BY ROBERT BEHRE
Of The Post and Courier Staff

Charleston Post and Courier—Oct.13, 2003

When the city of Charleston set out to renovate Market Hall after Hurricane Hugo in 1989, it aimed to set a new standard for historic preservation.

It was a sensible goal in this case: Not only was this 1841 building heavily damaged by that storm and from decades of neglect, but in a city full of landmarks, Market Hall stands out, clearly deserving of careful -- and costly -- attention.

The restoration took 13 years, as architects studied the building, as the city figured out how to pay for its eventual $3.6 million cost, and as what was expected to be a two-year construction phase stretched over 40 months.

Earlier this year, the building reopened with an appearance much the same as during the Civil War, when would-be soldiers walked up its sandstone steps to enlist in the Confederate cause. Today, as vendors bustle around in the open air below, visitors ascend the same steps to see a century-old museum full of artifacts from that war.

Did the city succeed in setting a new standard?

Consider:

-- The work included repairing timber beams in the roof that had rotted from termites and moisture. The contractors brought in timber guild members from as far away as Massachusetts and West Virginia to make the repairs while leaving as much original fabric as possible.

"I think the thing that says the most about the restoration is not what you see but what you don't see," says Bill Turner of the city's Parks Department. "We could have done it cheaper, but we chose to save as many timbers as we could."

Likewise, it would have been easier to remove all the stucco, but between 65 and 75 percent was saved, Turner says.

-- Re-pointing the masonry walls, which are at least five bricks thick, deep inside the structure. Again, the city could have done it more cheaply -- and this work is invisible, too -- but it didn't.

"The biggest challenge to start with was getting into the meat of the job," says Tom McGee of NBM Construction. "There were more structural problems than we thought, and we had to almost stop and put more time and effort into the stabilization of the structure in order to fix it."

-- Reopening the arcade below, which had been closed in with shops in the 20th century. The work wasn't part of the original plan, but city officials made the change after ripping out the shops and savoring the new, open space.

"You can feel the history here," says Parks Director Steve Livingston while standing underneath. "Like you were in the 1840s or 1860s with this vaulted space overhead." The change included the addition of new, generous sidewalks along both North and South Market streets.

-- Recreated the interior oculus -- or circular skylight -- based on evidence on the walls. Architect Joseph K. Oppermann says its design, blending amber and frosted clear glass, was based on remnants of such glass found inside the building.

-- Sensitively adding an elevator, at the request of advocates for the handicapped. While many preservation groups and the state Archives and History Department initially resisted the lift -- which wasn't required because historic landmarks are exempt from the Americans with Disabilities Act -- Mayor Joseph P. Riley Jr. pushed for it anyway.

Today, a transparent ornamental iron cage is tucked inside the building's arcade and is able to carry a person to the museum above, where it arrives in a small room off to the side. Not only is it difficult to see, but it also could be easily removed.

-- The first use of limewash, a thin, watery mix of lime and pigments, in the city in perhaps about a century. Both the exterior and interior colors -- even the controversial, bright green color on the iron rails -- were based on paint samples taken from the building itself.

"The rails are just a little bit striking, and some people think it's too much," Livingston concedes. But restoring only the parts still considered tasteful by today's standards would have been an impure --even half-baked -- approach.

-- Finding sandstone from the original quarry to replace the worn steps out front after the first set of stone steps were an unsuitable color and after preservation groups rejected a second set of cast-stone steps.

"We got a lot of pressure, and it was good. That's what communities do," Livingston says. "They raised our consciousness above where we were at the time."

-- A painstaking approach to restoring its original colors, including faux graining on its massive pine doors (repainted to resemble oak) and on its pine mantels (repainted to resemble expensive marble). When an investigation showed that the cornice was originally brown paint mixed with brownstone dust, that look was recreated, too.

"The building is really all about illusion, a much more grand space originally than what the budget permitted it to be," says Oppermann. "There's faux painting and faux materials and faux spaces. It's a wonderfully designed building."

People can decide for themselves if a new standard was set, but the National Trust for Historic Preservation has already made up its mind: Earlier this month, it gave the city, Oppermann and NBM Construction Co. its National Preservation Honor Award.

"We are continually pleased by the high standards for historic preservation set by the city of Charleston," Trust president Richard Moe said. "Charleston has long been revered as a model for historic preservation, and the painstaking attention to detail exhibited in the restoration of Market Hall further illustrates Charleston's dedication to maintaining its historic landmarks."

"We weren't trying to make a building look new," Oppermann adds. "What we were trying to do was to conserve the old. We wanted it to look like an old building well maintained, and I think all of us are pleased that we did that."

Robert Behre may be reached at 937-5771 or by fax at 937-5579. His e-mail address is rbehre@postandcourier.com, and his mailing address is 134 Columbus St. Charleston S.C. 29403.