Denver Modern Links

There is wonderful architecture in Denver, and here are some excellent links:

 

Tom Lundin's site,ModMidMod              Todd Carpenter's: DenMod                On the National Register of Historic Places:  Arapahoe Acres

 

Let me get back to ca. 1960 for a minute.  We were in Colorado Springs on October 16-18, and finally got to explore this amazing structure.

 

It is the Broadmoor Hotel International Center, completed in the Spring of 1961.  A four-gabled hyperbolic paraboloid, it is 180 feet on a side and about 45 feet high.  As you can see from the photos in the album, it is elegant.  It makes the Great Pyramid of Cheops (ca 2520 B.C.)look like a beatup double-wide.

 

The structural engineering was done by Ketchum, Konkel & Hastings, of Denver.  By 1960, Milo Ketchum had been involved in designing thin-shell structures for several years.  And take a look at the Wagener page for some of his work in Boulder.

 

The main structure is square in plan and is supported only at the four corners.  The interior is divided into three large spaces; a foyer and two meeting rooms.  The entrance structures in front and back look out of place to me, and they obscure the delightful sweep of the main facades.