Clapp Hall - Architecture

Architecture

Clapp Hall was designed by Trautwein & Howard, a successor to architectural firm of Charles Klauder who designed the university's gothic Cathedral of Learning, Stephen Foster Memorial, and Heinz Memorial Chapel.

Clapp Hall's exterior and interior spaces have been described as a mix of Collegiate Gothic and Art Deco. The building features a diagonally-positioned entrance that creates a direct axis with the Cathedral of Learning which is framed in Clapp Hall's stone portal entryway. The building is clad in textured Indiana limestone to match the stone used on the Cathedral of Learning. The building’s use of aluminum windows has been suggested to be a quiet homage to the work of aluminum magnate George Hubbard Clapp, the building's namesake. The lobby of Clapp Hall is streamlined Art Deco in character, with terrazzo flooring and stainless steel doors, and is thus more stylistically modern than its exterior which is meant to reflect the Cathedral of Learning. It has been suggested that the lobby reveals a struggle in the design process to find a balance between the traditional gothic and more contemporary design elements.

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