by Cynthia Young
Contributing Editor

Summary: GWWO Inc./Architects of Baltimore recently unveiled plans for a new 17,200 square-foot visitor center for the Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine in Baltimore Harbor. The graceful new building, scheduled to begin construction in 2009, takes its inspiration and curved shape from the defiant American flag that flew over the fort and survived the 25-hour British bombardment during the War of 1812—the Star Spangled Banner.

Francis Scott Key, an attorney and poet, was watching from a ship anchored in Baltimore harbor when the British barrage on the fort began on September 13, 1814. After a night illuminated by the “rockets’ red glare,” the next morning Key was surprised to see the red- and white-striped banner still flapping proudly over the fort. He was so inspired he sat down and wrote the poem “Defence of Fort McHenry.” Later, the popular poem was set to an old song, and, in 1931, became America’s official national anthem.

The new Fort McHenry visitor center is designed to evoke the spirit of the American flag and the patriotism of that dramatic night. The new center’s sweeping, curved lines, building materials, and open interior spaces are meant to celebrate the birthplace of America’s national anthem and to educate and inspire its visitors. The center will focus visitors on the fort and the flag flying above it.

The building will boost the site’s capacity to handle three times as many visitors. The center’s east and west elevations contain floor-to-ceiling windows, which will fill the lobby and exhibit areas with natural light. The center will offer expanded reception and orientation areas, provide efficient retail and office spaces, add flexible program and lecture space, enhance visitor flow, and immerse visitors in a stirring theatrical audio-visual experience.

“The current building was built to handle 250,000 people annually. Now, we have 620,000 visitors, and as we plan for the War of 1812’s bicentennial, there will be a bubble of 750,000 visitors,“ says Gay Vietzke, superintendent of the Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine. The current center cannot meet visitation demands, and last year 30 percent of school groups had to be turned away. “We wanted a building that gives visitors a positive experience, which sets the scene and gets visitors excited about seeing the real building itself,” says Vietzke.

Creating meaning and movement
“The building represents the dynamic movement of the flag,” says Alan Reed, AIA, president and design principal of GWWO. ”As you move around the visitor center and see the building from different angles, it is meant to give a sense of motion.”

GWWO also designed the new center to focus on the flag flying over the fort. “The building’s brick wall slopes upward, taking the eye up to the flag that flies over the fort. The visitor center and the flag are engaged in a dialogue,” says Reed.

“We realized the flag was really the center of the story of Fort McHenry,” explains Reed, of discussions held with focus groups and the National Park Service, which runs the site. “We talked about what the flag means. Everybody has personal and emotional reactions to the flag.”

The new building literally connects the flag and the meaning behind it in its own walls. The front elevation is composed of two walls differing in height and angles, one of brick and one of copper, representing the flag’s red and white stripes. The solid brick symbolizes the hardiness and valor associated with the banner’s red stripes. The thinner, more delicate copper façade expresses the purity and innocence associated with the white stripes. The difference in height and the opposing slants of the walls suggest a sense of motion, and as the copper wall recedes from the brick façade it directs the eye upward toward the banner.

Landscaping design by Mahan Rykiel Associates of Baltimore complements the center’s curving lines with arcing pathways and paving patterns, along with plantings of differing heights that lead visitors to the entrance and then up to the fort.

The drama of revealing the fort
The center focuses visitors’ eyes up toward the fort, yet once inside, strategically placed windows will give only fleeting glimpses of the structure. ”We don’t want people to see the fort,” mentions Reed. “It is all part of the drama of unveiling the fortification. Once they enter the building, the tall, thin windows will only give you glimpses of parts of the fort and escarpment. This teasing builds on this emotional experience.”

Inside, after perusing carefully selected artifacts and exhibits, visitors will be immersed in a dramatic audio-visual program when the exhibit gallery will come alive with the sights and sounds of the Battle of Baltimore.

“We tried to put people in the position of being Francis Scott Key,” says Bill Haley, partner and designer with Haley Sharpe Design of Falls Church, Va., and the United Kingdom. “Visitors go into this space and suddenly the space will transform into seeing the inspiration for Key’s poetry.” In the conclusion, the national anthem will play, and, beyond the windows, the fort and the flag flying above it will be revealed. “It makes it more dramatic and alive,” adds Haley. “At the end of the day, it’s a story that has a profound message—it is a powerful piece of poetry and music.”

“It is an emotional moment that gets right at why the flag and the anthem are potent symbols for most Americans,” agrees Vietzke. “It sets people up to see the real resource, to go to the historic fort and stand at the base of that flagpole.”

The center also features two entrances on opposite sides to accommodate visitors who arrive by land and by sea. A water taxi delivers 20 percent of the site’s visitors from the harbor, yet most visitors enter from the land side of the stronghold’s peninsula. To connect both entry points, GWWO created a lobby that runs through the building and that also frames the view. “Now, people can stand in the lobby and look down to where Francis Scott Key was,” says Reed. “In the future, park rangers will be able to point directly to where he was located.”

GWWO also helped restore Fort McHenry in the early 1990s, so the firm was familiar with the site. They repaired crumbling escarpment walls, monitored water damage and cracks, and waterproofed underground structures. During the restoration, the fort stockpiled large amounts of custom-made bricks, replicas of the historic bricks making up the fort’s walls. Those bricks will be used in the new visitor center.

The new visitor center will be constructed outside of the cultural landscape, away from the 1814 reservation boundary, at the east end of the existing parking lot, and the present visitor center will eventually be demolished.