The Historic Netsch CampusMain MenuThe Historic Netsch Campus Walking TourThe Historic Netsch Campus Walking TourCampus Plans: From Navy Pier to the University of Illinois Chicago CircleWalter Netsch's Unique Campus DesignChronology of Campus ConstructionHarrison-Halsted NeighborhoodBlock "I" Window DesignHarrison and HalstedHistoric ArtifactsThe Circle ForumThe Site of Turner GateThe Architecture and Art buildingSecond-Story WalkwaysHenry Hall and Jefferson HallUniversity HallBehavioral Sciences buildingStevenson HallLincoln, Douglass, and Grant HallsRichard J. Daley LibraryScience and Engineering OfficesTaft, Burnham, and Addams HallsScience and Engineering LaboratoriesScience and Engineering SouthBlue Island CorridorMemorial GroveGreen Architecture at UICLeanna Barcelonab78d4da7f92616ae537951578811de1af3a3c396
View of a column in the Science and Engineering Laboratories building
Walter Netsch described the enormous Science and Engineering Laboratories as “a city underneath a roof.” In this building, Netsch used bricks twice as large as those used in smaller campus buildings to express the size and strength of structures devoted to science and engineering. They are arranged to form an endless pattern of letter I’s on the building exterior. The dramatic ceiling arch between the east and west sides of these enormous buildings owes its height to the second-story walkway that has been removed. From under the arch, one can see a concrete walkway still in use at the fourth floor level.
The columns supporting the roof are a much larger version of those surrounding the lecture centers, again proportional in size to the load they carry. They lack the butterfly capitals visible in the other locations, and because they have been rotated by 45 degrees, they expose a different geometry. The twisted columns here and on the lecture centers are precursors to the twisted geometry of Field Theory.
