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Nelson School

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Nelson School is a former school building in Stillwater, Minnesota , United States, built in 1897. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979 for its local significance in the themes of architecture and education. It was nominated for its Neoclassical / Georgian Revival architecture by Orff & Guilbert and for its status as the oldest surviving public school building in Stillwater.

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22-438: Nelson School is a two-story building with a square footprint. It has red brick walls over a raised foundation of limestone blocks. The front façade has three distinct bays set off by pilasters . The central bay is slightly recessed with an oriel window jutting from the second story. The flanking bays bear slabs inscribed with the building's name and construction date which, like the oriel, are framed with pilasters and topped with

44-405: A column, with a capital at the top, plinth (base) at the bottom, and the various other column elements. In contrast to a Classical pilaster, an engaged column or buttress can support the structure of a wall and roof above. In human anatomy , a pilaster is a ridge that extends vertically across the femur , which is unique to modern humans . Its structural function is unclear. A pilaster

66-419: A different partnership of Fremont D. Orff : Orff & Joralemon . Within two months of opening for classes, a fire broke out in the building and caused $ 5,000 (equivalent to $ 183,120 in 2023) worth of damage. The entire building had cost $ 17,000 (equivalent to $ 622,608 in 2023) to construct. In addition to public education, the building provided civic meeting space. Nelson School last hosted classes in

88-433: A multi-unit residential building. Pilaster In architecture , a pilaster is both a load-bearing section of thickened wall or column integrated into a wall, and a purely decorative element in classical architecture which gives the appearance of a supporting column and articulates an extent of wall. As an ornament it consists of a flat surface raised from the main wall surface, usually treated as though it were

110-556: A pilaster appears at the corner intersection of two walls it is known as a canton . As with a column, a pilaster can have a plain or fluted surface to its profile and can be represented in the mode of numerous architectural styles. During the Renaissance and Baroque architects used a range of pilaster forms. In the giant order pilasters appear as two storeys tall, linking floors in a single unit. The fashion of using this decorative element from ancient Greek and Roman architecture

132-534: A semicircular pediment . The central bay contains the main entrance on the ground floor and a dormer on the roof with a triangular pediment. The building's side walls have a row of ten windows on both floors, while the rear wall is blank but for an oriel window. The building's square plan was an economical design allowing for four classrooms on each floor. Moreover, the lack of windows on the front and rear façades intentionally provided three full walls within each classroom for blackboards . The original Nelson School

154-565: A straight line as they narrow going upward. The human eye would believe that the middle of the column was diminishing in a concave curve halfway up the column, and entasis corrects this. The word we apply to the design principle is used by the Roman architectural historian Vitruvius , and derives from the Greek word έντείνω ( enteino ), "to stretch or strain tight". Creating the illusion of greater strength or perception of height may have been an objective in

176-437: A strained muscle, a theory that accords well with the etymology of the word, from the Greek meaning "to strain". It also has been argued that a "stunted cycloid" column that bulges in the middle is stronger structurally than is a column whose diameter changes according to a linear progression, therefore, having a sound engineering purpose. Because their discussion of the application of the principle has never been discovered, it

198-522: Is also found in architecture, as in the sloping or battered walls of some Tibetan and Bhutanese monasteries and fortresses. The lower parts of such walls, approximately one third, have a slight convex or inward curve, while the higher parts retain an even slope, offsetting the outwardly bulging illusion created by a straight sloping wall. An example in Bhutan is the Dobji Dzong . When some collapsed walls of

220-583: Is foremost a load-bearing architectural element used widely throughout the world and its history where a structural load is carried by a thickened section of wall or column integrated into a wall. It is also a purely ornamental element used in Classical architecture . As such it may be defined as a flattened column which has lost its three-dimensional and tactile value.". In discussing Leon Battista Alberti 's use of pilasters, which Alberti reintroduced into wall-architecture, Rudolf Wittkower wrote: "The pilaster

