Brutalism in Washington DC

Washington DC acquired its concrete monuments through the federal government, whose 1960s and 70s building programs made brutalism the unofficial style of American bureaucracy. The J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building on Pennsylvania Avenue is the most argued-over example, while the Robert C. Weaver Federal Building by Marcel Breuer's office gave HUD a curved double-Y plan of precast concrete. On the National Mall, Gordon Bunshaft designed the Smithsonian Hirshhorn Museum as a raised concrete cylinder around a fountain courtyard, and I. M. Pei answered with the sharply angular East Building, National Gallery of Art. The Metro system's coffered concrete vaults, designed by Harry Weese's office, carry the same sensibility underground. University work like the Gelman Library at George Washington University shows the style's civilian reach.