Documenting Place - LLSams Historic Lofts, Waco, TX

 The structures at LL Sams Lofts in Waco, Texas were established as a cotton mill and later transformed in 1946 into a church restoration and furniture factory. The building has seen thousands of people within its doors. Today the buildings serve as student housing, in which most of the residents do not know or do not care about their history.   

For this series, I focused on the converted parking garage. At one point, this structure housed lumbar, supplies, equipment, housed completed furniture and served as a delivery bay for the company. People used to move and busy themselves within this space, filling it with energy. Today, this building has become the most neglected and forgotten structure on the premises. Filled with cobwebs and dust, it only receives company when the LL Sams cats find shelter or when people need to get to their car. 

Looking at the work of Andrew Prokos, a fine art and architecture photographer based in New York, who highlights the structure, individuality and beauty of buildings all across the world, I realized that windows offer an inside look at a building but also give a glimpse to the surroundings and life around the building.  Focusing on the windows of the structure and utilizing time of day to reflect the past and the present, sunlight creates a warmth to the images to draw the viewer in. Sunlight brightens up the space, but in turn leads to smaller more precious detail being lost in the windows and shadows because of its overpowering presence. In a similar way, the updates occurring in the apartment have caused the smaller marking of human presence to be covered up or removed.   

For each image that is filled with the warmth of the sun, there is a partner image that was taken early in the morning before the residents of LL Sams began bustling about. In these quieter moments, reflections in the windows can be seen with more clarity allowing the beauty of the buildings and their surroundings to shine without being overpowered by the powerful light of the sun.  

Taking time to study and spend quiet moments within this space allowed the windows to share what this space once was. Energy and sunlight filling the space invited joy and warmth, but the quiet moments allowed history to step up and speak.