St. Louis to get new downtown plaza

ST. LOUIS (AP) -- A new plaza in downtown St. Louis -- scheduled to open next spring with an outdoor balcony, cascading water and sculpture -- will also be a new venue for lunchtime and evening music, film series and street performers.

Community leaders, including St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay, gathered outside the redeveloped Old Post Office building on Wednesday to describe features of the new outdoor plaza to be located just across the street.

The roughly $8 million project will include a sculpture, "Torso di Ikaro" by Igor Mitoraj.

Architect Barry Sampson said the sculpture's reference to the ancient Greek myth of Daedalus and Icarus helped inspire the plaza's design, by the firm Baird Sampson Neuert of Toronto.

Daedalus created the labyrinth on Crete and sometimes is described as the first architect. He was associated with public squares in ancient Greece, Sampson said.

In the myth, Daedalus constructed wings for himself and Icarus to leave Crete, but when Icarus flew too close to the sun, the wings softened in the heat and Icarus fell into the sea.

Sampson said the new 30,000-square-foot plaza includes a central square, and a glade of trees at the east, with benches forming a symbolic labyrinth. A walkway at the back of the plaza will lead to a balcony, tying into the idea of flight and creating a high location where visitors can take in the view. A water basin wraps around the square, with a three-story water cascade adjacent to the balcony.

A wall at the rear of the plaza, near the Roberts Orpheum Theater, will provide a site to screen movies and other images.

Developing the plaza was identified in a 1999 plan as a key part of revitalizing the Old Post Office District downtown, said Jim Cloar, with Downtown Now! and the Downtown St. Louis Partnership, organizations working on downtown revitalization. New lofts, offices and businesses have been opening in the district.

Community leaders said they have actively been working for more than four years to make it a reality.

Slay said it's not easy to develop new parks because they don't produce a lot of revenue. But he was very supportive of the project, saying the plaza will be an important component in downtown revitalization.

Organizations including Downtown Now!, the Downtown St. Louis Partnership, the Gateway Foundation and the Danforth Foundation worked on the plaza, with additional financial support from other groups. The privately owned plaza will be open to the public, Cloar said.