65Waco's Front Porch
Bridge Street Plaza, “Waco’s Front Porch,” by architect Michael Papernov, AIA, of RBDR PLLC, Architects, for City Center Waco and the City of Waco, opened 2021 · weathering-steel tower and cut-steel entry sign, Bridge Street at the east bank · the tower carries the manufacturer’s mark of Streetlife and appears to be a specified product, not a separately commissioned sculpture · the entry sign’s designer is not on record · know who designed it? Tell us.SCULPTURE
A rusted steel tower that is quietly a bridge, over a sign that names this whole corner of town.
A single slab of weathering steel stands on a round concrete pad, maybe eighteen feet of it, rusted to that deep orange-brown that only ever looks like it has been there forever. The bottom two-thirds is solid plate. The top third is cut clean through in a repeating X-brace — and the moment you see it as a truss, you cannot unsee it: this is a bridge tower, standing on end, a hundred yards from three real bridges.
The curved concrete seat wall in front of it carries the plaza's name in cut steel, in a lettering style borrowed straight from the 1920s, with the silhouette of a suspension bridge running behind the words: BRIDGE STREET PLAZA — WACO'S FRONT PORCH.
That second line is doing a lot of work. For most of this city's history, the front porch was on the other bank, and East Waco was what you looked at from it. Putting the porch on this side is not an accident of phrasing.