American Colonial Architecture in the Philippines Part 2

The start of tropical imperial space and Beautiful city Movement

Daniel Burnham
- Was tasked to survey Manila and Baguio and recommend preliminary plans for the
development of these colonial cities
- He was assisted by Pierce Anderson on a 6week official mission
- Father of City Beautiful Movement
City Beautiful Movement
- The movement was conceived due to ill effects caused by the Industrial Revolution to
combat pollution, traffic and human congestion, lack of basic utilities, outbreaks of disease,
and general social disorder plaguing American cities at that time.
- a movement whose main advocacy was to transform cities into beautiful, orderly, efficient,
healthy, and democratic places, with profound reliance on Beaux Arts formalism
- The most successful application of which was the 1901 Plan for Washington, DC. Origins of
the Neoclassical Style
-
Elements found in City Beautiful Movement
- the wide boulevards
- elegant parks,
- recreational waterways and riverbanks,
- spacious public plazas adorned with grand monumentsJune 28, 1905
- The master plan and final report for Manila and Baguio was sent to William H. Taft
-
Beaux Arts Architecture
- Characterized by massive and heavy, defining itself to construction of monumental public
buildings like train stations, schools, and government buildings.

Beaux-Arts plans unique characteristics:

1. Symmetry is stressed, and where there is asymmetry, it must be worked into the larger whole.
2. Axiality is important; the most important spaces must be on axis and clearly emphasized in
space and proportion.
3. Cross-axes are used to distribute and organize the program.
4. There should be a clear hierarchy of the major and minor parts of the program. There should be
no hidden spaces, but a gradation of importance.
5. At the center of the composition should be a great hall, the dimensions of which relate to the
building’s overall proportions.
6. Repeating elements should be unified to support the overall planning.
7. The relationships between open and closed spaces, and among building, courtyards, and
surrounding gardens, should be resolved into an integrated whole.
8. The decorative elements should be in accordance with the program. Civic buildings would show
restraint; opera houses, ebullience.

The proposed plan of Manila seemed to resemble the plan for Chicago and San Francisco. (Chicago Plan
is the prime example of City Beautiful Movement Plan)

January 20, 1906

- The congress approves Burnham’s recommendation for Manila Plan.

Burnham’s recommendations include:

- establishment of a central civic core with streets radiating from it
- cleaning and development of canals and esteros for transportation
- construction of a bay shore boulevard from Manila to Cavite
- the provision of zones for major public facilities such as schools and hospitals
- the development of parks and open spaces for recreational activities
- Development of summer resorts near the capital.
In the recommendation the plan includes all elements of a classic City Beautiful Plan. It had a central
civic core; radials emanating from this core were laid over a gridiron pattern and large parks were
interconnected by parkways, all of which recommended an architectural style from which future
buildings were to be patterned. Burnham's Manila plan borrowed elements from the Washington, DC
plan, as evidenced in the central civic core, where government buildings were arranged in a formal
pattern around a rectangular mall . Radiating from this Government Center was a series of radial
boulevards superimposed on an efficient gridiron street system. These radials divided the city into five
sections and produced a street system that directed traffic efficiently up to a Point where diagonals
were introduced as a continuous connection between sections.

Furthermore, Manila suburbs were identified by its social and economic characteristics.

The Arrabales (suburbs) of Manila

 Quiapo – the illustrado territory, the enclave of the rich and powerful
 Binondo – trading port developed for the chinese and arabs
 Sta. Cruz – the main commercial district with shop, movie houses, restaurant, etc.
 San Nicolas – a commercial district with streets of specialized categories (e.g. ceramics,
soaps,etc.)
 Sampaloc – University Town

The later arrabales

 San Miguel – resthouse were built for the Spanish Government
 Malate – early summer resort of the wealthy, later became a fishing and salt making town
 Ermita – the red-light district
 Paco – first town built around a train station
 Pandacan – town built by the American for oil depot

The City of Pine: Baguio City

The Americans identified health hazards with their ventures in the tropics. This health hazard or
“Tropical Fatigued” was described as weakened by dysentery, typhoid, malaria, and a host of other
tropical ailments, not to mention symptoms of depression. As a cure, they believed that the efficient
way is to search for the fabled cool place.

Baguio
- Its environment offered an ideal site for an American health resort.
- Baguio was declared by the Philippine Commission onJune 1 , 1903, as the summer capital
of the archipelago.

