So who's going to visit the George W. Bush Library and Museum with me?

[ellisonz]

Entrance to the George W. Bush Institute (west facade), George Bush Presidential Library and Museum, in Dallas. (Peter Aaron, Otto / March 25, 2013)

Architecture review: Bush presidential library is fittingly blunt
The George W. Bush Presidential Center at Southern Methodist University, designed by Robert A.M. Stern, is firm at the expense of nuance.
Christopher Hawthorne, Los Angeles Times Architecture Critic
April 20, 2013, 7:00 a.m.

DALLAS — What do neo-classicism and neo-conservatism have in common?

That's the question at the heart of the design by New York's Robert A.M. Stern Architects for the George W. Bush presidential library, set to open to the public May 1 on the campus of Southern Methodist University.

The $250-million complex holds the president's archive as well as a museum, restaurant, auditorium, policy institute and foundation. Officially known as the George W. Bush Presidential Center, it is carefully and cannily contextual, like much of Stern's work.

Its wide and low-slung form, sunk into a modest hill and ranging from one to three stories high, is wrapped in red brick and cream-colored limestone in an effort to match SMU's Collegiate Georgian buildings. Covering 226,000 square feet, the center is set on a 23-acre piece of land on the eastern edge of campus, about five miles north of downtown Dallas.

With its stripped-down exterior and spacious central plaza leading to its main public entrance, the building owes a clear debt to the work of Dallas architect George Dahl. In particular it evokes Dahl's 1965 Owen Arts Center at SMU, which is also clad in brick and limestone and represents a surprisingly happy marriage of modern architecture and historically minded contextualism.

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/culture/la-et-cm-bush-presidential-library-review-dallas-20130420,0,6482526.story

http://www.georgewbushlibrary.smu.edu/

Needless to say, any visit would be Occupational.

6 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Sure thing buddy, I\'ll go with you ellisonz to the George W. Bush Library and Museum in Dallas, Texas.
	0 (0%)
	No way man, I wouldn\'t set foot in such a monstrosity as the George W. Bush Library and Museum in Dallas, Texas.
	5 (83%)
	Kittens
	1 (17%)
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[Hippo_Tron]

1. Why bother, I can buy My Pet Goat on amazon.com for way less than a flight to Dallas

[sharp_stick]

2. Sure I'll go

I once stopped at Focus on the Family simply to take a dump in the bathroom. I'm sure I can do the same for the shrubbery.

[ellisonz]

29. You sir,

are a Patriot.

[sharp_stick]

30. I do what I can

I'm sure some fiber would allow me a "passage" through the GWB library as well.

[ellisonz]

31. We'll have to eat nothing but Tex Mex for weeks beforehand. n/t

[Politicalboi]

3. Shouldn't that say

George W Bush Institution? What a waste of time, money, and material.

[MineralMan]

4. Dallas? The likelihood of my visiting Dallas

approaches zero. So, no.

[tanyev]

5. Nope, but I always give a salute every time I drive past.

[marlakay]

6. Be curious though to what he is going to put in there

main reason other than living far away is what his peeps would do with the money collected from tour or entrance.

[rickford66]

7. No thanks

There's a children's reading section at our local library.

[BlueStater]

8. What a bland, ugly building.

Compare it to Clinton's. Yeesh.

[Buzz Clik]

15. Here's Daddy Bush's:

Been to that one. It's nice.

[WillyT]

9. Can't... I'm Afraid Of Heights...

[Marrah_G]

10. That would mean going to Texas......

[ismnotwasm]

11. LOL

This outdoor room has unavoidable and frankly unnerving connections to the architecture of muscular state power. It has echoes, fairly faint but altogether present, of authoritarian landmarks of a much grander scale, among them the 1959 National Museum of China on Tiananmen Square in Beijing and the buildings Adalberto Libera and other architects designed for Benito Mussolini in Rome.

[northoftheborder]

12. I would like to see the whole library building. Any photos in Dallas Morn. News???

[ellisonz]

13. I was surprised they didn't have a photo tour on the website...

...but what can you expect really from such a brain trust?

http://www.dallasnews.com/news/george-w-bush-presidential-center/

[Buzz Clik]

14. Does it have an awesome comic book collection?

[JHB]

21. An awesome comic book collection requires diligence and...

...some actual expertise in the subject matter. Plus an attachment that makes it valuable, if only to the collector.

I expect Bush has an extensive collection of "asshole frat boy" jokes, but don't he ever took the trouble to write them down.

Crap! I think I just gave myself a book idea, but it would mean spending hours with him while keeping my own mouth shut.

[Buzz Clik]

23. Coloring books? "My Pet Goat"?

If not, I'm not going.

[kimbutgar]

16. I have been to simi valley many times and would set foot in the Reagan library

As I would never set foot in either bushes libraries. To me all 3 places are evil.

[Phentex]

17. You couldn't pay me to go...

I'd rather watch paint dry.

[Solly Mack]

18. I'm allergic to bullshit. So, no.

[on point]

19. I'll go. I have some old shoes I need to leave at the door

[appleannie1]

20. I've already read the "Run Dick Run" series.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

22. If Bush Sr. visited the George W. Bush Library and Museum in Dallas, Texas...

...would he remember where he was that day?

[11 Bravo]

24. I'd go, but what if the book is checked out?

[Warren DeMontague]

25. Is that a revolving door on the front, there?

Might not be a bad idea.

[FailureToCommunicate]

37. With a place to drop off a donation on the way around: your common sense!

[geomon666]

26. I would

But I don't have enough spit and bile in me to cover that monument to incompetence.

[Brimley]

27. It won't be W Himself

He won't be able to find the building.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

28. What can I eat in abundance beforehand to cause the worst smelly diarrhea?

I'd want to leave my calling card as a courtesy, right where he's certain to find it.

[OhioChick]

32. "The George W. Bush Institute"

I'm sorry I just can't stop laughing

[Octafish]

33. The place look like the juvenile detention facility it is.

Puro BFEE. The opposite of a school, the George W Bush Institute is a Lie-Bury.

[sarisataka]

34. If I am ever in Dallas

I'll set aside five minutes to stop in and read the post-it note

[jmowreader]

35. The architecture is familiar...

[Initech]

36. Only if I can press my ass cheeks against the glass.