Small town character design case study
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Slide show describing how small town character is built by repetition of design themes, which need not be perfectly executed. A true asset-based community development approach based on history, spirituality, gardening, and architecture in New Harmony, Indiana.
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Small town character design case study
- 1. SMALL TOWN CHARACTER: A Design Case Study from New Harmony, Indiana, USA Copyright 2011, http://www.useful-community-development.org
- 4. Wow! Do you have something like this? Bet you tore it down years ago!
- 7. Surprise! Visitors’ center isn’t what you were expecting, is it?
Editor's Notes
- As an illustration of how small town character can be maintained and enhanced through repetition of themes and variations on those themes, it’s hard to beat New Harmony. New Harmony is a town of less than 1,000 population, now and probably consistently since the 1820s. Its survival, community development, and economic development through tourism and conferences all depend on maintaining a specific personality or character.
- Starting with the historic Thrall’s Opera House, still open for public gatherings and meetings, serving a public purpose. Stage allows for small performances, and there are a few exhibits from theatrical events past. Helps establish red brick theme and traditional American architecture.
- Functioning town hall, with bunting in preparation for annual traditional Fourth of July with a patriotic speech. If you have wooden facades that are relatively plain, but with some architectural detail, good painting can still make you a hit. How about that New England-like Town Hall sign outside of New England, but tastefully playing off something deeply embedded in the cultural history of the U.S. And see the side garden? You’ll note many small scraps of garden in New Harmony.
- Odd sundial-like clock established by one of the utopian communities that occupied this town in the 1820s. Keep your historical conversation pieces and artifacts. They distinguish you from other small towns. This presentation isn’t a travelogue, so please forgive (but correct through Contact Us at http://www.useful-community-development.org) our mistakes. The points are small town design considerations.
- Keeping historic West Street cabins intact has been a major effort, but it’s worth it in terms of tourism and value for school groups. One of your editors got a flat tire when they re-roofed recently, but didn’t really mind a bit.
- Historic Lenz house is open on one of the tours given by historic foundation now with strong connection to a university. Admission is charged for tours. Tickets are sold at the visitors center.
- Famous architect Richard Meier designed this modern Atheneum as a visitors’ center containing an information booth, gift shop, introductory film (for a fee), with upstairs auditorium offering event space and a place for a model of the historic Owens settlement in the 1820s. Yes, I know most small towns can’t afford things like that, but the message is twofold: if you’re going to spend money for a tourism center, make a statement about your town; and secondly, if you’re a historic town and you want to build something new, you can be bold if you make it interesting intellectually or even controversial. But above all, make it functional. The restrooms and drinking fountain here can be the main draw on a hot day.
- Old and new merge in this particular version of small town character, to the delight of many and to the chagrin of a few.
- The nice walk between the Atheneum and the Wabash River in New Harmony establishes a link from town to the river, which is important for any community. The recently developed public trail system near the river and back through the woods toward town is another great element for the tourism economy and also the local population.
- Historic clock on historic school building. Clock recently was repaired to working order, and the old school gym is used for community meetings and other local purposes. Important point: everything doesn’t have to be perfect in your small town. Note the disruptive power lines. With so much to look at and appreciate, we aren’t as annoyed as when there are only advertising signs and run-down buildings along a highway. Hmm, the second clock we’ve seen so far. Theme and variation, just like music.
- Noted American architect Philip Johnson designed this Roofless Church, administered as a church by a local congregation. While some people visit and say there’s nothing there, others understand the more subtle point being made about the church being open to the sky and the world.
- Fruit trees are part of the edible landscape in New Harmony at the Roofless Church and elsewhere. Once quaint, now they are right in style.
- Massive gates of the Roofless Church open, allowing visibility into the beehive structure that is the only shelter in the church. Can your small town attract a renowned architect to build something that is used occasionally for weddings and ceremonial reasons? Probably not without patronage, but if you have such a curiosity, as many small towns do, restore and maintain them.
- Another view of the generator of economic development through weddings, being realistic and not meaning to be irreverant.
- Now you’re getting the picture of a town with a relatively few historic buildings that have been preserved, then carefully added to. The Roofless The Roofless Church begins to establish the air of spirituality, so a later addition was a replica of the labyrinth at the Chartres Cathedral in granite, with a small garden setting entered through, and given visual importance by, this gate. Your small town does not have to replicate that feature, of course, but it’s a theme. Your small town needs a theme, whether it’s agriculture, mining, mountains, or whatever. Ideally you can identify two or three themes.
- But now that this small town has asserted a spirituality theme, its churches need to look good. Here the Episcopal church meets the challenge.
- Another local church not only reinforces the spirituality theme, taken from an urban design standpoint, but also reinforces the gardening theme to great advantage.
- This massive granary sat in ruins for many years and recently was restored and retrofitted to some extent to fit current needs. Now it is the scene of many wedding receptions, a winter concert series, and conferences. Scale matters, and when you have a large-scale building in a small town, it will be a focal point, even if located on a side street, as this one is. The wedding, tourism, and arts themes expand.
- Murphy Auditorium, scene of summer stock theater, obviously coordinated with the local university but offering tourists on many summer Thursday, Friday, and Saturday evenings something to do. And keeping a piece of the historic public infrastructure viable.
- Workingman’s Institute, both a working public library (then and now), as well as a museum of local history and natural history. While not a really high-quality museum, it’s interesting enough to keep people occupied from a couple of hours to all day if they fall into the leisurely pace that the small town character reinforces.
