de Good, de Bad, and de Ugly

Tyler Green's mention of Ess Eff's new de Young Museum, designed by Herzog and de Mueron, reminds me that my fair alma mater squandered a Herzog and de Mueron design toward the end of my college career, a story I'll record here for posterity. "Reminds" is the wrong word, implying some period of healing and forgetfulness between then and now. The wound is raw as ever.

The Board of Regents commissioned the architects for the new Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art, which would house the campus's permanent collection and serve as a much-needed, premier university gallery and classroom space. In a move that shocked and insulted many, the Board never consulted with UT's premier architecture faculty,* taking it upon themselves to reject H & dM's first design stage in 1999 for noncompliance with Paul Philippe Cret's 1933 "Master Plan" for the university's architecture. Chagrinned or not, H & dM submitted a second phase that implemented aspects of Cret's Southwest/Beaux Arts style; this second proposal was apparently greeted with a professional insult. Rita Clements, Regent and chair of the Facilities Planning and Construction Committee, apparently asked a local architect she had hired to add a wing to her home for a quick sketch that she could take to H & dM to show them what the Regents were looking for. Can't y'all add some golden arches?

Didn't go over so well, obv. Now, I've heard that H & dM immediately returned a third design—a windowless, doorless box. Apocrypha notwithstanding, H & dM quit, and Larry Speck, the dean of architecture, resigned in protest. The outrage was palpable. Three schemes comprising 14 models, down the drain; the Board of Regents boorishly announced that it would limit its next search to American firms.

Naturally enough, not more than a semester later Herzog and de Meuron went on to win the Pritzker Prize, adding a layer of frosting to our cake of shame, which has now been topped with two big scoops of Walker Art Center and de Young Museum. A worse marker still—a black candle casting a light as dark and impenetrable as this metaphor—came in the form of the eventual successful design. Judge for yourself:

Kallmann, McKinnell & Wood, Bad Blanton, 2001. There are the arches!

Herzog and de Meuron, Good Blanton, 2000. Note how the design fails to match the, uh, simplicity of the Jester dormitory complex, which towers over the horizon.

I'm not able to find better images than those, unf. Click here for a larger shot of the Good and here for a bigger popup of the Bad.

And then there's the Ugly: Tony Sanchez, a Board Regent (a position he purchased acquired despite his lack of experience in education (much less architecture)) and one of H & dM's most vocal opponents, who ran a (quite brutal) campaign for governor on the Democratic ticket against current governor Rick Perry. Even by the November 2002 election, the sting of his role in the Blanton disaster was too fresh; considering also his otherwise rebarbative candidacy, I did something I haven't admitted to anyone since—I voted in protest for the Green Party candidate. Don't even recall his name.

I know. Green Party. Yeah, more than partly motivated by the Blanton deal. Yeah, I know, I know.

* Reading over the student daily archives, the professor quoted most frequently about the matter is Austin Gleeson, a physics professor. I took a course with him later on and needled him on the subject, since he was a member of the facilities steering committee. Never wanted to talk to me about it, though. Perhaps he was tipped off by the specks of blood that would form in the spittle on my lip whenever I brought up the subject? Could have been anything I suppose.