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Train as Theater

Gensler to renovate Baltimore Penn Station’s historic building and add a new facility.

Venting the Stacks

An archive at Yale University and a new website continue the legacy of architect Kevin Roche.

Yale University Library’s Manuscripts and Archives department has acquired an archive of the career of architect Kevin Roche. Roche’s family donated correspondence, project documentation, interviews, drawings, and photographs from the architectural firm of Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo and Associates (KRJDA) to cement the architect’s legacy. In addition to the newly housed archive at Yale, a recently organized legacy website for KRJDA has also launched.

Work on the archival project started in 2007. Robert A. M. Stern, then dean of the Yale School of Architecture, supported the project from the beginning. “The Kevin Roche archive is one of the most important resources for the study and appreciation of postwar architecture,” he noted in a press release. “International in scope and brilliantly occupying the crossroads of corporate postmodernism, it documents the work of a major talent.” transferring them. Scinto began working at KRJDA in 1997 as an interior designer and worked as Roche’s executive assistant from 2011 to 2019.

Roche, who was born in Ireland, launched his architectural career in the Michigan office of Eero Saarinen. After Saarinen passed away in 1961, Roche eventually founded a firm with John Dinkeloo in 1966 and completed many of Saarinen’s designs, among them the St. Louis Gateway Arch and the TWA Terminal at JFK Airport. Roche went on to win the Pritzker Prize in 1982. In 2021, following Roche’s death in 2019, the firm rebranded as Roche Modern, and it continues to operate from an office in Connecticut under the direction of Jerry Boryca and Eamon Roche, Kevin’s oldest son.

“It was an honor to be chosen by Kevin Roche to be the lead archivist on such a monumental project and I am delighted that people will be able to study the collection today and in the future,” Scinto said in a statement.

Among the items in the collection are drawings and plans for several corporate headquarters designed by KRJDA, including those of the Ford Foundation, Cummins, and ConocoPhillips, as well as a number of museum renovation projects, theaters, and university buildings.

Items in the archive are listed online by project name. They are physically stored at Yale University’s archive locations.

In addition to the archive at Yale, the Roche family has produced an archival website that highlights the history of the firm, the people who shaped it, and information on how the archive was assembled. It also showcases KRJDA’s portfolio with project imagery and building models.

Gensler has redesigned Baltimore’s Penn Station (BPS) to be a multimodal hub open to the public. Set across the train tracks from the existing 1911 edifice, with its Beaux Arts features, the new station which will stage a “train as theater” concept that “sets the design apart experientially, putting the old station and the transit activity itself on display.”

BPS is Amtrak’s eighth-busiest station and the second-busiest in the Maryland Area Rail Commuter (MARC) network. The original station was realized for the Pennsylvania Railroad. It features a granite facade, terra-cotta and cast iron elements, arched windows, and Tiffany glass domes. The station hasn’t been updated since 1984.

As part of the renovation, the existing train hall will be expanded, and the addition will replace a parking lot across the tracks from the main building. The station’s two entrances will be joined by three others.

The expansion will be fronted with an all-glass facade and a low-lying, copper-lined roof that draws inspiration from the existing train hall’s three Tiffany domes. A covered passageway will connect the modern addition to the historic building.

In facing the addition with glass, Gensler has designed a “window to history,” meaning that travelers will be able to view the historic building from the new portion. Similar to the existing station, the expansion will be naturally illuminated by sunlight filtering through the glass elements.

“The expansion maintains clear views to the historic, offering levity and fluidity, where the historic headhouse is designed around ideas of mass and permanence,” Peter Stubb, the project’s design director, told AN

The addition will primarily house ticketing and baggage services for Amtrak, while the old building’s main concourse will accommodate new retail and restaurant options. In a project that the developers hope to complete by the end of this year, upper floors of the existing Penn Station will house office space, for either a single tenant or as a co-working space.

Renderings of the expansion show a brightly lit, open lobby with tables and seating options where passengers can work or have a cup of coffee while waiting for their train. The glazing overlooks the train tracks below.

The reimagined train station is part of a larger plan to redevelop the neighborhood as a commercial destination. An office complex and adjacent residential development are planned for the area immediately north of the new station. Visuals shared by Gensler and Amtrak depict the office portion as a glass tower that is angular in form and faced with balconies. The surrounding sidewalks and landscape will be improved with new seating and plantings.

“Together, the station expansion and future commercial buildings amplify the presence of Baltimore Penn in the Station North neighborhood—literally bridging the tracks and connecting neighborhoods. By meshing with the city of Baltimore, it stitches it together, strengthening a tapestry that tells the story of a bright future,” Stubb said.

Construction is now underway. Improvements will be made to the existing building this summer, including the installation of a new roof, restoration of old windows, updates to stairs and ramps, and maintenance and updates to the aging mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems. Kristine Klein

The archive includes 789 boxes of Roche’s personal and professional correspondence, along with 954 drawing tubes, 64,000 four-inch-by-five-inch transparencies, and over 88,000 35-millimeter slides.

Archivist Linda Scinto has been responsible for sifting through the materials and objects, cataloging, packaging, and

“Speaking on behalf of my siblings we are delighted to have been able to fulfill our father’s commitment to form this comprehensive archive of KRJDA’s mid to late 20th Century architecture. We are so grateful for Bob Stern’s instigation of the effort in the first place, to Yale for their partnership and of course for the fifteen years of documentation and cataloging put forward by the team at KRJDA,” Eamon Roche shared in a written statement.

The completed archive and the new website follow an announcement last year that the architect’s family would reallocate the money received from Roche’s Pritzker Prize to launch a scholarship program in the name of Roche and his wife, Jane, whom he met while working for Saarinen. KK