The Liberty Hotel, Boston
Retrofit Team
Architect: Cambridge Seven Associates Inc., Cambridge, Mass.
Preservation Architect: Ann Beha Architects, Boston
Developer: Carpenter & Co. Inc., Cambridge
Materials
To match exact, historic details, Custom Window by Wausau 8300 Series windows include true divided lites and custom-machined grilles to honor the landmark structures in which they are installed. The windows feature modern aluminum frames and low-e glass. Thermal barrier framing contributes to buildings’ energy-saving goals and condensation resistance.
Custom Window by Wausau products include fixed and project-in or -out casements; self-balancing double-hung windows; fixed and projected, simulated double-hung windows; hopper vents and historic glazing inserts for swinging terrace doors. Available on an accelerated delivery schedule, the competitively priced windows and doors are backed with a warranty of up to 10 years.
Custom profiles can be designed for panning, perimeter framing or muntins, including panning systems with “T” mullions to echo existing profiles. These aluminum components may be specified with up to 70 percent recycled content and finished with liquid paint, powder coatings or anodize. Dual-color finishing can be accommodated to match different interior and exterior color schemes. With a palette exceeding 30,000 color choices, painted finishes may be requested with ultra-low VOC and VOC-free content. Durable, VOC-free anodize finishes, such as a patina-free copper, also may be selected.
Where conservators can sample complete stratigraphies and original colors are unlikely to have degraded, durable fluropolymer paints can be custom-formulated to meet conservators’ goals for authenticity—not only for exterior colors, but also in lobbies, entrance vestibules, corridors, auditoriums, libraries and other interior public spaces.
Glazing Systems, Window Manufacturer: Custom Window, now a brand of Wausau Window and Wall Systems
The Retrofit
When baseball superstar Babe Ruth toured Boston’s Charles Street Jail in 1925, he famously quipped, “This isn’t a jail, it’s a hotel,” a prophecy that has since come true. Today, the 298-room, high-end hospitality destination retains its architectural heritage with its famed rotunda, jail-themed bars and restaurants, and historically accurate replacement windows.
Architect Gridley James Fox Bryant, widely considered Boston’s most accomplished architect of the 19th century, designed the original penitentiary. A proponent of the Granite Style, Bryant embraced the many technological and social changes of the age, forming strategic partnerships with other architects and reformers. On the Charles Street Jail, he collaborated with Rev. Louis Dwight, a prominent Yale-educated penologist with an active interest in and advocacy for prison reform.
“What is fame in architecture in these latter days?” Bryant wrote toward the end of his life. “Is it to witness the demolition or radical remodeling of an architect’s work, with less than a century of its real usefulness about it?”
Through restoration, reuse and reinvention, this abandoned structure was reborn as a vital commercial development that complements the urban fabric of its Beacon Hill neighborhood. Now owned by Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc., The Liberty Hotel is part of The Luxury Collection—a group of unique hotels and resorts enabling the most discerning traveler to collect a world of unique, authentic and enriching experiences indigenous to each destination that capture the sense of luxury and place.
PHOTO:Bill Horsman Photography and Wausau Window and Wall Systems