To differentiate between

new and historic fabric,

the architect detailed
a new balcony and stair
using materials that
contrast with the
existing wood and stone.
 Kieran Timberlake & Harris revamps Yale’s
historic BERKELEY COLLEGE, stirring up
controversy and clashes over old and new design.

By James S. Russell, AIA

rchitect James Gamble Rogers’ slate-roofed, carved-stone

P R OJ ECT S
A structures for Berkeley College at Yale University once
enfolded a world of almost unimaginable gentility. Though
much of the country was wracked by the Great Depression
when Berkeley was completed in 1934, undergraduates wore jackets and
ties to meals taken in a magnificent Oxford-inspired dining room, where
waiters in uniforms with white collars and aprons served them. At leisure,
students gathered around a grand piano or a record player, gifts of alum-
nus Paul Mellon.
T-shirts and backpacks have replaced the jackets and ties,
women have moved into the once male-only precincts, and a bowl of
cereal now frequently constitutes a meal. Yet the splendor of the dining
commons remained intact, if worn, when Philadelphia architect Kieran
Timberlake & Harris (KTH) took on the challenge of upgrading the col-
lege. As part of what Steve Kieran, faia, KTH partner-in-charge, Berkeley College was the eighth of 11 residential colleges
considered a deft and discreet upgrade, his firm added a small mezzanine. underwritten by Standard Oil heir Edward Harkness in a 1930s building
To denote the contemporary nature of the insertion, his team detailed it spree. Recalling the isolation of his Yale years in a New Haven boarding
with contrasting materials, and introduced a new fluidity of space by house, Harkness offered the university the then-vast sum of $15.7 mil-
adding an eyebrow window and inserting an opening onto an elaborate, lion to rebuild its student housing in the residential-college mode of
historic lounge. Oxford University. His gift enabled Yale to house students in manage-
Even before the balcony was built, this new element became a able units of about 200, sharing garden courtyards, elegantly appointed
cause célèbre at Yale. Labeled a travesty by critics, it inspired a petition for lounges, dining halls, libraries, music rooms, and game areas with a
its removal and an editorial denunciation in the Yale Daily News. It master, dean, and fellows. All these features were intended to nurture
attracted attention from the Wall Street Journal and elicited disapproval both lifelong friendships and academic achievement.
from Vincent Scully, Yale’s celebrated professor of architectural history, With additional gifts, mainly from Harkness, most of Yale’s acad-
P H OTO G R A P H Y : © B A R R Y H A L K I N , E XC E P T A S N OT E D

and architecture school dean Robert A. M. Stern, faia.
The battle of the balcony is only the latest clash in the long-
running debate over how institutions can keep a landmark building
vital while preserving the original work of art. Our era demands accom-
modation of stringent life-safety
regulations, access for the disabled,
new technologies, and—in the case of
college residences—an expanding
panoply of social and recreational
possibilities. (Singing around the
piano no longer cuts it, even at Yale.)
Can contemporary needs and expres-
sion find a place within cherished
traditional design?
emic structures rose in a relatively short period of time, meeting a very high
standard. Rogers designed most of them. By the mid-1930s, Yale possessed
an architectural quality and completeness arguably unequaled in America.
Project: Berkeley College Fordham, Yves Gauthier, Kimberley
Renovations, New Haven, Conn. Jones, Vanessa Keith, Catherine Moy,
Owner: Yale University Lisa Neely, Alix Peck, Jane Pfaff, John
Architect: Kieran Timberlake & Poros, Dana Reed, Marie Reichardt,
Harris—Stephen Kieran, faia, Nicole Rittenour, Anne Roderer,
partner-in-charge; James Timberlake, Amanda Sachs, project team
faia, Samuel Harris, aia, Engineers: Robert Silman Associates
Christopher Macneal, aia, Amelia (structural); Lev Zetlin Associates
Floresta, aia, Steven Johns, Patreese (mechanical, electrical, plumbing)
Martin, Ron Crawford, Clifton Construction manager: Linbeck

