engineering

Hill Building

Hill Building is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Hill Building rather than just read about it. In short: The Hill Building is a 17-story modernistic skyscraper located in Durham, North Carolina. Built in 1935–1937, the Hill Building was designed by George Watts Carr.

Key takeaways

Hill Building belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Hill Building to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Hill Building from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Hill Building is a 17-story modernistic skyscraper located in Durham, North Carolina. Built in 1935–1937, the Hill Building was designed by George Watts Carr. New York City architecture firm Shreve, Lamb & Harmon best known for the design of the Empire State Building, acted as consultants. Named for John Sprunt Hill, and built to house the Durham Bank & Trust Company, the building is outfitted with Art Deco ornamentation, interior fluted doors and an exquisitely crafted letter box. The building is in the heart of downtown Durham, located at the intersection of Main and Corcoran Streets. The Hill building was home to Durham Bank & Trust and its successor, Central Carolina Bank and Trust, from 1937 until its 2005 purchase by SunTrust Banks, which had its local headquarters in the building until 2006. Greenfire Real Estate Holdings, which bought the Hill Building in 2006, successfully renovated the building into a 165-room luxury hotel. The city of Durham voted to add $4.2 million after a September 20, 2010 public hearing regarding this plan, and Durham County voted to add $1 million. Greenfire hoped historic tax credits would provide $11 million, and other tax credits would add $4 million. In February 2013, Greenfire formed a joint venture with Kentucky-based hotel operator 21C Museum Hotels. Construction began in late July 2013 and was completed in 2015. Skanska was in charge of the construction project in partnership with 21c Museum Hotels. The renovation also includes a plan for a contemporary art museum, upscale restaurants, bar and ballroom. The museum is open 24 hours per day and offers free admission. An estimated $48 million was spent to complete the entire renovation for the Hill Building. The hotel itself was inducted into Historic Hotels of America, the official program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, in 2019.

References

External links Construction history, with photos

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Hill Building

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Hill Building claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Hill Building before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Hill Building ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Hill Building

In research: Hill Building appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Hill Building in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Hill Building is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Art Deco architecture in North Carolina, Bank company headquarters in the United States, Buildings and structures completed in 1935, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Hill Building outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study Hill Building in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Hill Building means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Hill Building out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Hill Building in simple terms?

The Hill Building is a 17-story modernistic skyscraper located in Durham, North Carolina. Built in 1935–1937, the Hill Building was designed by George Watts Carr.

Why does Hill Building matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Hill Building?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Hill Building.