Baguio plan
- The function of Baguio, with emphasis on the city's tripartite role—as a health sanitarium
for American servicemen, as a large market center, and as a hub of recreational activities.
- Burnham and Anderson admitted that the Baguio Plan was fragmentary due to the absence
of surveys. Thus resulting to steep road slopes and other urban planning errors.
-
Three Objectives of Baguio Proposal
 To provide a street system adapted to the changing contours, allowing easy communication, and
avoiding east-west and north south orientation of building lines;
 To provide suitable locations for public, semipublic, and private institutions of importance; and,
 To provide recreational areas in the shape of playgrounds, parks and open esplanades, and
parkways

October 3, 1905
- Burnham submitted his "Report on the Proposed Plan of the City of Baguio Province of
Benguet, P.l."

Edgar K. Bourne had designed government cottages in Baguio using the American Stick Style.
The American Stick Style

- The architectural imagery of these residences provided an instant cure for the homesick
American. Its design would later influence the development of the new house model known
as "tsalet."

- The American Stick Style homes expressed its inner structure through the use of exterior
ornaments, such as trim boards.

- the Stick Style was allowed to interact with other revivalist styles but have maintained its
essential character: pinewood construction; vertical, horizontal, or diagonal boards applied
over clapboard siding or half-timbering; building forms expressing angularity, asymmetry,
and verticality; roof composed of steep, intersecting gables; large veranda or covered porch
that recalled Swiss chalet balconies; and, simple corner posts, rafters, brackets, and railings.

William Edward Parsons, the Imperial Consulting Architect

William E. Parson

- was appointed on September 20, 1905 as Consulting Architect and was authorized by
Governor William Cameron Forbes, who imposed upon his administration, the responsibility
o planning and developing the political and physical infrastructure of the colony.

- Parson’s foremost contribution to local architecture are:

o was the improvement of the quality of construction materials and techniques which was
achieved through the importation of building technologies from the United States, such
as the Kahn Truss System and concrete hollow blocks (Cody 2003, 39)

o the adoption of standardized plans and modularized systems for building types (i.e.,
markets, schools, dispensaries) to bring down construction costs.

American Colonial System of Construction

The American colonial period saw the rise of the use of concrete in major infrastructure and civic works
in urban and provincial areas. Concrete is a highly adaptable and plastic material, which can be formed
and employed in a range of applications, from massive structures to the most exquisite of architectural
details. Concrete's plastic quality renders a smooth surface and crisp plane as well as an inexpensive way
to precast relief ornaments. The combination of concrete and steel reinforcements resulted in a medium
known as ferroconcrete. The added reinforcement provided the needed strength for tensile forces while
the concrete countered compressive forces. The use of this composite material in new construction
meant that structures became taller, with longer spans, and larger openings.

Rizal Cement Company

- the first rotary plant for cement manufacture was erected in Binangonan, Rizal, in 1915.

Kahn Trussed Bar

- a horizontal main bar with Ranges or plate-like projections from each side of the bar that
were partially cut away from the bar and bent upward at forty-five degrees, apparently to
act as shear reinforcing. This system was used as a reinforcement medium for concrete
construction as the trussed bars were placed within concrete molds for floor slabs and
beams.
Concrete Application

Concrete hollow blocks,

- are still manually produced but with the aid of a machine, were feasible building materials in
the Philippines. The abundance of manual labor resulted in the inexpensive production of
hollow biocks. These relatively low-cost blocks became the fundamental building material
for constructing walls and other vertical components.

Another important application of concrete was in the production of prefabricated components and
precast concrete ornaments demanded by the neoclassical and the art deco style. This was an important
aspect of construction, as a significant amount of decorative features (such as medallions, low-relief
sculptures, statuaries, inserts) were repetitive in nature and, thus, produced in multiples. Original
sculptures and decorative panels were first executed in plaster from which a mold was formed for the
eventual concrete casting.

Parson’s Notable Works

Insane Ward at San Lazaro

- the first building of the government to be executed entirely of reinforced concrete (with the
exception Of wood window frames and roof trusses)

- The building was an L-shaped, two-storey structure; the length of each wing was twenty-
three meters and the width twelve meters. The first floor level was raised 1.5 meters above
ground with a well-ventilated under floor space. The interior corners of the floors and walls
were all rounded to facilitate cleaning and disinfection.

Government Capitol Buildings

- Pampanga (1907), Iloilo (1907), Capiz, and Laguna (1 908)

- His concept and design ofthe Lingayen Capitol Building, possibly the most impressive of all
those built during that era, was an excellent example from which his philosophy can be
deciphered. Parsons also accorded capitol and municipal complexes with a logical and
convenient scheme: placing them in parklike settings, in positions ofdignity and repose.
Parsons's neoclassic designs forthe capitols became the archetype of all succeeding capitols
built before

Philippine General Hospital, Manila

- encapsulated most of the outstanding elements of Parsons's
architectural canon. The project was started earlier by Boume,
with Parsons taking over, amending the plans without
abandoning the pavilion morphology set by the former.
-It was notable for its clear circulation network, flexibility for
expansion, and the excellent ventilation and lighting provided by
wide, interconnecting, open walkways.