1
3
2
4
5 7
0 10 FT.
SECTION THROUGH DINING COMMONS 3 M.
When an institution possesses a campus of such singular
character and when it has graduated thousands of influential people
who cherish their highly individual memories, the prosaic process of
bringing older structures up to date can resemble tiptoeing through a
minefield. To many teachers, students, and alumni, altering the build-
ings means tampering with the university’s very identity.
A rare architect who actually cares how cavity-wall drainage
works and who can derive aesthetic inspiration from the performance
of materials over time, Kieran Timberlake & Harris seemed an excel-
lent choice for the first of the Rogers-era colleges to receive a
long-overdue rehabilitation. The extraordinary high quality of the 1934
structures meant that much of the building fabric needed little more
CAN CONTEMPORARY EXPRESSION
FIND A PLACE WITHIN A CHERISHED
TRADITIONAL DESIGN?
than spot repairs. Still, almost all the $35 million budget (made possi-
ble by a gift of Ann T. Bass and Robert M. Bass) went to conventional
historic restoration. Much of the work, such as air-conditioning in
public spaces, sprinklers throughout, wheelchair ramps, and screened
trash-disposal areas, called for a high order of sophisticated detailing
and design discretion.
Among the subtlest interventions was the reconfiguration of
the floor plans. KTH created more single dorm rooms while maintain-
ing a bed count higher than Rogers had originally designed. Using
alarmed communicating doors, the architect also assured two means of
egress from each suite, while permitting building managers to recon-
figure suites (by switching the door alarms and locks on and off), to
1. Swiss Room 5. Exercise
2. Servery 6. Dining Commons
3. New balcony 7. Multipurpose
4. Breakfast servery 8. New stair, elevator
6
8
Reconfigured Areas
accommodate groups of varying size.
The thousands of panes of leaded art glass set in standard
steel sashes presented the greatest technical challenge. Replacing the
windows with insulated units in aluminum sashes would have met cur-
rent energy codes while depriving the building of a key aspect of its
original design personality. From neither a functional nor aesthetic
point of view could the rusted sashes be restored. The architects con-
sidered a weatherstripping retrofit and the equivalent of interior and
exterior storm windows, and finally settled on an interior-glazed
vented steel frame that matches the existing windows’ exterior profiles.
P H OTO G R A P H Y : © R O B E R T B E N S O N P H OTO ( O P P O S I T E PA G E , TO P R I G H T )
This alternative nearly equals the energy performance of insulated
units, yet aesthetically, it is barely distinguishable from the originals.
Following the mandate of a planning study by architect
Herbert S. Newman and Partners and consultants at Bovis
Management Systems, KTH placed new social and recreational spaces
in the basement. A laundry, an exercise room, and a multipurpose area
surround a small cafe. In converting former storage space, the archi-
tects made no attempt to emulate lofty above-grade grandeur. Instead,
they exposed brick walls, cut discrete openings for skylights, cast quo-
tations from the college’s namesake George Berkeley (a figure
prominent in Yale’s early history) into the black stones that trim the
tinted-concrete floor, and disguised surface-mounted conduits, sprin-
klers, and light fixtures with overlapping grids of blackened metal.
Only two contemporary elements intrude into the areas of the
building most richly detailed by Rogers. KTH placed a new stair lead-
ing to the basement social spaces adjacent to the Dining Commons,
filling a former cloakroom and washroom and thereby avoiding the
alteration of important Rogers-designed areas. The stair’s combination
of concrete, steel, and stone eschews neo-Rogers style, proclaiming
The controversial
mezzanine was added
at the far end of the
Dining Commons
(right). The stair is
semiconcealed (below)
and skylit (bottom).

balcony
limestone concrete
plaster
new window

NEW STAIR AND BALCONY

 A niche with a view
(above) was added at
the new stair (above
right), which leads to a
new cafe (opposite, top
left) and multipurpose
room (opposite, top
right). Battens, holding
insulation, screen stairs
and chair storage. Wood
panels reverse to
dance-studio mirrors.

