Platforms and Porches in New Formalist Architecture

Placing buildings on a platform was a common practice during the years of the New Formalism style of mid century modernism.

                  Reynolds Metals Building, Southfield MI, 
                  Minoru Yamasaki & Associates, 1967.

                                

                   Edward T. Foley Center, Loyola Marymount 
                   University, Los Angeles CA, 
                   Edward Durell Stone, 1964.                                            

                   Ambassador Auditorium, Ambassador 
                   College, Pasadena CA, 1974.

Horace Mann Educators Corporation,
Springfield IL, Minoru Yamasaki, 1972 
   

Oviatt Library,  California State University, Northridge. 1973

   Robertson Hall, Woodrow Wilson School of Public 
   and International Affairs, Princeton University, 
   Minoru Yamasaki, 1965.

   Some of the buildings on the Meramec Campus of Saint Louis
   Community College are on a platform and have features of both 
   New Formalism and Brutalism. The large amount of brick in 
   the buildings makes classifying the buildings into a single 
   style difficult.

The New Delhi American Embassy is frequently considered to be the start of New Formalism architecture and the break from the International Style that attempted to omit ornamentation or historical reference.

                                                                                                         

New Delhi American Embassy (1954),

Edward Durrell Stone.

The new wing of the Saint Louis Art Museum opened in 2013 and is similar in style to the 1954 New Delhi Embassy building. 



Frank Lloyd Wright sometimes put his Prairie Style on a platform.

 Hoffman House, Frank Lloyd Wright. Rye, New York, 1955

Sometimes more than one building would be on the same platform.

Main Plaza Lincoln Center, New York NY 1962-66.

Main Plaza Lincoln Center 
Left, David H. Koch Theater, 1964
Center, Metropolitan Opera House, Harrison & Abramovitz Architects,1963-66.
Right, David Geffen Hall, Harrison & Abramovitz Architects, 1962

The platform of the New Formalism is referencing the stylobate of Greco Roman architecture.

A pedestal is taller than a platform and usually not much wider than the structure it is supporting. It was more commonly used to support statues.

One of the most dramatic pedestasls to support a building was used by Yamasaki for the Rainier Tower in Seattle, 1977.

An example of a building on blocks would be the Beinecke Rare Book Library, Yale University, Gordon Bunshaft, 1963. This building would be Brutalist because of the unfinished concrete, massive proportions, and lack of windows on an entire side.

Many buildings in the New Formalism style are built with a colonnade around or under the  building.

  IBM building Seattle WA, 1963, Minoru Yamasaki.

   One M&T Plaza, Buffalo NY 1967, Minoru Yamasaki.

   Interior of One M&T Plaza

  Milwaukee WI

   Sometimes there was a porch supported by the colonnade.

    Northwestern National Life Building (now Voya Financial 20 
    Washington), Minneapolis MN, Minoru Yamasaki, 1964.

   North Charleston SC 

   Amon Carter Museum of Art, Fort Worth Texas, Philip Johnston, 
   1961.

   Fullerton CA City Hall 


   Sometimes there were multilayered porches similar to Victorian 
   buildings built in India.

   Irwin Library, Butler University, Indianapolis IN, 

   Minoru Yamasaki, 1963.

  Occasionally there was a large raised platform.

   Home Savings and Loan (now Chase Bank) 

   Pomona CA, 1963.

   These buildings with white ornamentation are found in every 

   city. They are all over Southern California.

   CashCall Building, Orange CA.

   City National Building, 1974, Oxnard CA

                                                                                            

   Pacific Coast Highway, Long Beach CA.