- Built of reinforced concrete, with a low angled roof, the sprawling, two-storey hospital
featured service and medical wings architecturally integrated but hygienically isolated via a
series of arched corridors. Such an arrangement allowed for generous and efficient future
expansion. This hospital morphology would become the template for American army
hospitals in other tropical territories, such as Panama.

Parsons's private practice

- Yielded clubhouses that would cater to the recreational needs of American and British
expatriates in Manila.
Elks Club, Manila

Army Navy Club (1909)

The club buildings were typically two— and three-storey structures, usually in H-plan, with large loggias
or verandas. The Army and Navy and the Elks Club are still extant (rebuilt from war damage funds) and
have been refunctioned today as museums. Dubbed as the most important construction of 1909 in the
city of the Manila, the Army Navy Club was one of Parsons's private commissions.

the Manila Club (1908),

- The British-owned Manila Club was

acclaimed by The Far Eastern Reviewin
1908 as "one ofthe most modern
buildings ofits kind in the Orient."
- the two-storey, reinforced concrete
building covered an area of forty-five by
thirty-five meters, with the second floor
covering over one-third ofthe area ofthe
spread foundation. The floors and
interior finishes were made of local
hardwood. The first floor was divided to
contain a nine by twelve meter-dining
room, ladies' room, office, card room,
bar, and billiard hall. On the same floor,
a covered loggia was located in front,
while the rear had a colonnaded porch
overlooking the tennis grounds. The second floor contained a large reading room and a number of
private rooms with a communal toilet and bath

YMCA Building (1909)

- With the aim of "spreading the Christian
civilization of the West among the, peoples
ofthe Orient," the International Committee
ofthe Young Men's Christian Association
(YMCA) commissioned Parsons to design its
building in 1909
- Parsons divided the building into three
clusters: the athletic building on the right, the
main building at the center, and the kitchen
building on the left. The central main building was forty-five by thirteen-and-a-half meters.
The Philippine Normal School, completed in 1914
- rendered in a style that allowed the California
Mission style to mingle capiz window panes and
ornately grilled ventanillas, was erected at the corner
of Taft Avenue and Ayala Boulevard. The building,
three storeys in height, followed a V-configuration
plan, where the bill (Gabaldon Law)appropriating PI
million for the building of modern public schools
throughout the Philippines.

*Gabaldon Law or Act No. 1801 which provided the funding for the building of modern public
schools in the country between 1907 and 1915 with a budget of P1 million.

Parsons's University Hall

- Parsons's University Hall (1 913) of the University of the Philippines was the first building to
be erected on the campus grounds at Padre Faura (Report of the Philippine Commission
1912, 186). The structure, costing 250,000 pesos, measured 58.35 meters long by 25.8
meters wide and consisted of three floors and an attic. The foundation was made up ofchain
footings of reinforced concrete
- The University Hall manifested the aesthetic shift ofcivic buildings from the austere
combination of Mission Revival, plain, classical Doric orders with the obligatory allusive
elements to local architecture (i.e., capiz windows) to a more omate, precast neoclassicism
requiring a complicated casting process and moulding technique.

Manila City Aquarium (1912)

- was built in the inner slope ofa bastion in Intramuros integrated with a public playground
constructed from the reclaimed moat surrounding the walled city.

Paco Train Station (1914)

- built at the terminus of a newly laid boulevard

fronting a semicircular Plaza Dilao. The building could
be read as an ideological statement of the "White
Man's Burden" frame of mind with the deployment of
four garlanded American eagles surmounting the main
cornice above the central motifon the building fagade.
-

The Bilibid Prison Hospital and Gateway (1907), Cebu Custom House (1911 and Tarlac Provincial Prison
(1913) were also attributed to him. Parsons had also designed small structures in Manila, which had long
been forgotten. These obscure ones include the Tondo fire Station (1913), the Cottage of the Singalong
Experiment Station (1 906), the Gatehouse of the Reservoir of New Waterworks System (1907), the
Sewer Pumping Stations of Manila (1 908), the College of Medicine and Surgery (1910), the
Communicable Disease Ward at San Lazaro Hospital (1913), the Philippine School ofArts and Trade
(1914),
Bureaucratic Change at the Office of Consulting Architect

