Boston City Hall

Boston City Hall
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Boston City Hall

Night view of Boston City Hall west elevation and entrance from the plaza, with new lighting. 

Credit

© Anton Grassl

Site overview

Boston City Hall has been heralded as a landmark of 1960s Brutalism. Constructed of primarily of brick and precast concrete with massing that evokes an inverted pyramid, and based upon both modern and classical ideologies, its design was meant to stand apart from the surrounding architecture while invoking a sense of accessibility and openness. The surrounding plaza originally contained a fountain but after chronic mechanical problems it was covered with a concrete slab, creating a venue for public gatherings and events. It stands as one of the most important concrete buildings constructed in Boston in the mid-twentieth century, representing a complete departure from the prevalent architectural expression of the city and marks the beginning of a “new” Boston, a city of progress.

Boston City Hall

Boston City Hall from plaza

Credit

http://academics.triton.edu/faculty/fheitzman/architecturalmethodology-C.html

Site overview

Boston City Hall has been heralded as a landmark of 1960s Brutalism. Constructed of primarily of brick and precast concrete with massing that evokes an inverted pyramid, and based upon both modern and classical ideologies, its design was meant to stand apart from the surrounding architecture while invoking a sense of accessibility and openness. The surrounding plaza originally contained a fountain but after chronic mechanical problems it was covered with a concrete slab, creating a venue for public gatherings and events. It stands as one of the most important concrete buildings constructed in Boston in the mid-twentieth century, representing a complete departure from the prevalent architectural expression of the city and marks the beginning of a “new” Boston, a city of progress.

Awards

Advocacy

Award of Excellence

An Advocacy Award of Excellence is given for the nearly two-decades-long campaign to secure landmark designation for Boston City Hall. A broad coalition of stakeholders, including Friends of Boston City Hall, Docomomo US/New England, and Boston Preservation Alliance, among others, worked tirelessly to secure important protections for the building’s historic character by encouraging city officials, local Bostonians, and the public writ large to understand and embrace the merits of the original design by Gerhard Kallmann, Michael McKinnell, and Edward Knowles. When the influential Brutalist building faced threats of abandonment and demolition beginning in 2007, advocates mounted a sustained effort that spanned seventeen years and fueled growing recognition of the building’s architectural and civic value. They combined lectures, articles, public tours, media outreach, scholarship and exhibitions, all kicked off by a highly persuasive landmark petition that former Boston Landmarks Commission chair Pauline Chase-Harrell called “the best documented one I have ever seen.” These efforts engaged local, national, and international audiences, gradually shifting public opinion, winning over traditional preservationists unaccustomed to advocating for buildings of the recent past, and even influencing skeptical city leaders. Key milestones included two major exhibitions of original architectural drawings from the archives of Historic New England, a Getty Foundation “Keeping It Modern” grant, major publications such as Heroic and Concrete Changes, and recent investment and improvements to the building lobby and plaza. This unrelenting work culminated in December 2024, when Boston City Hall, including its significant interior spaces, was designated a local landmark, ensuring its protection for generations to come.

“The Advocacy Committee was impressed by the comprehensiveness and duration of this advocacy process. It shows that sustained steps slowly moving forward can have a great impact. Preservation efforts require tenacity, and theirs paid off.”

- Todd Grover, FAIA, Advocacy Committee Chair

“The partnerships and collaborations ran deep. Getting the Mayor’s support was huge. It is a remarkable outcome.”

- Eugenia Woo, Advocacy Committee
Restoration Team

Advocacy Team: 2007 Landmark Petition: Gary Wolf; Douglass Shand-Tucci (deceased); 2007-2024 Essential Advocacy Activity: Docomomo US/New England (David Fixler, Henry Moss, and Gary Wolf, among others), Friends of Boston City Hall (Joan Goody, deceased, Jean Caroon, Herb Gleason, deceased, Elizabeth Padjen, and Hubert Murray, among others), Boston Preservation Alliance (Sarah Kelly, Executive Director, Christine Piontek, Project Coordinator); 2007 ArchitectureBoston special issue on Boston City Hall: Elizabeth Padjen, Editor; 2008 Boston City Hall Architectural Drawing Exhibition, at the Wentworth Institute of Technology and the American Institute of Architects Annual Convention: Gary Wolf, Historic New England (Carl Nold Executive Director, Diane Viera, Vice President and COO, Lorna Condon, Curator of Library and Archives), Glenn Wiggins, Architecture Chair, Wentworth Institute of Technology, Richard Fitzgerald (deceased), Executive Director, Boston Society of Architects, Michael McKinnell (deceased), collaborator;  2013 Boston City Hall Architectural Drawing Exhibition at the Boston Society of Architects’ Space: Gary Wolf, Carl Nold, Lorna Condon, Eric White (Executive Director, Boston Society of Architects); 2015–2017 Boston City Hall and Plaza Study, “Rethink City Hall,”: City of Boston, Mayor Marty Walsh, Utile Design, Reed Hilderbrand; 2015 Heroic: Concrete Architecture and the New Boston: Mark Pasnik, Michael Kubo, Chris Grimley; Keeping it Modern grant awarded to the City of Boston, Getty Foundation; 2017–2019 First Phases of City Hall Renovations: City of Boston, Mayor Marty Walsh, Utile Design; 2018 Concrete Changes: Architecture, Politics, and the Design of Boston City Hall, Brian Sirman; 2018 Boston City Hall Conservation Management Plan: City of Boston, Mayor Marty Walsh, Utile Design, Building Conservation Services, Over/Under; 2020–2022 City Hall Plaza renovations: City of Boston, Mayor Marty Walsh, Sasaki; 2023 Landmark Study Report: City of Boston, Boston Landmarks Commission (Rosanne Foley, Executive Director, Bradford Walker, Chair), Murray Miller, Director, Boston Office of Historic Preservation, Eamon Shelton, Commissioner, Property Management Division, Laura Lacombe, Architectural Conservator, Building Conservation Services; 2024 Landmark Designation: City of Boston, Bradford Walker, Kathy Kottaridis, Director, Boston Office of Historic Preservation, Boston Landmarks Commission, Michelle Wu, Mayor

