Rehabilitation of buildings by the masters of Modernist architecture has become a specialism of the practice. Although these buildings are now coming to an age where substantial upgrades are required, renewal requires sensitive handling of the original fabric and architectural intent to preserve their historic significance.

Close study of twentieth-century architecture has informed work with buildings reflecting the breadth and variety of Modernism. Projects range from renovation of the Streamline Moderne De La Warr Pavilion by Erich Mendelsohn and Serge Chemayeff to repurposing brutalist architecture by Ernö Goldfinger, and Art Nouveau work by Charles Rennie Mackintosh. A series of projects in the United States included proposals to restore Louis Kahn’s Trenton Bathhouse in New Jersey, and Paul Rudolph’s Riverview High School in Florida. The most notable is the renovation of the Polk County Science Building designed by Frank Lloyd Wright – the central figure in American architecture.

Fixing the fabric
Completed in 1958, the laboratory building sits within the Lakeland campus of Florida Southern College – home to the country’s largest collection of buildings designed by Wright. The architect was persuaded to work on a “great education temple” by college president Ludd Spivey. Work on site began shortly after the end of the second world war, and construction provided employment to unskilled students at 10 cents an hour.

Though Wright predicted that the buildings would last for a millennium, their condition deteriorated dramatically within decades due to defects in the original fabric, exacerbated by the heat and humidity of Florida. A masterplan for repair and modernisation of the whole campus was prepared by JMP and Arup, and work began with the 6000-square-metre Science Building whose poor condition and unsuitability for current needs had raised the threat of demolition.

Damage was particularly severe in the concrete roof, and in facades formed from the unique ‘textile block’ walling system developed by Wright in the 1920s. For the original structure, more than 50 types of patterned, hollow concrete blocks were hand-formed in moulds, with grooves enabling them to be dry-stacked to make walls which were then filled with liquid grout.

Restoration entailed the removal of a 1970s glasshouse that obscured the original architecture, and the replacement or repair of half of the original blocks. Those with small cracks were patched. New blocks were made to match the variegated sandy colour, in new wooden moulds that replicated the original patterning and texture. A new concrete admixture containing a rubber-polymer additive was developed to give increased resilience, and blocks were relaid with additional stainless steel reinforcement. 

Raising performance

Within the building – which incorporates the only planetarium completed by Wright – bold but discreet interventions were needed to meet the needs of a contemporary science faculty. Revisions to the plan aimed to reduce compartmentation – which did not support the school’s flexible, interdisciplinary teaching methods – and create spaces for collaborative work. Consolidation and rearrangement of the varied uses – laboratories, seminar areas, lecture theatres, offices and social areas – improved usability. Glazed bridges introduce new routes across the central atrium at first-floor level, allowing easier circulation.

Modern laboratories need much more space for mechanical equipment than those of the 1950s. As there was little capacity within the original building, three basement chambers were expanded to take air-handling equipment. From these, risers extend upwards to labs and offices arranged on either side of a central spine route. Within labs and circulation areas this adjustment is made explicit in the form of bare metal ductwork that complements the rich colour and texture of Wright’s interior finishes.

The changes turned a building that had become effectively unusable into a state-of-the-art facility for the physics, mathematics, biology, and chemistry departments, at a lower cost than demolition and replacement. Moreover, acclaim for the project helped to spread understanding that with care and detailed understanding of historic fabric, neither structural flaws nor a complex, technical programme are a barrier to conserving works of architectural distinction.