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Hello everyone,

In the class of Tuesday, October 20 we visited downtown Greensboro for the first time; a thing to be excited about! We discussed the values of some buildings, how they contribute to the city and how they can be compared to the UNCG campus. In this post I will discuss three different locations.


First Citizens Bank
If you consider what the most important employers of Greensboro are, you will emphasize that these are the colleges, the denim industry and especially the banking and insurance companies. The First Citizens Bank has a very important function. It is right in the middle of downtown Greensboro (on the corner of Elm Street and Market Street), so I think it is definitely a "beat", also because usually there are a lot of people coming in and out of the building. The design of the building is very prominent; as you can see in the picture the entrance consists of golden doors and two capitals in front of it. That refers to a classical style, that is also used for a couple of buildings on the UNCG campus, such as the Jackson Library and the Brown Building. The First Citizens Bank building is made of brick and glass. There is a lot of glass used. I think it was done this way to make the building light(er) from the inside.




Alleys
There are a lot of alleys discernable in downtown Greensboro. Most of them are used as drainage-canals. Some of them are very artistic, as you can see in the picture. On this kind of water slide the rain is guided into a box. The box leads to a sewerage system. In my opinion this is a very nice way to create from an ugly view an artistic masterpiece. It really contributes to the external appearance of the downtown of Greensboro. It makes me think about what one can do with buildings or locations in other parts of Greenboro. I consider this change of an alley as an infill and the alley itself as a "sink". This sink is partly covered by an artistic piece.




The KRESS Building
When I saw the KRESS building for the first time, it attracted my attention immediately. It is a beautiful building and I think the owners did a good job in making it look like the way it is. It is a building for food and entertainment and that is also the message the building transfers in its appearance. A lot of people visit this building every day, so in that perspective you can describe it as a "beat", according to Clay's vocabulary. The KRESS building is also (part of a) "strip". This part of downtown (especially Elm Street) is a very developed area and this building is definitely an example of this. By the way, there are more theatres in this area of the city.