When architect John Galen Howard mapped a Beaux-Arts plan for the University of California, Berkeley campus in the early 20th century, one of the first buildings erected in its spirit was Durant Hall—a two-story steel-framed structure completed in 1911 and wrapped in granite along classical lines. Designed by Howard for the law school, and later home to the university’s East Asian Library, the 18,000-square-foot box has been restored to house the administrative offices of the College of Letters and Sciences, which had been scattered among several locations. The building also has been brought discreetly into the 21st century, its formal aura softened by an emphasis on sustainability and a new entry plaza that invites students to linger.
“A straight restoration would have left it wooden, part of the past, but clumsy changes would have been criminal,” says Mark Cavagnero, a Bay Area architect best known for a refined but strong Modernist style. While this design philosophy might make his firm seem an odd choice for restoring Howard’s landmark, Cavagnero got his start in the office of Edward Larrabee Barnes, where he oversaw the restoration of San Francisco’s ornate California Palace of the Legion of Honor.
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