Background
The City of Port Townsend, Washington, a unique town on the northeast end of the Olympic peninsula at the head of Puget Sound, sprang to life in the late 1800's with high hopes of becoming a major trading port. The National Historic Registry cites Port Townsend's waterfront district as a fine example of High Victorian architecture. The citizens of Port Townsend are proud that their town captures a moment in time. The local Historic Preservation Committee (HPC), which reviews all exterior renovation work within the historic district, struggles with how to accept modern improvements while maintaining its historic character without becoming clich�.

Amazingly, the City Council has continuously conducted its meetings in the Historic City Hall at its historic waterfront district location since 1895 when the building was completed. Years of deterioration and deferred maintenance however have taken their toll on the "grand old dame." In the 1940's, due to lack of funding for roof repairs, the character establishing ornate 3rd floor with a steeply pitched roof and detailed corner towers was demolished and replaced with a flat roof.

The Setting
Since the 1970's the Jefferson County Historical Society (JCHS) has operated a local history museum in the Historic City Hall (HCH) showcasing the original courtroom, fire hall, jail, and council chambers. Recently, JCHS has been working on plans to renovate the building, and their analysis revealed that the scope and cost were significantly beyond the reach of JCHS and that additional support was needed for the renovation efforts. After much discussion, committee meetings, and further study, JCHS and the City agreed that the City could cover the costs of the shell and core elements, including repointing the brick, restoring all the windows, and providing a new roof. The Historic Society would then be responsible for raising the funds for the interior work including wiring, plumbing, and final finishes.

Meanwhile, coincidentally and just down the street, the Port Townsend City administration was concluding that it needed a stronger civic presence. For years the City administration had been located in an unassuming brick building with a baffling layout, inefficient work spaces, and an anonymous side entry for the public. The city administration wanted a building with a sense of arrival and welcome for the public, a building that residents could be proud of and where staff could work efficiently. Under discussion since 1976, these ideas finally led to an extensive 2001 study of several sites downtown and a recommendation to locate a new building to accommodate these needs on the city owned parking lot immediately adjacent to the HCH. In 2002, programming and initial schematic design began for a new City Hall Annex as a separate building with a distinct separation between the old and new city halls.

The Challenges
As with any historic project, the challenges were substantial. ARC Architects was initially hired to design a convincing modern City Hall Annex with a civic presence immediately adjacent to the HCH, considered by many in the community to be "the Queen". But as the search for additional space for the annex logically pointed to unused space in the HCH the project morphed to include examining architectural issues of joining two apparently separate projects, and the ARC design team found itself with all the challenges of two adjacent projects, one new construction, the other a Victorian Rehabilitation. It was apparent from the beginning that the town was divided on the necessity and the appropriate character of a new City Hall, so the first challenge was gaining community support. The second challenge was the renovation of the HCH in which the retrofit work would have the minimum impact to the original design. The third challenge was to complete all of this work on both buildings within a limited budget, overseen by a skeptical city council and the critical eye of the Historic Preservation Committee. Yes, the challenges were significant!

Then the Work
In 2002, the design team was working on two separate projects, the rehabilitation of HCH and the construction of a new City Hall Annex. Several brainstorming meetings were held in an effort to find the best solutions within the constraints of two complicated projects with inadequate budgets. These early collaborative sessions as a team encouraged all members to discuss all options. City staff participated as a full member of the team and encouraged the exploration of wide ranging solutions. The Design Team included: ARC Architects; Kate Johnson, Historic Preservation Architect; Swenson Say Fagét, Structural engineer; Keen Engineering, Mechanical; Travis Fitzmaurice, Electrical; Telegraph Engineering, Civil; McLeod Reckord, Landscape; Port Townsend City Staff.

Keep in mind that this project is under close scrutiny by the entire community - multiple review boards and the public at large in open and often contentious city council meetings. At one point we were told in a city council meeting that "There isn't a way to be successful with this project - everyone has their opinions and they aren't the same as anyone else's." We strategized with city staff about the best way to shepherd the project through the multiple layers of approval. Everyone decided that a Steering committee, including the community opposition as well as community supporters, should be created to help guide the project through the historic review and gain the support of the community and a skeptical city council.

As a team, we explored many options that were presented first to City Administrators, then to the Steering Committee, then the Historic Preservation Committee, and then to the City Council, carefully scripted in that order. The Steering Committee was instrumental in gaining early community reaction to all aspects of the design, which helped us formulate the design as well as the methods for presentation. The Steering community also became real advocates for pursuing sustainable design and helped to convince the city of the value of setting an example for the community by pursuing LEED certification for the project. Throughout the project the power and enthusiasm generated by this committee helped ensure that despite the complexity and apparently insurmountable obstacles the movement was always forward, toward completion.

