Failed justice center design: What Denver needs to learn from the federal government’s Design Excellence Program

Image: A "signature" courthouse by Thom Mayne's Morphosis. The Design Excellence Program of the U.S. Government’s General Services Administration supervised the commission of this building.

In 2005, Denver voters approved $378 million for a justice center. We were promised design of such significance that a “signature” building would result. Renowned architect Steven Holl was commissioned. But almost immediately after design work started, Holl was fired and the local firm klipp took over.

In today’s Rocky, art and architecture critic Mary Voelz Chandler says the city will fail to deliver a building of the significance promised.

The question remains: The klipp courthouse may become really good, but will it become great? I'm not just talking the power of a star's name here, but whether the design we finally see can overcome the strictures and challenges in place.

Signature, though? No. And for that, Denver voters should be cautious the next time they are asked to open their pockets for design.

But more important than budgetary caution, Denver should learn from this mistake. When Holl was fired, the architect said that the city failed to provide a strong advocate for design.

With the failure of this building, Denver should ask itself one question: What are best practices for commissioning great design?

The federal government does it well. So why can’t Denver create something like the Design Excellence Program from the General Services Administration?

After all, Holl is known for being difficult to work with. But this is not an excuse, he's certainly not unique -- the words "difficult" and "architect" are known to go together. And at the same time that Denver fired Holl, the Federal government was completing three great buildings from another notorious brat: Thom Mayne. In January, the New York Times noted:

At 60, this former bad boy now finds that his firm, Morphosis, is winning some of the most prestigious commissions in the country. Even more surprising, he appears to have become the first-choice architect of the U.S. government, which, under the ''design excellence'' program of the General Services Administration, has retained Morphosis to build a federal office building in San Francisco, a courthouse in Eugene, Ore., and the satellite facility for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration outside of Washington.

According to the GSA, The Design Excellence Program of the federal government advocates for “design quality and artistic expression.”

It establishes nationwide policies and procedures for selecting the finest and most appropriate architects and artists for GSA commissions. The program also implements rigorous review processes to produce facilities and civic artworks of outstanding quality and value.

So how do we craft a program like this program for Denver? I have no idea. But as the nation's designers prepare to visit denver for the national AIGA conference this October (when the National Design Archives will be unveiled in their new home at the Denver Art Museum) the people leading Denver should be asking themselves exactly that.

• Rocky Mountain News: Signature' lost in plans, By Mary Voelz Chandler, Art & Architecture Critic, May 19, 2007
• Rocky Mountain News: Justice taking shape, Demolition signals progress on jail-courthouse-plaza complex, By Rocky Mountain News, May 19, 2007
• GSA Design Excellence Program
• NYT (Times Select login required): How Did He Become the Government's Favorite Architect?, By ARTHUR LUBOW, January 16, 2005
• Morphosis