Primary classification

Administration (ADM)

Secondary classification

Law (LAW)

Terms of protection

In 1991 the Massachusetts Historical Commission determined Boston City Hall to be eligible for individual listing on the National Register of Historic Places.

It has been on Boston Landmarks Commission’s “watch list” since 2007. The watch list does not offer any legal protection, but should new developments that threaten the building come to light, the BLC and/or BLC staff may decide to prepare a study report to consider City Hall for landmark status.

Author(s)

Lindsey Schweinberg, Mary Nastasi | | 5/2007
Lindsey Schweinberg, Mary Nastasi | | 3/2010

How to Visit

Open to the public

Location

Boston City Hall

1 City Hall Square
Boston, MA, 02201
More visitation information

Night view of Boston City Hall west elevation and entrance from the plaza, with new lighting. 

Credit:

© Anton Grassl

Boston City Hall from plaza
Credit: http://academics.triton.edu/faculty/fheitzman/architecturalmethodology-C.html

Designer(s)

Other designers

architect: Kallmann, McKinnell and Knowles
landscape/garden designer: Kallmann, McKinnell and Knowles
other designers: Campbell, Aldrich and Nulty
consulting engineer: Le Messurier Associates
building contractor: J.W. Bateson Company

Related News

Related Sites

Commission

1962

Completion

10 February 1969

Commission / Completion details

commission date: 1962, start of site work: September 18, 1963, completion: February 10, 1969

Original Brief

Commission brief: The City Hall and the Government Center project were part of one of the Boston Redevelopment Authority’s first urban renewal projects. The project was conceived of in 1954 when local, state and Federal governments were considering building in Boston. Under Mayor Kevin H. White, the original vision was for close to thirty new buildings over 60 acres in the downtown region, at a cost of $260 million. The BRA hoped that local, state, and Federal investment in the area would go on to promote private investment. The area selected for the project had been known as Scollay Square, a squalid retail and entertainment district that was home to burlesque houses and dive bars. When the project began, fifty acres in the heart of the city were cleared completely to make way for the new structures that were meant to rejuvenate the city morally and economically.

Design brief: The master plan for Government Center was the work of I.M. Pei and Partners, while the designs for the City Hall building and plaza were the work of the architecture firm of Kallmann, McKinnell and Knowles, who won the national design competition in 1962.

Significant Alteration(s) with Date(s)

type of change: Interior conversion of gallery and reception room on the 5th floor to office space
date: (c)1983
circumstances/reasons for change: The gallery was converted to office space to make room for the City Council which had expanded
from nine to thirteen members.

type of change: Plaza fountain covered with concrete slab platform.
date: (c) May 2006
circumstances/reasons for change: The fountain had not been functioning properly for decades so the City opted to cover the fountain to create a new venue for public gatherings and events.
persons/organizations involved: MBTA

Current Use

Mayor’s Office, City Council Chambers, city agencies

General Description

The City Hall Building is a 9-story pre-cast concrete and brick structure that is roughly rectangular in plan of an inverted pyramidal shape
with an interior light court. The lower 4 floors are of red brick and the upper five floors are pre-cast concrete. The design is said to have been inspired by/modeled after Le Corbusier’s Convent of La Tourette. The City Hall architects used the massing and materials to delineate the building’s different parts and uses. The brick base contains the offices of ordinary use (taxes, permits, etc.), while the middle floors, housing the offices of elected officials, are distinguished by their monumental scale, placement of windows, and projecting volumes. Finally, the upper floors of administrative and planning departments are designed in a more ordinary fashion with more regular, repetitive window placement. The building is set in a gently sloping nine-acre brick plaza defined by geometrically arranged tree plantings. The plaza originally contained a fountain but after chronic mechanical problems it was covered with a concrete slab in spring 2006 to create a venue for public gatherings and events.

