Addressing Kimmel Center's Issues - Page 2 - PhillyBlog

CountFunkula · #11 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008, 10:36 AM

another idea:

book a few acts in there that broaden the demographics and give the place a bit more hipness.

makes everyone feel like it is their building too...not just the playground for the over 75 crowd.

I went to a concert recently and felt like the audience needed oxygen. It was an old crowd. This city is getting younger. And young people hang out in bars, clubs, etc. Old people go home and fall asleep early. They are also not picking people up as often...so this notion of this great meeting place has to become a little hipper, younger, and more diverse.

Busing in people from the retirement home to watch concerts doesn't exactly turn the place into a major nightlife mecca.

ChasingFoxes · #12 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008, 12:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hyzer

The building is so wrong . . . . . frankly, I'd turn the thing into an aquarium. Just fill it with water, add fish.

Vinoly clearly did not understand Philadelphia. He forced a concept ill suited for the given site. May he sleep with the fishes.

Seriously - I understand that the AIA book store and AIA headquarters are moving from their 17th and Sansom location. Given the amount of traffic that the architects' book store generates, it would be have interesting to see the Philadelphia Chapter of the AIA move into the Kimmel. Would add lots of people (and would be a odd turn to have the AIA chapter in such a failure of a building).

So - best fix, anything that adds people 24-7. Bookstore, Starbucks, live music, cars (car show cross over - "come to the Kimmel to see concept cars -for free- get discount tickets for the car show"), plants (Flower Show cross over), art from the Art Museum (its a theme, link to all Philly institutions), comfy seating, cyber cafe, have Ryan Howard try to hit a baseball over the top from Broad Street on opening day . . . . .

Dont think its fair to call the Kimmel a "failure"...just a work in progress.

The car show crossover idea is intriguing...i cant imagine the convention center is sending a lot of out of towners to the Kimmel to see the Phila Orchestra and whatnot. Hopefully the board of directors isn't so stodgy as to reject that idea.

hyzer · #13 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008, 04:58 PM

The urban concept of the building is a failure. The concept – to have each concert hall as a discreet object within a space, around which people can circulate in the space as though it is an outdoor public/urban/city plaza (but actually covered, dramatically).

Why the concept fails:

Neither performance hall can be discreet; in fact, each is tied to all its back-of-house necessities. The public can’t circumnavigate around them. Both are “encumbered” ruining the effect. This is a fact of life, performance halls have dressing rooms, green rooms, storage areas, flys and pits, lounges, bathrooms and much more.

The site is too small for the two halls and the space necessary to achieve the effect of two separate forms in an open area.

The interior space is separated from the street, and no amount of fancy skylight can create the feeling of a public/urban/city plaza once severed from the street.

The interior is sterile, bereft of anything public. The interior serves the performance halls only. If you aren’t going to a concert, one would never enter the space.

The space is not a “through” space, one can not “cut-through” the block to reach another major destination. People cut through the rotunda of the Liberty Center all the time to get from Market Street to Chestnut Street, see the shops, get out of the rain, go to the food court, city stuff . . . . . not so at the Kimmel.

The site is too tight for the concept and the concept was not well considered to begin with.

MarketStEl · #14 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008, 05:04 PM

Agree with everything Hyzer says about the Kimmel's functionality, but believe that blasting open the Broad and Spruce corner and adding a passer-by attraction (restaurant or exhibit) there might make it serve its intended purpose better.

Jayfar · #15 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008, 11:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hyzer

The urban concept of the building is a failure. The concept – to have each concert hall as a discreet object within a space, around which people can circulate in the space as though it is an outdoor public/urban/city plaza (but actually covered, dramatically).

You meant discrete, of course.

thunda · #16 (**permalink**) 02-06-2008, 02:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hyzer

The urban concept of the building is a failure. The concept – to have each concert hall as a discreet object within a space, around which people can circulate in the space as though it is an outdoor public/urban/city plaza (but actually covered, dramatically).

