Massachusetts General Hospital Building For The Third Century

I assume it's for this. The woodification of Boston continues apace.

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I saw it again on the subway ride home tonite,It's not a "Real" crane(one used for steel erection) but simular to the ones recently used on the old Ford building in Cambridge to build the roof screen,So I think ur right ^,I just caught a glimpse thru the window of a moving train,I'll look again tomorrow,maybe get a pix
 
Doesnt wood not have a very long life...?

I mean, if I was to build my home from scratch, Id use reinforced concrete, not some planks of wood from the home depot.
 
jass said:
Doesnt wood not have a very long life...?

I mean, if I was to build my home from scratch, Id use reinforced concrete, not some planks of wood from the home depot.
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Yeah, wood isn't very popular among most urbanists who see it a a sort of suburban/rural material, but for some reason I really like the look (and "feel") of wood clad/trimmed buildings.

It definitely has it's downsides, but properly maintained it can last quite a while.
 
Yeah the problem with wood is that it won't last as long as the rest of the building. I feel like in 20 or 30 years all these wood clad buildings will be replacing it with some ugly prefab material or something.
 
porter said:
Yeah the problem with wood is that it won't last as long as the rest of the building. I feel like in 20 or 30 years all these wood clad buildings will be replacing it with some ugly prefab material or something.
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Ha. I live near a 1 million sq ft development (recently sold by Chiofaro's partner, Prudential Real Estate) in DC which was built in the early 1980s, with a facade entirely of brick and pre-cast stone. The owners have spent the past four years repointing all, and replacing some, of the brick, and much of the horizontal stone tiles on decks and patios. The pre-cast has held up well, but the brickwork is another matter. I swear they must have spent as much or more re-doing the masonry than was spent on masonry in the original project.
 
There's two buildings going up around here, no? One's the MGH museum?

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Building is currently clad in bright shiny copper - will try to get a picture. Is this the facade (rather than wood), or is it some kind of insulation?
 
Looks to be a copper cladding, which would age to a greenish tint.
 
That's the power of modern space frame CAD designed and implemented with high-strength steel struuctures. You can simply hang whatever you want from wood,to metals, masonry, glass, to fabrics as the exterior depending on climate, societal values, etc. The wall has absolutely nothing to do with the overall integrity of the building except to keep out the weather. So in 20 or 30 years you can just recover -- much as the typical dwelling unit gets painted and wall papered.

In particular -- I'm expecting fairly soon to see fabric converings start to spread from hot dry climates where they are becoming fairly common to more temperate and cold / wet / windy climates such as Boston -- particularly as the fabrics get more sophisticated and robust -- nano and active properties.

The military is doing a lot of reseach on such fabric skin structures -- modern incarnation of the humble tent as they are lighter, faster to erect and breakdown than metal walled stuctures (e.g. quonset huts)
 
I walk by this every day and I always ask myself what the hell is the deal with the copper siding? Is it just an ugly cheapskate design? Or is it for possibly green energy? Like solar paneling that will power the building?
 
One of my friends works for LWA and he said the cladding will dull quickly and eventually turn green as part of the building's overall concept. It is supposed to be dull copper, not shiny and new.
 
Copper siding? I certainly hope that crackheads don't rent cranes.
 
datadyne007 said:
One of my friends works for LWA and he said the cladding will dull quickly and eventually turn green as part of the building's overall concept. It is supposed to be dull copper, not shiny and new.
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Copper no longer "quickly turns green". The air is not acidic enough. It will take more than 50 years for you to start to see greening unless you chemically patina it. The rendering suggests that the designers intent is for the copper to dull to its brown (which it will do withing months) ... and stay like that for a good long time.

cca
 
cca said:
Copper no longer "quickly turns green". The air is not acidic enough. It will take more than 50 years for you to start to see greening unless you chemically patina it. The rendering suggests that the designers intent is for the copper to dull to its brown (which it will do withing months) ... and stay like that for a good long time.

cca
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That's why I said dull quickly and eventually turn green... -.-
 
There appears to be some sort of garden or landscaping on the roof. Or at the very least, just 2 trees...

EDIT: Just noticed them in 02124's pics... I've walked by here dozens of times, didn't notice until today.
 
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