Construction Period

Pre-cast concrete

Original Physical Context

Names of surrounding buildings: Government Center/City Hall Plaza including the John F. Kennedy Federal Office Building, State
Health, Education &. Welfare Services Center, One Center Plaza and the Government Center Garage

Currently, Mayor Thomas Menino is reconsidering his plans to raze the City Hall Building and/or sell the site to real estate developers and
move the city’s offices to a site on the South Boston waterfront.

Technical

The City Hall building in Boston has been heralded as a landmark of 1960’s Brutalism. Heavily influenced by Le Corbusier, Brutalism was
all about the use of raw concrete with rough blocky forms and repeated angular geometries. The idea of Brutalism is that the form,
appearance and engineering of a building should “accurately reflect the advantages and drawbacks of the material.” The bulky mass and strong angular geometries of City Hall reveal this. Another aspect of the style was the exposition of the building’s functions. As discussed in section 3.1, the different portions of the building are reflected by the various levels of projection an organization of materials on the exterior.

Social

The social importance of City Hall is found not only in the fact that the building itself was a symbol of the City, but that it was supposed to represent a new era of economic rebirth for Boston. The City Hall building was part of a federally funded urban renewal effort that took place in Boston during the sixties. The site, the former Scollay Square, was an unsavory area that planners hoped to rejuvenate with the new Government Center project. The insertion of the very modern Brutalist structure showed that the City was moving forward, as it was chosen in part because it resembled no other city hall in America. The bold design showed that the city was confident in their new project and ability to prosper, and was intended to promote private investment in the area.

Cultural & Aesthetic

Mayor Menino may wish to disagree, but there is no denying that City Hall has canonic value in the narrative of modern architecture. The year City Hall was completed it won the AIA Honor Award for Architecture. In 1971, the AIA voted City Hall the 7th best building in the history of the United States. Most discussions of mid-20th century modern architecture, and nearly all on Brutalism, site City Hall as an important example of such work.

City Hall has proved to be a bit of a conundrum in the world of architecture. While the average person may have difficulty understanding it, and it seems to be the general consensus in Boston that the structure is aestheticly unpleasing, there is a certain value behind its design. One cannot deny that City Hall shows the values inherent in Brutalism, with direct ties to Le Corbusier. Its heaviness and angularity convey a sense of solidity and permanence, even if the mayor is trying to raze it. The inverted pyramidal shape draws the eye down, while the eye is busied with the patterns of windows and structural projections of concrete. The plaza, however, has had more issues functionally that aesthetically. The paved brick plaza, with its somewhat awkward changes in grade that create problems for pedestrian flow, has long been a thorn in the city’s side. Several design changes have been proposed to rejuvenate the area, with the most recent change being the concrete slab that was placed over the old fountain.

General Assessment

City Hall has very strong reference value in the scope of modern and Brutalist architecture. The singe most important reference it makes is to Le Corbusier’s Convent of La Tourette, Lyon, France, 1960. Le Corbusier was the inspiration for most early works of Brutalism. The name itself comes from a French term béton brut, meaning ".raw concrete," that Corbusier used in describing his choice of building material. Both structures have an upper massing with repeated fenestration, midsections broken up by irregular projections and window arrangements, and finally bases with strong verticals.

References

Baumann, Meredith, Boston’s Planning and Economic Development Agency, Boston Redevelopment Authority, http://www.cityofboston.gov/bra/press/PressDisplay.asp?pressID=20, 24 February 2007.

Chacon, Richard, “Suite Deal for City Hall Plaza,” Boston Globe, 8 February 1996, 27.

Fixler, David, “New, Improved Modernity,” Boston Globe, 14 January 2007, D9.

Flint, Anthony, “Save or Raze? City Hall, Fenway Talk Strikes Nerve,” Boston Globe, 10 April 1998, B8.

Glasser, Judy, Judy McDonough, and Ralph Memolo, “Boston City Hall, New City Hall,” Historic American Buildings Survey, National Parks Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, Washington D.C., 1993.


“Hall of Shame,” Great Public Spaces, Project For Public Spaces, http://www.pps.org/great_public_spaces/one?public_place_id=148, 25 February 2007.

Howe, Peter J., “City Hall Designer Says Building is “Grungy,” Can be Brightened,” Boston Globe, 14 December 1988, 45.

Huxtable, Ada Louise, “Boston’s New City Hall: A Public Building of Quality,” New York Times, 8 February 1969, 33.

Lockley, Walt, Brutalized in Boston, http://www.waltlockley.com/boston%20city%20hall/bostoncityhall.htm, 25 February 2007.

Whitehouse, Franklin, “Architects Pick Year’s Best Building Designs,” New York Times, 25 May 1969, R1.