| Kansas Center
For Historical Research Topeka, Kansas |
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On the site of a historic 1848 Indian mission and a 1980's museum, stands the new Center for Historical Research housing the State Archives, a public Research Library and the State Historical Society headquarters. The Center's architectural form evolves from both Museum and Mission precedents. The limestone walls are direct extensions of the Museum using the same height, material and joinery. Avoiding imitation, the new building's scale, gabled roof form, clerestory infill between roof and stone walls and punched fenestration all echo, in contemporary vocabulary the Mission's vernacular architecture. |
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The Center's internal development expresses its primary functions - archival storage and research. The basic planning unit, a simple thirty-foot compartmentalized storage module, planned for repetitive expansions, grows to form the overall building. The system adapts morphologically to increased spans and special requirements of public spaces creating environments reminiscent of great-plains pole barns. Inspired by the Mission's structure, the storage module solves program mandated fire protection without sprinklers or concealed spaces with an economical, environmentally sustainable, technologically efficient, laminated timber roof truss system. The exposed wood structure with articulated joinery and aluminum components expressive of the assembly system, instills in the building a refined order with indigenous ornament, yet retains a storehouse humbleness and recall of its architectural heritage. |
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The Center connects to the existing Museum transforming the competitive condition between Mission and Museum into a framing composition that uses the Mission as a focal element and creates a central outdoor space for the Society's "living history form". The original site development is reorganized removing parking from around the Mission creating a more natural setting, restores a wagon trail and extends the Museum's existing canopy system to new entrances providing a mitigating buffer between new and historic structures. "The Center communicates to both public and staff that the work to be accomplished there is stimulating and important; and conveys the commitment of the institution and the state to its heritage." |
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