Salk Institute
N 32° 53.225 W 117° 14.672
11S E 477127 N 3638795
Quick Description: These buildings are located in La Jolla, California.
Location: California, United States
Date Posted: 8/4/2007 8:29:59 PM
Waymark Code: WM1YNF
Views: 117
Long Description:The buildings of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies
(www.salk.edu) are research laboratories and offices made of
reinforced concrete.
The Creator's Words
"I did not follow the dictates of the scientists, who said that
they are so dedicated to what they are doing that when lunchtime
comes all they do is clear away the test tubes from the benches and
eat their lunch on these benches. I asked them: was it not a strain
with all these noises? And they answered: the noises of the
refrigerators are terrible; the noises of centrifuges are terrible;
the trickling of the water is terrible. Everything was terrible
including the noises of the air-conditioning system. So I would not
listen to them as to what should be done. And I realizes that there
should be a clean air and stainless steel area, and a rug and oak
table areal From this realization form became. I separated the
studies from the laboratory and placed them over gardens. The
garden became outdoor spaces where one can talk. Now one need not
spend all the time in the laboratories. When one knows what to do,
there is only little time one needs for doing it. It is only when
one does not Know what to do that it takes so much time. And to
know what to do is the secret of it all."
—Louis I. Kahn. from Heinz Ronner, with Sharad Jhaveri and
Alessandro Vasella Louis I. Kahn: Complete Works 1935-74. p158.
"Louis Kahn's Salk Institute for Biological Studies on the
Pacific coast near La Jolla aspires within its own spirit to an
order achieved through clarity, definition, and consistency of
application. It stands as a testament to Kahn's word, 'Order is. '
Two parallel laboratories, each an uninterrupted 65- foot wide and
245-feet long and encircled by a perimeter corridor, flank a
central court. The support elements to these totally flexible
spaces are placed in a peripheral relationship to this corridor.
They are the studies and offices for scientist, fractured in
profile and vertical in rhythm, which line this central court,
connected by bridges to the perimeter corridor and receiving views
of the ocean by virtue of exterior walls angles toward it. The idea
of simple and strong; the served space of laboratories where
research is performed, the serving space of offices where thought
initiates....Clearly, in the institute at La Jolla, a new level of
realization and accomplishment is evident for this ides....The
institute manifests beauty of mind and act; of the resolution and
articulation of the major elements of the building...being what it
wants to and needs to be, to the precise detail and execution of
beautiful concrete surfaces. Even the component of structure
derives from the need to enclose specific spaces, specifically and
pertinently, rather than offer a general envelope within which
specific space might then be designated. The central court, as a
typical Kahn-like space of shimmering blue water, a band pointing
toward the ocean epitomizing what human endeavor can accomplish at
one scale with geometric clarity and authoritative but modest
deliberation, to give to the scaleless sweep of the ocean, here the
Pacific, a poignant gesture."
—from Paul Heyer. American Architecture: Ideas and Ideologies in
the Late Twentieth Century. p195.
(A majority of the above text was copied from
www.greatbuildings.com)
