Pasadena's City Hall has been impressive for over 80 years (it opened in December of 1927). Since its recent retrofit and clean-up job, it positively sparkles.$3.5 million bought some fancy materials in 1927. They used Alaskan marble to make the stairway treads, wrought iron for the balustrades and cast stone for the wall ornaments. And did you know that the dome, which is red fish-scale tile, was originally multicolored? I learned that from reading this. Oh yes—and within City Hall is a cloistered courtyard garden with a baroque fountain. You can bet there'll be more pictures to come.
Throughout history, edifices such as this one have been built to impress—perhaps even to frighten. When you approach an entrance like this one, you know you'd best behave.
14 comments:
Nice angle of view. Looking forward to see more photos of this spot.
what a beautiful looking building, I look forward to seeing the rest.
Pasadenans are proud of this building. At least I am. I'll keep putting up photos of it intermittently. It has lots of pretty angles.
It's always had such a powerful presence with all the detail. Like you say, there really are no bad angles to photograph it from. I wonder how much it cost to rehab it.
Hi Keith: In tooling around on the web, I found this wikimap: http://wikimapia.org/43513/. It shows Pasadena City Hall in the center. At the bottom is a comment saying the cost came out to about $117 million. I haven't been able to verify that. The fundraising continues. Stop by City Hall and buy a souvenir to help out!
Oh this building brings back many fond memories as I worked for many years right across the street at the courthouse!! Is it back open now?
Hey pont girl! Yes, City Hall reopened last summer with a big party. The courtyard was undergoing some kind of work when I was there the other day, but the building is in full swing.
The $117 million is correct. This includes all construction costs as well as leases on three-year interim office space when we had to move out of the building, all restoration/retofit costs, furniture, landscaping, new technology infrastructure, etc.
$117 million is cheap, considering what the city got for that price. The place looks fantastic. And 3 years' rent in the interim for all the city offices had to have been a lofty tab in itself.
Thank you, Spokeschick.
I'm going to be sure to follow your blog. Do you realize that I don't read any blogs from California? Weird. You have beautiful photos here. This photo of city hall is stunning. Can't wait to see the rest.
Thanks, Andrée. I may have to post another picture of City Hall soon.
This building is looking like a... church! I am really interesting to see more photos of it! - Glorious picture.
Wow! I don't think I've driven by that - at least, not enough to recognize it. Impressive building.
If you've driven through downtown Pasadena, you've seen it, Kevin. The angle I chose doesn't show the impressive dome.
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