Alice Tully Hall

The Juilliard School building sits along the west side of Broadway, between 65th and 66th Streets (across the street from Avery Fisher Hall and the Lincoln Center parking garage). Prior to its expansion, it maintained a rectangular footprint of approximately 200 x . Also, prior to the re-development project, the building's primary means of connection to the main Lincoln Center complex was a large pedestrian footbridge (named the Paul Milstein Plaza) that crossed over and covered a large portion of West 65th Street. Despite the original building's shape, its site was rhomboidal in shape, due to the diagonal progression of Broadway through the orthogonal grid of Manhattan. Rejecting Broadway's diagonal progression, the architects oriented Juilliard to the grid, using the remaining triangular section as a small plaza. Though not located on the complex's superblock between West 62nd and 65th Streets, the architects identified the original Juilliard building with Lincoln Center through the footbridge connection and use of cladding. Gordon Bunshaft originally envisioned the bridge to better integrate Juilliard with the main Lincoln Center campus and hide street traffic. Little to no consideration was given to the effects of such a wide bridge on the street below. As Juilliard's main public theater, Alice Tully Hall was not given a prominent entrance, despite the fact that it was housed in the only Lincoln Center building on a site directly facing Broadway. The entrance was instead tucked under the second-story outdoor terrace/footbridge and the monumental exterior staircase that led up to it from the plaza. This feature along with the rejection of the diagonal and the setting back of the building from Broadway follow a similar logic of detachment from the city street that the main Lincoln Center campus embodied. This original entrance to Tully Hall became fully visible only once the terrace, staircase, and footbridge was removed in 2006. ==History==

Context and construction Before the construction of Alice Tully Hall, most of the chamber music performances in New York City were held at The Town Hall on West 43rd Street, which had been built in 1921. The founders of Lincoln Center wished to have a chamber music hall in the complex, as there was still a need for a dedicated space. Before construction on Lincoln Center began, the architects considered placing a chamber music hall in the basement of Philharmonic Hall (since renamed David Geffen Hall, formerly Avery Fisher Hall). However, as the Juilliard School needed a concert hall that was equal in size to a chamber music hall, Lincoln Center chose to build one in the Juilliard building. Construction on the Juilliard building began in 1965 on a site one block north of the original Lincoln Center complex and part of the parcel designated for improvement through urban renewal. The cost of the chamber music hall was approximately $4.2 million, all of which was covered by donations from Alice Tully, a New York chamber music patron and former singer. Alice Tully Hall was designed as part of the Juilliard School building by Pietro Belluschi, who became involved with the Lincoln Center project in October 1956, when he participated in a two-week conference devoted to discussing the planning of the center. The president of the Juilliard School consulted with Belluschi on which architect to choose for the project, and though Belluschi had submitted a list of architects to be considered, he was ultimately chosen for the role. He collaborated with Eduardo Catalano and Helge Westermann. Westermann had established an office in New York, which Belluschi and Catalano used as a local liaison for the project. Opening, use and renovation Tully Hall opened on September 11, 1969. Its opening night showcased the first concert of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. The New York Times praised the “restrained, elegant interior” of basswood, deep lavender carpeting, and raspberry seats,” and Mildred Schmertz of Architectural Record stated that Alice Tully Hall and the other auditoriums in the Juilliard School building “prove that it is possible to create elegant halls in contemporary terms without resorting to skimpy evocations of the gilt, plaster, and crystal décor of the great halls of the past.” In April 2004, Lincoln Center unveiled the designs by Diller Scofidio + Renfro and FXFOWLE for the first phase of its redevelopment project, which included the expansion of the Juilliard building and the redesign of Alice Tully Hall. The plan received final approval and construction began in March 2006. The plan was praised by many architecture critics, but it also received criticism from preservationists, such as advocacy group Docomomo International, which wished to see the original Belluschi building remain intact. The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission declined in 2005 to designate Alice Tully Hall as a city landmark. The majority of the controversy has been focused on changes being made to other parts of Lincoln Center, in phase two of the redevelopment project. By June 2006, Lincoln Center, Inc. had raised $339 million, 75% of the $459 million it was responsible for raising for the project. The total goal for the project was $650 million, and the remainder of the money was provided by the federal government and the governments of New York City and State. Lincoln Center also received 20 gifts of $5 million or more, nine of which were at $10 million and above. The donors included individuals, corporations, and foundations, as well as banks Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse, and Bank of New York Mellon. Tully Hall reopened in February 2009 with a two-week celebration. The Juilliard expansion and renovation was projected to cost around $100 million, but it was reported to have cost as much as $360 million; no official numbers have been released. The entire West 65th Street project was projected to cost $325 million. Charles Renfro, a partner at Diller Scofidio + Renfro, stated that the sum was probably twice as high as it would have cost to tear down Belluschi's building and build anew. ==Architecture==

Exterior In keeping with the Brutalist style, Juilliard features rigorous geometries and highly cantilevered forms. Initial studies by Pietro Belluschi and Eduardo Catalano related more toward the white classical temple image adopted for the other Lincoln Center buildings. The theaters and working floors are tied together by a West 65th Street vestibule-lobby that rises several stories, allowing one to orient oneself upon entering the building. The arrangement and packing of a campus’ worth of spaces into a single building greatly impressed architectural critics, but was not as well received by the students of Juilliard, who were confused by the building's circulation. The expansion by Diller Scofidio + Renfro and FXFOWLE extended the travertine cladding of the original building along the West 65th Street facade, and also created an adapted extension of the Brutalist geometries on the upper stories. The fourth-story row of recesses housing windows is extended, but with the glass displaced and extending beyond the recesses, differentiating the extension from the original building and subtly beginning to break the original Brutalist box. The Juilliard extension cantilevers over a sunken public plaza and a new 38-foot-6-inch-high glazed lobby. The underside of the extension tilts up at a 16-degree angle. A dance studio punches through the curtain wall, overlooking Broadway. The transparency of the entry makes it feel like an extension of the Broadway sidewalk. A grandstand of bleacher-style seating on the far corner of the plaza rises at a similar angle to the canopy. Structural glazed walls bring daylight into three stories of rehearsal space and classrooms in the extension, and the protruding dance studio is suspended beneath its soffit. ==See also==