Profile

Dallas City Hall

Dallas, Texas
Completed 1977

Municipal center with fountain plaza and a 1,325-car underground parking garage
 

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The design of this project involves more than just the building. It extends to the relationship of the new Municipal Center to neighboring structures, to nearby undeveloped parcels of land and to the whole of downtown. Dallas City Hall is an inseparable combination of building and park. Contributing much-needed open space to the center city and serving as a catalyst for future development, the boldly horizontal building, designed in a balanced dialogue with Dallas's skyscrapers, creates an urban aesthetic and unique sense of place decisive to the city's identity and life.

The 113-foot cast-in-place concrete structure slopes at a 34° angle, each floor 9'-6" wider than the one below, expanding to a 192-foot width at top. The 560-foot-long form has both symbolic and functional logic: the architectural gesture serves as a "front porch" to welcome approaching pedestrians, providing shelter from rain and the torrid Texas sun while simultaneously accommodating diverse programmatic requirements. The building's lower floors house busy public facilities with easy access from the surrounding streets. Upper floors, by contrast, offer the building's 1,400 employees the additional space needed for larger, less public municipal offices. Flexible interiors were designed to accommodate the changing needs of the growing city.

Major Components

178,000 s/f offices; 25,000 s/f Great Court; 5,000 s/f reception lobby; 250-seat council chamber; 4.7-acre plaza with 180' diameter pool; monumental sculpture; three 84' high conical flagpoles; 2-level underground disaster shelter; 1,325-car garage

Awards

I. M. Pei & Partners services

Urban Design; Master Planning; Architectural Design; coordination with associate architect on construction documents and construction administration

Associate Architect

Harper and Kemp, Dallas, Texas

Structural

Terry-Rosenlund and Company, Dallas, TX 

Mechanical / Electrical

Gaynor and Sirmen, Inc., Dallas, TX 

Landscape

Myrick, Newman & Dahlberg, Dallas, TX

Planners / Traffic

Ponte-Travers & Associates, Clifton, NJ

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