One of the City's goals for the rehabilitation of the HCH was to be able to increase the use of the building - this required significant improvements beyond the exterior rehabilitation. Seismic strengthening of the building was required. This included the addition of new lateral elements to help brace the south and west walls and the attachment of the existing wood floors to the unreinforced masonry walls. The building also would need to be made more accessible to people with special needs and a second means of egress would need to be built to meet exiting requirements of the current building code. It was also agreed that the long term goal should include restoration of the ornate 3rd floor that was removed in the 1940's.

The new City Hall Annex building was at the same time struggling to meet a tight budget and programmatically really needed more space than allowed by the budget. In addition, the historic district code required that any new building be shorter than HCH and that it not outshine the older "Queen".

Eureka!
Aha! What if the buildings were connected?

As the Design Team wrestled with minimizing impact to the HCH and creating more program space for city administration the advantages of combining the two buildings became obvious. The Annex could provide the required accessibility, new restrooms, and a second means of egress without taking up valuable space in HCH or the expense of restoring finishes to original condition. The HCH would provide needed program space that the Annex could not afford. All of this could be done for less money than if the two projects were considered separately.

In addition, the need to strengthen the HCH south and west unreinforced masonry walls was a significant challenge in itself. The numerous openings in these ornate facades significantly weaken their ability to resist the lateral forces of an earthquake. One solution involved core drilling the brick pilasters between the windows and placing post tensioned steel rods to strengthen the masonry piers. This solution proved impractical because it would be very expensive and difficult to control the drilling through the brick that would risk damaging the pilasters. Another solution was to strengthen the walls with steel frames. While a steel braced frame resolved the lateral forces economically, the Historic Preservation Committee was not in favor of the diagonal bracing that would be apparent just inside the historic fa�ade. This would also significantly disrupt and in some cases change the interior spaces of HCH and require considerable restoration work to conceal the steel frame. Finally, we explored the possibility of using the Annex to act as a buttress to support HCH's west face in an earthquake.

With refinement, this braced frame buttress became the solution for the seismic strengthening of HCH. On the aesthetic side, the team continued to work on finding a design that could incorporate the steel bracing and pay reverence to the "Queen." We utilized the steering committee to gain early feedback on the design. The exposed steel braces are very modern for this historic town, but once it was explained how these help to support the Historic City Hall, people appreciated the braces and some even grew to like the modern aesthetic of the steel. This innovative solution is an example of how you can use a new adjacent structure to alleviate the visible impact on an historic structure without compromising the seismic integrity of system.

In addition there was still the issue of support for the south fa�ade. Because of the disruption a steel frame was not the preferred solution in the interior space of HCH. Instead, it was decided that one of the wood partition walls near the south face of the structure could be replaced with a concrete shearwall. This eliminated any impact to the south fa�ade as well.

In order to stay on course, the team set up multiple meetings with the Historic Preservation Committee and Steering Committee. In the early stages, we initiated a walking tour of the downtown with the Historic Preservation Committee to discuss Victorian architecture and learn more about what was important to them in the existing buildings. This helped to facilitate the discussion about what was 'appropriate' for new construction and what could be defined as 'complimentary'. As the building began to take shape we realized that living in Port Townsend was limiting HPC's vision of new masonry construction, so we presented a slide show of modern brick buildings in Seattle that highlighted examples of modern details and aesthetic and expanded their vision of the possibilities of these new buildings. We completed design review with HPC in several stages of development; first the scale, bulk, and window proportions were approved, then general detailing, then colors and finish materials, then lighting and hardware. The City Staff of Port Townsend contributed enormously throughout this process - they coordinated meetings, reported on local opinions, and helped guide the presentations for best results.

Take Home Value
We are pleased to have had the opportunity to work with the City of Port Townsend to help solve a remarkable dilemma - saving one of the community's most treasured assets and providing a new civic place for the city.

Out of this we all learned:
• There is power in structuring a layered consensus building process with multiple stakeholders. They help navigate the project through the multiple layers of oversight.
• There is value in collaborative exploration of ideas to come up with an innovative approach to preservation on a tight budget. The team as a whole continued to ask and explore better solutions.
• Perseverance is critical. When many opportunities for the project to be sidelined by seemingly insurmountable issues, the collective leadership kept the momentum going forward, always reaching for a solution that everyone could accept.

Inclusion, community outreach and consensus building combined with the team's insight and collaboration helped to ensure not only meeting the challenges of the project but creating an innovative, exciting and successful relationship between the "Princess" and the "Queen."