instead a design approach akin to that of Carlo Scarpa, the Italian

Master's House
architect known for modern insertions into historic buildings, such as
the Castelvecchio museum in Verona.
The stair has attracted little criticism. By contrast, the inclu-
sion of the balcony in the Dining Commons, which shares the stair’s
design vocabulary, was excoriated because it altered an important
6-Bed
LR Rogers-designed space. Kieran says it was needed to reconfigure the
1-Bed
kitchen and food-service areas. It also added 30 seats and improved
LR 6-Bed
access to the Swiss Room, a period interior given to the college for pri-
LR vate dining.
6-Bed Now that Kieran’s work is complete, Yale has given it mixed
2-Bed LR
reviews. Robert A. M. Stern professes himself happy with the result.
1-Bed 1-Bed
OPTION 2 “What they did was not all that bad,” adds Scully. Robert Irving, an
architectural historian who led the protesters, remains an unrepentant
LR
critic, still hoping Yale will remove the mezzanine, which he calls, “a
4-Bed
LR
8-Bed major and irrelevant architectural intrusion in materials, style and pro-
portions, as insensitive as was the Kodak mural in Grand Central
OPTION 1
Terminal’s main hall.”
1-Bed
LR LR
Tiny as it is, the mezzanine has become a larger symbol in the
preservation debate, especially as Yale has contemplated alteration and
1-Bed LR 2-Bed
even destruction of a number of older structures. Says Scully,
5-Bed 3-Bed
“Should we be able to butcher really beautiful buildings to serve
THIRD FLOOR NORTH; changes that are not fundamental? If we change the building every
;
 time we make a slight functional change (which is how he regards the
mezzanine), pretty soon there won’t be much left.”
“A generation ago, the world was far too ready to demolish and
dramatically alter our past,” says Kieran. “Today, the pendulum has
swung too far the other way. We place all too many buildings and land-
SHOULD RENOVATIONS RECOGNIZE “REAL
TIME” OR “LEAVE NO FINGERPRINTS”?
P H OTO G R A P H Y : © R O B E R T B E N S O N P H OTO ( TO P R I G H T )
facilities. So you have a convergence of not necessarily common interests.”
Irving argues that the preservation community does not want
the landmarks to be unchangeable museums. Instead, he argues, new
functions should be placed “behind closed doors,” not intermingled with
historic fabric. That no contemporary expression can be allowed to coex-
ist with historic expression, Kieran feels, is to embalm the buildings. Must
new spaces, functions, and design be relegated only to leftover spaces, he
asks. Out of the Berkeley controversy has apparently come a new con-
sensus if not a new orthodoxy: architects are to leave “no fingerprints.”

scapes beyond time, where no change is acceptable.” He wonders Kieran calls this “the dogma of total retention.”
whether the university today would have demolished the substantial Beeby, for one, sees neither side of this argument prevailing:
19th-century buildings that Berkeley replaced, or whether it would now “To be fair to the buildings, you have to deal with each situation as you
build anything as daring as Paul Rudolph’s celebrated—and still con- come to it. I think, in the end, most architects are forced to do a little
troversial—1963 Art and Architecture building. bit of everything.” Expect more aesthetic fireworks. ■
A further irony, Kieran adds, is that “Gamble incorporated a
multiplicity of styles and times in the design of Berkeley,” ranging from Sources Stile and rail wood doors and
16th-century English Tudor to 19th-century American-style Gothic. Slate and stone: Vermont Structural cabinets: Modern Industries
“We had an opportunity to add real time to the design in the way we Slate, Indiana Limestone Hardware: Best, Stanley, Rixon,
addressed program needs.” Replacement windows: Crittall LCN, Von Duprin, Detex Haëfele
“No one wants to harm these buildings,” observes Thomas H. Steel Windows Reception furniture: Trouvailles,
Beeby, faia, of the Chicago firm, Hammond, Beeby, Rupert & Ang. He Glazing: Rohlf ’s Studios Chairmasters
has for several years advised the corporate body governing Yale on archi- Custom steel doors and frames: Chairs: GF, Dakota Jackson, ICF
tecture. “But surveys of the faculty show that user groups want first-rate E. H. Friedrich Special lighting: Edison Price

Repr inted from Arc h i t e c t u ra l Re c o rd , 02.00. Copy r ig ht by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., w ith all r ig hts reser ved.