Notes on Kite Aerial Photography: Photo Gallery
A view of the plant as it borders San Francisco Bay. It turns out that this is the Ford Motor Assembly Plant designed in 1930 by noted
architect Albert Kahn. The city of San Francisco's downtown is on the horizon
just to the left of the smokestack (Canon 24-mm,
May 2000)
After Charlie and I discovered this site I pledged that I would look it up at
school. It was not a surprise to find that this was a Ford Motor Company
Assembly Plant designed by architect Albert Kahn in 1930 and completed in 1931.
I have always been a fan of Albert Kahn's Office, the most prominent American industrial
practice in the first half of the 20th century. Though Kahn died in 1942 his firm remains active
today with a staff of 400 people. The building we found is the only remaining example of Kahn's work on the
West Coast of the United States.
A quartet of view of the Ford Plant. From the upper-left clockwise: A
ground-level fisheye view of the Craneway from the west showing its relationship
with the water, a view down the assembly floor clerestory skylights, an oblique
view of the Craneway facade, and an overhead view of the Craneway's butterfly
roof section with sailboat (Canon 24-mm, May
2000)
My faculty colleagues in
building science and I belong to a set of
architecture faculty that harbor an abiding curiosity regarding the physical
performance of buildings. Architects establish, in their designs, a frame for
our daily lives, a setting that reflects culture, region, and place, that
contributes to our well-being as building occupants, and - of principal concern
in this lecture - a frame that shapes major patterns of energy use. One of the
charms of Albert Kahn's design for this factory is that it responds so honestly
in relating the assembly process to the natural amenities of light and air and
the circulation of material and occupants. In doing so it creates a sense of
place and purpose that is missing from the modernist boxes (albeit with
postmodern decoration) that have risen in its shadow.
On
the left, a view down the roof monitors with the Port of Richmond beyond and, on
the right, a close aerial view of the Oil House roof (Canon
24-mm, May 2000)
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All rights reserved. Revised: Sunday, June 04, 2000
URL: http://arch.ced.berkeley.edu/kap/gallery/gal159.html
