The Mabel Shaw Bridges Hall of Music, more commonly known as Little Bridges (to distinguish it from nearby Bridges Auditorium, known as Big Bridges), is a

concert hall A concert hall is a cultural building with a stage that serves as a performance venue and an auditorium filled with seats. This list does not include other venues such as sports stadia, dramatic theatres or convention centres that may ...

Pomona College Pomona College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Claremont, California. It was established in 1887 by a group of Congregationalists who wanted to recreate a "college of the New England type" in Southern California. In 1925, it became ...

Claremont, California Claremont () is a suburban city on the eastern edge of Los Angeles County, California, United States, east of downtown Los Angeles. It is in the Pomona Valley, at the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. As of the 2010 census it had a popul ...

, designed by

Myron Hunt Myron Hubbard Hunt (February 27, 1868 – May 26, 1952) was an American architect whose numerous projects include many noted landmarks in Southern California and Evanston, Illinois. Hunt was elected a Fellow in the American Institute of Archi ...

and opened in 1915. It was sponsored by a $100,000 gift (equivalent to $ in ) from the parents of Mabel Shaw Bridges, a student in Pomona's class of 1908 who died of illness her junior year. It is used for a variety of musical and non-musical purposes, and is considered the "architectural gem" of Pomona's campus and one of Hunt's finest works.

History

Bridges Hall of Music and Lebus Court (view of Bridges Hall, 1916), Pomona College

The hall was designed as the primary anchor point for the south side of Marston Quadrangle in Hunt's Master Plan for the Pomona campus. In its early history, it was the premier destination of choice for prominent visitors to

Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. It includes the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second most po ...

. The hall was closed in 1969 following the discovery of structural defects, and fears that it would be demolished prompted a successful fundraising campaign that enabled a renovation, including a

seismic retrofitting Seismic retrofitting is the modification of existing built environment, structures to make them more resistant to seismology, seismic activity, ground motion, or soil failure due to earthquakes. With better understanding of seismic demand on stru ...

, beginning in 1971. It was renovated again three decades later, reopening in fall 2000. Pomona's 2015 master plan identifies Little Bridges as one of five "architecturally distinguished buildings with historic stature", and a 2015 environmental impact report from the college identifies it as eligible for listing on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

, although the college has not yet applied for it to be listed. John Neiuber, writing for the ''

Claremont Courier The ''Claremont Courier'' is a community newspaper based in Claremont, California, United States. It is widely regarded as the city's newspaper of record, and is often cited by other news outlets covering the city. In 2018, the ''Courier'' was n ...

'' in 2017, expressed surprise it is not listed.

Architecture

Bridges Hall of Music Exterior, Pomona College

The building takes the form of a

basilica In Ancient Roman architecture, a basilica is a large public building with multiple functions, typically built alongside the town's forum. The basilica was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek East. The building gave its name ...

, and is built in a modified

Spanish Renaissance The Spanish Renaissance was a movement in Spain, emerging from the Italian Renaissance in Italy during the 14th century, that spread to Spain during the 15th and 16th centuries. This new focus in art, literature, quotes and science inspired b ...

style, incorporating a number of influences. It is split into two halves. The northern half contains the concert hall, featuring a heavy wood beam ceiling painted with coats of arms from the

Medici family The House of Medici ( , ) was an Italian banking family and political dynasty that first began to gather prominence under Cosimo de' Medici, in the Republic of Florence during the first half of the 15th century. The family originated in the Muge ...

. The seating was inspired in part by the British

Houses of Parliament The Palace of Westminster serves as the meeting place for both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the two houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Informally known as the Houses of Parliament, the Palace lies on the north bank ...

, and was designed so that the hall would appear occupied even when filled only to a small portion of its capacity. The southern half contains a

colonnade In classical architecture, a colonnade is a long sequence of columns joined by their entablature, often free-standing, or part of a building. Paired or multiple pairs of columns are normally employed in a colonnade which can be straight or curv ...

with Ionic columns surrounding Lebus Court, home to the college's art history department and ''

The Spirit of Spanish Music ''The Spirit of Spanish Music'' is a sculpture by Burt William Johnson (25 April 1890—27 March 1927). It was commissioned by the Pomona College class of 1915 www.pomona.edu/ and placed in the Lebus Court of the Mabel Shaw Bridges Hall of Music ...

'', a bronze sculpture by

Burt William Johnson Burt William Johnson (April 25, 1890 – March 27, 1927)Moore, Nancy Dustin Wall. ''Dictionary of Art and Artists in Southern California Before 1930''. Los Angeles: Privately printed, 1975, p.130 was an American sculptor. Biography Johnson was b ...

Pipe organ

The hall's current

pipe organ The pipe organ is a musical instrument that produces sound by driving pressurized air (called ''wind'') through the organ pipes selected from a keyboard. Because each pipe produces a single pitch, the pipes are provided in sets called ''ranks ...

is the Hill Memorial Organ, named after Carrie Schitker Hill. It was constructed by C. B. Fisk and installed in 2001 after a planning process that lasted over a decade, and has 3519 pipes over 66 ranks, weighing . Previously, the hall used pipe organs by M. P. Moller installed at construction and in 1939.

Usage

Pomona uses Little Bridges for a variety of musical and non-musical events, including

convocation A convocation (from the Latin ''wikt:convocare, convocare'' meaning "to call/come together", a translation of the Ancient Greek, Greek wikt:ἐκκλησία, ἐκκλησία ''ekklēsia'') is a group of people formally assembled for a speci ...

, practices and performances by the Pomona College Orchestra, and guest speaker lectures. The college also allows community and other outside groups to use the hall. It hosts roughly 45 musical performances per year, most of which are free to all.

References

External links

* {{authority control Pomona College Spanish Revival architecture in California Concert halls in California 1915 establishments in California Claremont, California Music venues completed in 1915 School buildings completed in 1915