April 4, 2008
Seattlest Pix: 08Apr04
"Reflections on Old Justice" by Jonathan Hanlon

Each plane of the central library's glass skin reflects, absorbs, or becomes transparent to light in different ways—like a giant, irregular gemstone—depending on your distance from it, your point of view, the time of day, and the weather. Jonathan captures each one of these behaviors in this shot. Thanks for sharing this with the Seattlest Flickr pool!
Reflected in one plane is the extremely hot, albeit prosaically named, Art Deco/Moderne "United States Courthouse", completed in 1940. The Dept. of Neighborhoods page extols its "seven-story shaft defined by fenestration". It doesn't receive much airplay, but thoughtful fenestration goes a long way toward a building's overall sex appeal.
Speaking of glass, we always love to walk around the central library when we have idle time to take it in from many angles and several street corners. Day or night, the things you can see in, and through, its glass never disappoint. About the only place you can't witness these fabulous glass behaviors is in Google maps:


