Part 9 (1/2)
”There is a succession of impressions produced as one walks through the different parts of the grounds that play on the feeling and the mind, each part having its own peculiar influence on the sentiment. Along the main axis, for example, the Machinery Hall and neighborhood suggest a mixture of the cla.s.sic and romantic, as you understand the terms in literature.”
”The Court of Ages suggests the medieval with all its rising power of idealism in conflict with the physical. The Court of the Universe suggests Rome, inhabited by some unknown placid people. The Court of the Four Seasons suggests the grace, the beauty and the peace in the land where the souls of philosophers and poets dwell.”
”The Fine Arts Palace suggests the romantic of the period after the cla.s.sic Renaissance, and the keynote is one of sadness modified by the feeling that beauty has a soothing influence.”
Palace of Fine Arts The Garden and Fountain of Time
In the foreground of this poetic garden scene is the foremost figure of Lorado Taft's ”Fountain of Time.” In sympathy with the atmospheric influence of such a vista, Bernard R. Maybeck, the architect, continues the thought of the preceding page:
”To make a Fine Arts composition that will fit this modified melancholy, we must use those forms in architecture and gardening that will affect the emotions in such a way as to produce on the individual the same modified sadness as the galleries do. Suppose you were to put a Greek temple in the middle of a small mountain lake surrounded by dark, deep rocky cliffs, with the white foam das.h.i.+ng over the marble temple floor, you would have a sense of mysterious fear and even terror, as of something uncanny. If the same temple, pure and beautiful in lines and color, were placed on the face of a placid lake, surrounded by high trees and lit up by a glorious full moon, you would recall the days when your mother pressed you to her bosom and your final sob was hushed by a protecting spirit hovering over you, warm and large. You have there the point of transition from sadness to content, which comes pretty near to the total impression that galleries have and that the Fine Arts Palace and Lake are supposed to have.”
California Building Bell Tower and Forbidden Garden
The California Building is the result of perhaps the most interesting combination of requirements that could be imagined--to provide a host building for the home State of a great Exposition where welcome could warmly and generously be extended to the millions of visitors, where the officials could have suitable quarters and where the fifty-two counties of the State could have their exhibits. The location set aside for the concrete development of these requirements was most stimulating. An edifice to terminate the vista looking north over a laguna of silent water flanked by the wonderful Palace of Fine Arts, and just beyond, the beautiful Bay of San Francisco with a background formed by distant Tamalpais.
No style of architecture could be more appropriate to these needs than that which exists in California--an architecture romantic, peaceful, subtle and charming in its proportions. The task of adapting the Mission architecture to the requirements was given Thomas H. F. Burditt. He entered into the spirit of the old Padre builders with rare intuition, and he designed a building of impressive dignity and hospitality.
California Building The Arches of the Colonnade
The Mission Padres had built neither in magnificence nor in magnitude, and as both of these were requisite qualities in the construction of the California Building, they presented peculiar problems, and were treated with the thought of what one of the old Padres with a limited knowledge of architecture would have done if presented with the larger problem. So it seemed that the entrance foyer should be quiet, and ma.s.sive and should form a nucleus to all parts of the building. The magnitude of the edifice was so great that all the existing Missions of California could be housed therein, and in order to show the largeness of its proportions and varied functions, each part was designed as a motif in itself and closely related to that part by which it stood.
From the forecourt in replica of the Forbidden Garden of Santa Barbara, surrounded by old cypress hedges, by driveways, and walled in by cloistered arches, one can find the princ.i.p.al entrances to all the main divisions of the building, and also to the administrative portion which contains the executive offices of the Exposition and the official reception and banquet rooms.
California Building A Vista in the Colonnade
The cloistered colonnades so intimately a.s.sociated with Mission architecture have been successfully handled in the Court of the California Building. The molds for the columns of the arches were made by the architect himself, to give the semblance of age and that each should differ from the other. It was most necessary to avoid mechanical regularity in any feature of the building, and in consequence all the details vary, so that no two that are exactly similar are placed near each other. The arches are made of slightly different radii, and the bells vary both in size and design. There are ten main groups of entrances, but no two of them are in any way similar, and it was through these means that the attempt was made to obtain a varied change of interest in plan, ma.s.s, silhouette and detail and the lack of precision which must have existed at the time when the old California Missions grew into being.
California Building The Forbidden Garden
There had grown on this location for forty odd years, a hedge of cypress, weary with its age, and groups of trees forming wonderful ma.s.ses of foliage to charm the eye. This happy circ.u.mstance was cleverly utilized by the architect in designing the court of the California Building. A replica of the enclosed Garden of Mission Santa Barbara was laid out within the boundary of this old hedge and planted with old-fas.h.i.+oned flowers such as would have delighted the Mission Fathers.
In the center is a fountain similar to that at Santa Barbara, and the quiet splash of its water adds a touch of charm and romance. The bell tower of the building throws an afternoon shadow over the garden, and within a niche in the tower stands the statue of Padre Serra overlooking this peaceful nook.
California Building The Semi-Tropical Garden
To the south of the California Building, off the Esplanade, lies an interesting garden filled with various species of cacti and unusual semi-tropical plants. Interspersed among these are ma.s.ses of brightly blossoming dainty flowers--baby blue eyes in the spring and others, equally lovely, as the seasons change. In a sheltered nook rise the tall slender stalks of rare bamboo, sent from a private garden in Bakersfield.