Achieving Design Excellence

Each day, GSA's Public Buildings Service is challenged to meet—and anticipate—the changing facilities needs of its Federal agency customers. These range from traditional offices to courthouses, border stations, and specialized laboratories. The biennial GSA Design Awards help PBS assess its performance in meeting these needs. This year’s 23 award-winning projects are a testament to our success

Two of these projects demonstrate PBS’s commitment to preserving our Nation's architectural legacy while providing up-to-date work environments for Government business: the restoration and renovation of the neoclassical U.S Courthouse and Post Office in Portland, Maine, and of the Romanesque Revival U.S. Courthouse and Post Office in Brooklyn, New York. New facilities are often needed, however, and the location of these requires PBS to balance the specific needs of Federal agencies with the broad goals of the Government as a whole and the economic development plans of local communities. This year’s award-winning courthouses in Portland, Oregon; Charleston, West Virginia; and Scranton, Pennsylvania are all meet these tests. Equally important is quality design that embraces the community and represents the Federal presence in an open, democratic manner. The new courthouse in Central Islip, New York embodies these principles and will be an important civic landmark for the community and the Nation.

Many of our awarding-winning designers and artists have had the wit and skill to transform classical elements into forms and images appropriate to 21^st century America. The designs of the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington, DC, and the Africa Rising sculpture at 290 Broadway in New York City are rooted in classicism. The Jacob Javits Plaza in New York City is a modern, whimsical interpretation of formal 17^th century French garden design, and the new courthouse in Charleston, West Virginia, has contemporary stained glass walls based on European cathedrals. Other projects, like the Bureau of the Census building in Bowie, Maryland, with its stainless steel tensile truss system, and the new courthouse in Phoenix, with its cable-suspended "lens ceiling," rely on technology for their forms.

PBS has engaged some of the finest architects, designers, engineers, artists, and graphic artists working in America today. Through collaborative partnerships, we are achieving the principal goals of the Guiding Principles for Federal Architecture: (1) producing facilities that reflect the dignity, enterprise, vigor, and stability of the Federal Government; (2) avoiding an official style; and (3) incorporating the work of living artists in our public buildings.

My congratulations and sincere thanks to all the award recipients for helping PBS achieve design excellence.

Robert A. Peck

Commissioner
Public Buildings Service