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Portsmouth Civic Center

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1966–1970, Yates and Boggs. 601 Crawford St.
  • (Photograph by Matthew Aungst)
  • Portsmouth Civic Center (Richard Guy Wilson)

Like larger cities across Virginia in the postwar period, Portsmouth erected a new civic center both to cope with an expanding municipal bureaucracy and to assert its aspirations to modernity. Semi-Brutalist design in brick and precast concrete unites the various elements of the Civic Center, including two courthouses, the jail, and the police headquarters. The nearby International Style City Hall (1977–1980, Thomas F. Marshall; 801 Crawford Street) was privately financed and leased to the city, an unusual arrangement at the time that has since become commonplace.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Richard Guy Wilson et al.
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Data

What's Nearby

Seaboard Building
Portsmouth Public Library (U.S. Post Office)
First Presbyterian Church
Bangel Law Building
Pythian Castle

Citation

Richard Guy Wilson et al., "Portsmouth Civic Center", [Portsmouth, Virginia], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/VA-01-PO2.

Print Source

Buildings of Virginia: Tidewater and Piedmont, Richard Guy Wilson and contributors. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002, 442-443.

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