242-468: Is reminiscent of the structure of a bone and a stroke is seen as stronger for it. Entasis in a stroke is intended to counter the illusion a stroke with perfectly straight sides has of bulging slightly. No record of the rationale for using entasis in columns by Classical builders has yet been discovered. . As a result, there has been extensive conjecture over its purpose. An early view, often articulated and still widespread, espoused by Hero of Alexandria ,

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264-402: Is that entasis corrects the optical illusion of concavity in the columns that the fallible human eye would create if the correction were not made. Some descriptions of entasis state simply that the technique was an enhancement applied to the more primitive conical columns to make them appear more substantial. Other descriptions argue that the technique emphasizes the substantiality of, not

286-406: Is the logical transformation of the column for the decoration of a wall. A pilaster appears with a capital . and entablature , also in "low- relief " or flattened against the wall. Generally, a pilaster often repeats all parts and proportions of an order column; however, unlike it, a pilaster is usually devoid of entasis . Pilasters often appear on the sides of a door frame or window opening on

308-463: The Punakha Dzong were rebuilt, around 1996, this asymmetry was not used. In calligraphy and typography entasis refers to the use of a concave curve to thin — rather than widen — the waist of a stroke or character. In calligraphy this is achieved either through a slight heightening of the pen or brush angle and/or by an increase in the speed of the stroke as it goes into a straight. Visually it

330-414: The facade of a building, and are sometimes paired with columns or pillars set directly in front of them at some distance away from the wall, which support a roof structure above, such as a portico . These vertical elements can also be used to support a recessed archivolt around a doorway. The pilaster can be replaced by ornamental brackets supporting the entablature or a balcony over a doorway. When

352-420: The 1950s, when the public school district converted it into administrative offices. The school district moved out completely in 1976. The vacant building, remanded to city ownership, was threatened with demolition but historic preservation efforts culminating in a court ruling prevented that fate. Local investors purchased it in 1980 and conducted a successful adaptive reuse project to convert Nelson School into

374-575: The application of entasis. Examples of this design principle may be found in cultures throughout the world, from ancient times to contemporary architecture. The first use of entasis is probably in the Later Temple of Aphaia at Aigina , in the 490s BC. It may be observed among Classical period Greek column designs, for example, in the Doric order temples in Segesta , Selinus , Agrigento , and Paestum . It

396-413: The columns, but rather, of some other part or of the building while being viewed as a whole. Yale architectural historian Vincent Scully argues that entasis emphasizes the weight of the roof of a building by making the building columns appear to bulge under the pressure distributed among them. Danish architect Steen Eiler Rasmussen believed that the effect represented strength by imitating the swelling of

418-428: The upper third of the shaft. Noted architects, such as the Renaissance master Andrea Palladio , also used entasis in the designs of their buildings. Entasis was often a feature of Inca walls and doorways to counteract the optical illusion that would make the openings appear narrower in their middles. The opposite effect, applying concave curves in order to narrow surfaces that otherwise would appear to bulge,

440-427: Was a one-story wood-frame structure built in 1885. The school was named for Socrates Nelson , who owned the land where it was built. Opening on September 28, 1885, its student body quickly outgrew the space, so a new facility was constructed on the same site in 1897. The property's National Register nomination attributes the building to the architectural firm of Orff & Guilbert, but a more recent description credits

462-482: Was adopted in the Italian Renaissance , gained wide popularity with Greek Revival architecture , and continues to be seen in some modern architecture. Entasis In architecture , entasis is the application of a convex curve to a surface for aesthetic purposes, or increasing strength. Its best-known use is in certain orders of Classical columns that diminish in a very gentle curve, rather than in

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484-617: Was used less frequently in Hellenistic and Roman period architecture. The Roman temples built during these periods were sometimes higher than those of the Greeks, with longer and thinner columns. Chinese carpenters of the Song Dynasty followed designs in the AD 1103 Yingzao Fashi (Treatise on Architectural Methods or State Building Standards) that specified straight columns or those with an entasis on

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