Celebrating The Courthouse
A Guide for Architects, Their Clients, and the Public

Steven Flanders, Editor

Overview – Contents – Review – Index

 

Book Review

from New York County Lawyer, Vol. 3 #1, January/February 2007

by Isabel Abislaiman

Celebrating the Courthouse, edited by Steven Flanders

Celebrating the Courthouse is an anthology of essays covering everything an architect should consider about how judges, lawyers, court personnel and individuals feel and what they need to accomplish when they inhabit a courthouse. Flanders demonstrates his editorial talent in selecting and organizing these essays to ably synthesize the role of imagery that conveys the lofty ideals of law and democracy and the practical aspects of building a structure with such aspirations. Through these essays, including his own, Flanders makes a case that "it remains possible to restate the centrality of the administration of justice in a bewildering variety of styles and settings."

Flanders dedicated this book to Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who fervently advocated the official departure from traditional federal architecture and after whom the U.S. District Courthouse on Pearl Street in New York City was named. Contributors to this book include Justice Stephen Breyer and Judge Douglas P. Woodlock, both whom were actively involved in the Boston federal courthouse project, and architect Andrea Leers, who has won several national awards for her designs of federal courthouses. No doubt, the authors in this book are among the leaders of courthouse architecture today.

The cover reveals that something refreshing is happening in the way architects, lawyers and the public are looking at this type of building and what is supposed to happen in it, as if not just beauty, but a new sense of justice, democracy and fairness is in the eye of these beholders.

Some authors are advocates for restoration and renovation of historic courthouses, which typically dominate the landscape of town squares. Others relish the physical and metaphorical dimensions of new building materials and design requirements such as glass walls to represent judicial transparency and openness and the removal of barriers to the physically disabled as literal symbols of accessibility. In his essay, Spencer Byard states, "Old architecture lives most and best, not fossilized in restoration, but at work in combination with new architecture meeting human needs."

The book also addresses the issue of building location. The authors provide some practical guidelines for architects to solve site problems, but also discuss the challenges of keeping the symbolic identity of the courthouse when the location is in a "residual" urban site. Leers proposes that the nature of the location should guide the design process, while Judge Woodlock argues that the courtroom, as the heart of the courthouse, should guide the design or else the whole meaning of the structure is at risk.

The viewpoint of a practicing attorney highlights the importance of proper seating for those sitting in a courtroom for hours on end. However, with the impact and growth of technology, the need for seating is countered by the possibility of virtual courtrooms in the future.

Flanders skillfully included opposing opinions to support his thesis that a universal courthouse model that applies equally to all does not exist. The importance of this book lies how architecture cab serve as our mirror to help us look at the way we practice law.

Mr. Flanders co-edited Cass Gilbert, Life and Work: Architect of the Public Domain and has written numerous articles for legal and scholarly journals. He just completed a book about NYCLA's Centennial history, which will be published later this year by Fordham University Press.

Mr. Abislaiman is a member of the New York County Lawyer's Association's Art Committee.

Reprinted by permission of the New York County Lawyers' Association; view the whole issue online here.

ISBN 10: 0-393-73070-0
ISBN 13: 978-0-393-73070-8
Octpber 2006
200 illustrations / 30 color / 320 pages / Cloth