Why the concept fails:

Neither performance hall can be discreet; in fact, each is tied to all its back-of-house necessities. The public can’t circumnavigate around them. Both are “encumbered” ruining the effect. This is a fact of life, performance halls have dressing rooms, green rooms, storage areas, flys and pits, lounges, bathrooms and much more.

The site is too small for the two halls and the space necessary to achieve the effect of two separate forms in an open area.

The interior space is separated from the street, and no amount of fancy skylight can create the feeling of a public/urban/city plaza once severed from the street.

The interior is sterile, bereft of anything public. The interior serves the performance halls only. If you aren’t going to a concert, one would never enter the space.

The space is not a “through” space, one can not “cut-through” the block to reach another major destination. People cut through the rotunda of the Liberty Center all the time to get from Market Street to Chestnut Street, see the shops, get out of the rain, go to the food court, city stuff . . . . . not so at the Kimmel.

The site is too tight for the concept and the concept was not well considered to begin with.

I have to disagree. I think the interior of the Kimmel Center is quite striking, and does have something of the effect of an enclosed city plaza. It's the outside that's the problem - as has been noted many (many, many) times, the red brick is ugly and uninteresting, the black cube, wastes its prominent corner, and the center turns long, dead walls along Broad, Spruce, and 15th.

I do sort of agree about the "through-routing" aspect. I had never thought to compare the Kimmel to the Gallery or Liberty Place, but it could have been interesting if people used its interior as a walking route.

Kukla65th · #17 (**permalink**) 02-07-2008, 01:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChasingFoxes

Dont think its fair to call the Kimmel a "failure"...just a work in progress.

When the expenditure is as astronomical as it was to create and build the Kimmel, it is reasonable for the public to expect that it would be a good fit from day one.

So while, yes, it appears that there is a groundswell to make the Kimmel a "work in progress" in the coming years, in no way should it have had to be as such.

niksiz · #18 (**permalink**) 02-07-2008, 02:42 AM

The basic problem and change that needs to be made: the glass should be at street level, not the roof.

Such a change would also improve the energy efficiency of the building.

MarketStEl · #19 (**permalink**) 02-07-2008, 09:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by thunda

II do sort of agree about the "through-routing" aspect. I had never thought to compare the Kimmel to the Gallery or Liberty Place, but it could have been interesting if people used its interior as a walking route.

There are two problems that probably made -- and still makes -- the Kimmel an unlikely candidate for serving as an enclosed pedestrian corridor/shortcut:

1) It sits at the boundary of a commercial and a residential district.

2) Unlike Liberty Place, it does not occupy an entire city block, and unlike the Gallery, it has no everyday trip generators attached or adjacent to it.

Liberty Place works as a pedestrian shortcut by design: its main path takes you from 16th and Chestnut to 17th and Market (or as close as you can get to it without cutting through One Liberty Place) by cutting diagonally across the space.

Anybody heading from Market East Station to points east of it will find the Gallery's lower level the most direct route.

What similar trip generators abut the Kimmel? What squares does it cut off?

hyzer · #20 (**permalink**) 02-07-2008, 09:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

There are two problems that probably made -- and still makes -- the Kimmel an unlikely candidate for serving as an enclosed pedestrian corridor/shortcut:

1) It sits at the boundary of a commercial and a residential district.

2) Unlike Liberty Place, it does not occupy an entire city block, and unlike the Gallery, it has no everyday trip generators attached or adjacent to it.

Liberty Place works as a pedestrian shortcut by design: its main path takes you from 16th and Chestnut to 17th and Market (or as close as you can get to it without cutting through One Liberty Place) by cutting diagonally across the space.

Anybody heading from Market East Station to points east of it will find the Gallery's lower level the most direct route.

What similar trip generators abut the Kimmel? What squares does it cut off?

Exactly - failed concept. Might have worked if the Kimmel occupied a full city block between Market and Chestnut.

As it is, the Kimmel is pretending to be something that it simply cannot be.