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this is 99% invisible I'm Roman Mars

Julia Barton has been thinking about what happens when we build big.

Maybe because she grew up in Dallas in the Gogo 80s.

Big football arenas, big freeways, big houses, Texans love big.

Dallas built a new city hall in 1978.

Designed by I. Impe.

It's this huge trapezoid jutting over a wide plaza.

It's kind of wedge-shaped, but upside down,

so the widest and largest floor is on the top.

When I was a kid, sometimes I'd go up to the top floor of City Hall with my friends.

That's where the vending machines were. They

stalked my favorite candy bar, Caramello. Then we'd sit by the windows eating chocolate and looking down over the plaza and I think wow this is so cool

But later in high school Julia went to a protest down below in the plaza.

And those same city hall windows were now

hulking over us.

We could see our tiny reflections in the glass.

...