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The design appears to be a mediocre office building in Washington, D.C. left over from 1968.
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I think it’s great. Love what’s happening in the Jewelry district. Will Morgan and David Brussat really love to preen on.
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I think the building design is 70’s retro. It reminds me of a time when men wore
polyester leisure suits and drove around in Monte Carlos. It was a time when
the public was conditioned to have to live with ugly buildings. This
building may be state of the art but it is definitely not cutting edge. It is not
ugly enough, it does not look like it is falling down or has succumbed to a
virus. It definitely will not win any awards. I fear that Brown University has
not selected an architect from academia who would have given us a more
Orwellian or Brave New World type of building.
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I agree with all you say, except I would not particularize the building as belonging to Washington, D.C. (my home town). It resembles many buildings in Washington, D.C., but also many buildings in many other places. However, most of those places have few or none of the glorious classical buildings that D.C. has, and to a lesser degree Providence. You are probably correct that Brown couuld have gotten a far uglier building by paying for a more celebrated and more expensive architect. – David Brussat
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Damn, that is an ugly building. Our great grandchildren will be mystified by our embrace of a boring derivative design that celebrates not stacking your moving boxes straight and hoping the one with the glassware on top doesn’t fall over.
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