The Architect The Architecture The Hospital

The Architecture Many architectural historians regard Richardson as America's greatest architect, if not of all time at least of the period before Frank Lloyd Wright. Richardson's design, executed in rough, rock-faced reddish brown Medina sandstone five feet thick, is the first major example of his personal revival of Romanesque, the style with which his name is popularly identified. The hospital consisted of connected pavilions, ten in all, stretching from either side of the administration building in the center. The administration building has monumental, medieval, double, identical towers (each 185 feet tall), each with four corner turrets and dramatically steep copper roofs mysteriously punctuated with dormered windows, all of which gave the administration building a rather sinister appearance. These great paired towers make the Psychiatric Center one of the most striking public buildings in America. The towers were never intended to house any functions and to this day are unfinished. This building once housed officers and their families on the second and third floors, and a large chapel occupied space on the fourth floor. The five pavilions to the east (the outer three were demolished in 1969) were constructed first. Richardson wanted all of the buildings to be constructed of stone, but for reasons of economy the outer pavilions were constructed of brick, a change to which Richardson agreed. The extended plan followed the Kirkbride system named after the Philadelphia doctor who devised it, which, on paper, resembles a V-shaped formation of geese in flight The plan afforded improved protection in event of fire, for each pavilion could be sealed from its neighbors by means of iron doors in the curving connecting corridors. It also provided an abundance of light and allowed for the classification of patients according to the nature and degree of their disturbance. Frederick Law Olmsted and his partner Calvert Vaux planned the hospital grounds, which originally covered more than 200 acres. The grounds, like those of a great chateau, were both ornamental and productive. Landscaped parkland surrounded the main buildings and provided a space for quiet recreation. Behind the buildings a large tract of farmland extended to Scajaquada Creek. Here the institution grew much of its own food and provided work -- considered to have therapeutic value -- for many patients. The present Buffalo State College campus occupies most of the original farm.