George Corner Fenhagen

- was appointed as Acting Consulting Architect when Parsons resigned from his post but went
on leave before the year 1914 ended.
- for July 1916, Fenhagen was still listed as the Consulting Architect in absentia while Ralph
Harrington Doane (1886—1941 ) was cited as Acting Consulting Architect.
- is best remembered for the unbuilt Capitol Building in Manila

Un-built Capitol Building in Manila

- This structure was supposedly the centerpiece of
Burnham's Capitol Group and a hallmark of
Fenhagen's commitment to an architectural style
that evoked America's federal presence in the
Philippines.
- The general scheme of the building clusters were
arranged in a U-pattern hugging a grand central
plaza. Fronting a reflecting pool and dominating the
clusters of compositional volume is a Neoclassical
domed edifice—a leitmotif based on the Roman
Pantheon—with an elevated portico and long wings of Ionic colonnades standing on a
massive platform—a classical style favored by Thomas Jefferson

George Corner Fenhagen works

Masonic Temple (1913) in Escolta

- was a five-storey structure that displayed a Neoclassic facade, with a colonnaded ground
floor, arched central portal, and divided, two-arched Florentine windows typical ofa
multistorey Italian Renaissance palazzo

Ralph Harrington Doane

- was bred in the Beaux Arts tradition. He was a Neoclassicist and sought to enhance the
quality of public buildings as well as increase the richness of ornamentation and articulation
for the most significant structures.
- The most notable of Doane's buildings were the Pangasinan Provincial Capitol (1918) in
Lingayen, the Leyte Provincial Capitol (1918) in Tacloban, and the Legislative Building (1926)
and the unbuilt Insular Post Office, both in Manila

Pangasinan Provincial Capitol (1918)

- described in the Bureau ofPublic Works Bulletin as "a successful adaptation of imposing
Classic Architecture in Tropical Conditions."
- Designed by Parsons, with some modification by Doane,
- was designed with minimal wall surfaces and maximum window openings to take advantage
of the cool sea breeze. It was shielded from direct sunlight and downpour by an imposing
colonnade and a projecting cornice surrounding the entire edifice, while the interior was
planned with large, open spaces, omitting interior walls as much as possible, to give the
impression of an unbounded pavilion.
Filipinization of the Colonial Bureaucracy and the Bureau of Public Works

Jones Law (The Philippine Autonomy Act) in 1917

- promoted a wide-scale recruitment of filipinos in the bureaucratic.
- The act resulted to dropped of americans in government system.

The transfer of the Bureau to Filipino hands was given focus in the Bureau of public Works Bulletin o
fJuly 1918. In this issue, Doane in his article, "Architecture in the Philippines," articulated the policy and
responsibility of the government concerning architectural production. He asserted that "there can be no
true democracy without leadership, and there can be no leadership worthwhile in democracy that is not
in the interest of the people as a whole ... Real democracy must provide for the masses ... not only those
things that protect the body, but, above all, those things which elevate the soul." Doane equated
architectural aesthetics with democratized cultivation of arts among the colonial subjects: "A
government which fails to recognize the right of the people to enjoy the benefits of the great heritage of
art; which fails to cultivate and encourage in its people the love of beauty; and which does not
recognize, as one of its legitimate functions, the orderly and systematic development of the fine arts is
no true democracy." Doane went on to clearly state the government's mandatory task: The Philippine
Government, conscious of these inherent duties, has with respect to the fine art of architecture,
established rigid Government supervision. It therefore becomes incumbent upon officials charged with
these special responsibilities to carefully analyze past and present architectural accomplishments and
procedures and to formulate an architectural policy, which in the future will produce splendid
monuments as well as practical buildings, and which will maintain a high architectural standard in public
works, commensurate with the dignity of the Philippine Government, and calculated to engage
favorable public sentiment and promote a healthy civic pride among the Filipino people. [ ...J So let us
hope that while the utilitarian aspects of Philippine architecture will not be neglected, its historical
significance and artistic importance may be emphasized, and that the rich resources of the land may be
marshaled in the production of an architecture sufficient in quantity and quality to announce to
prosperity the constructive genius and artistic accomplishments of the present day.

Casting the Imperial Allegory.

Anthropomorphic figures
- When integrated in architecture and public statuary serve as visual cues loaded with
collective memory that is grounded in a mythic past, reified in the present, and projected
into the future; they perform a didactic function, allegorically embodying the required
values the citizen must perform for the state.
- they signify national progress;
- they are heroic figures of men who represent faceless masses;
- they are symbolic of rights, liberty, and patrimony.

State edifices built in the Philippines during the 1920s and 1930s were embellished with motifs of
Classicism, such as pendants, acanthuses, volutes, relief figures, and allegorical statuary.