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Boston City Hall

Architects
Campbell, Aldrich & Nulty Kallmann, McKinnell and Knowles
Year
1968
Style
Brutalism
City
Boston, MA
Collection
concrete boston
Boston City Hall
Photo: Daderot, CC0
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Boston City Hall was proposed in 1956 as the centerpiece of the Government Center redevelopment, replacing the outgrown Old City Hall. The firm Kallmann, McKinnell and Knowles won a two-phase design competition in 1962, working with Campbell, Aldrich & Nulty and structural engineer LeMessurier Consultants; groundbreaking followed in 1963, the first occupants moved in during late 1967, and the building was dedicated on February 11, 1969. It became one of the era's defining, and most polarizing, works of civic Brutalism.

the building

A competition-winning design. Kallmann, McKinnell and Knowles won the two-phase 1962 design competition for City Hall, working alongside Campbell, Aldrich & Nulty and structural engineer LeMessurier Consultants.

Nine stories over the plaza. The building's nine-story massing rises in distinct sections over City Hall Plaza in Government Center, in the heart of Downtown Boston.

Decades of near-demolition. Deferred maintenance left the building in poor repair, and Mayor Thomas Menino twice proposed replacing it outright, in the 1990s and again in the 2000s, before the city opted for renovations starting in the 2010s instead.

the style

City Hall is a textbook exemplar of civic Brutalism, and its raw concrete massing over City Hall Plaza has made it one of the most widely discussed and polarizing government buildings in the country.

More on Brutalism

the architect

Designed jointly by Kallmann, McKinnell and Knowles and Campbell, Aldrich & Nulty, with LeMessurier Consultants as structural engineers, after the firms won the 1962 City Hall design competition.

significance

Boston City Hall was approved as Boston Landmark #224.07 on December 10, 2024, following decades in which city leaders debated demolishing it before choosing renovation instead.

nearby

All 282 buildings in Boston