- Don’t fail to tell people what they’re seeing and what its significance is. See yet another historic interpretation sign in the background.
- Church Park has been designed along a state highway on the site of a former large church used by one of the utopian predecessor communities. It commemorates history but also provides a much-needed pick-up basketball court, some further benches to rest the feet in a walkable community, and provides a show of color along an entrance highway. Use your odd vacant spots, and if they have a tie-in to local history, tell your story.
- The park from across the highway.
- Speaking of gardens, this one is a memorial garden, Carol’s Garden. It contains a simple repetitive motif of Bradford pear trees, ivy and hostas. In the center is a fountain, and there are two uniquely attractive but uncomfortable concrete benches on either end, as well as a private memorial off in a corner where it should be. Shade, sound of running water, and enclosure. What could be safer on a summer day?
- Having implied there’s a tourism industry supporting the small town character that you see, here’s a fanlight in the conference center. Once this building housed an informal restaurant open to the public, but now it is completely devoted to private events. The building design echoes other red brick, other interesting apertures, and other rounded shapes in town.
- The entry house (office) of the small 90-room inn is on the right. Check out the golf carts, implying you’ve come to a leisurely place, which you have. For many years the parking lot was entirely gravel, unpaved; now a little asphalt has crept in.
- Brides, their families, and wedding parties can stay at the inn, walk themselves to the Roofless Church or other wedding location, and walk to the several reception choices. Historic building in the foreground required new siding; these things will happen. Again, the lesson is that small town character doesn’t depend on complete historic authenticity or perfection in carrying out the details.
- Preserving semi-public buildings, such as lodges, can be important to small town character also. This is especially true when it reinforces the red brick look common, but not ubiquitous, in this town.
- American Legion building in the red brick and white color scheme also.
- Continuously look for adaptive re-use and also for additional uses for buildings, places, and outdoor spaces. This art association added some color to this space from time to time. Your activities can be seasonal and also occasional.
- Small town downtown with planters against buildings, as well as street trees. The American flags add to the ambiance and the color scheme here.
- By all means, keep historic signs, even if they’re a little odd.
- Unfortunately the local grocery/deli/food purveyor didn’t survive. The building does; note the architectural repetition with the I.O.O.F. hall.
- Don’t overlook the kick that an unexpected shot of color can give your downtown, if you have wooden buildings.
- Healthy trees are important to all small towns. More red brick.
- There’s a blinking stop light. A ramshackle building such as this can be interesting if painted well, even when awkward additions still need to remain in place.
- If you have an old-fashioned small town ambiance, don’t neglect the old-fashioned plant palette. The garden theme again.
- Beautiful old house, now restored and in institutional use.
- Keep those upper-story facades intact wherever you can downtown.
- Check out the adaptive re-use of buildings. Left: old firehouse is now an antique store, and the old Main Street building with lots of windows is now a contemporary art gallery.
- OK, you have a gardening theme around town, so perhaps you can support a garden-themed business in a town otherwise too small.
- Care to sit down? There are about a hundred places. This is key to those who depend on a tourism and economic development theme. But it also works well to build and keep social capital among the locals, and encourages a little mixing between the locals and the tourists.
- Built or refurbished as an energy efficiency experiment, not quite successful.
- When a historic downtown building burns, try to rebuild so that you don’t look like you had a front tooth knocked out. This new building follows architectural themes, with the red brick, semi-circular windows, and a quirky little turret of its own that provides shelter for the movie-goers. First run movie, a family-friendly one, as something else for tourists to do—and locals.
- Old cooper house restored into a restaurant. Recent research shows that actually paint was used in the good old days, so the new restaurant owners have painted the building white, and many townspeople are happy. A side garden, of varying degrees of complexity depending on the year, is another reinforcement of the town’s themes.
- Unfortunately the day spa didn’t make it, as it was a nice addition to the leisure tourism theme. But the structure, probably built as a house,is now a law office. Note that many people adopt the gardening theme, for both public and private uses, and do away with turf grass. Shade? No problem; New Harmony has hostas.
- Old depot building, which has had various uses. A couple were newspaper branch office, and before that, an environmental reading room and seed store. No railroad? No problem. Not every old depot has to be a museum, although that’s nice work if you don’t have a museum elsewhere.
- Downtown struggles here, as everywhere, to maintain viable businesses. However, those planters, street trees, benches, special sidewalks, preserved facades, and bunting are all helpful.
- Just a bit of nostalgia for bookstores, both antiquarian and current. Nice screen door on a Main Street façade, though, don’t you think?
- Tourist towns, even those with sort of a historic, intellectual, spiritual, gardens theme base, will need a little shopping. Antiques are a good bet.
- An old bank has had various adaptive reuses. The corner lot to the right is vacant, and if or when the economy allows, a nice infill could help Main Street.
- Transitioning over to private homes, this is a women’s institute. The proprietor lives in this home, through clever arrangement of space, and makes her living and dining rooms into an art gallery and woman-oriented gift shop. There’s also a reading room where one can get lost for hours in good books about women’s issues. The monument sign under the tree is the only thing distinguishing it from a private residence (OK, an occasional temporary exhibit sign on the door), and it’s on a street with other single-family homes. A classic live-work space.
- Handsome private homes are made more handsome by street trees. Think through the seasonal color issue and also don’t plant a monoculture, in case of a disease epidemic.
- Great-looking private homes obviously add to small town character. Front porches, gardens, green shingles, white fences, red brick, landscaping. And a very imperfect variety from an architectural standpoint. However, the themes are strong enough to hold the small town character together.