The Straight Torquer

Located next to the Capitol Building on the National Mall, The Hubert H. Humphry Building was designed by Marcel Breuer in 1975 and houses the headquarters of the US Department of Health and Human Services.  This excellent example of brutalism employs both pre-cast and cast-in place concrete to create a richly textured exterior with many sloping planes that pleasingly interact with the angled light.  Le Corbusier, the father of brutalism, is famous for saying: “Architecture is the learned game, correct and magnificent, of forms assembled in the light.”  One can see this philosophy at play in this building, where high contrast shadows add depth and interest to the building facade.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 4th, 2010 at 2:05 pm and is filed under Architecture, Washington DC. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.