Monthly Archives: September 2015

Classicism in Newport News

Posted on September 12, 2015 by David Brussat

Calder Loth, a Virginia architectural historian, provided TradArch with good grist for chewing when he offered up a photo of a newly completed chapel, among the atest of a series of classical buildings on the new main campus at Christopher … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Books and Culture, Development, Landscape Architecture, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Met, NYPL dodge ’40s bullet

Posted on September 11, 2015 by David Brussat

A surprising revelation in an interesting paragraph from Michael Gross’s history of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogues’ Gallery: [NYC parks commissioner and Met board member] Robert Moses’s first impression of the new director [Francis Henry Taylor, 1940-55] was changing. … Continue reading →

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Surprised and astonished

Posted on September 11, 2015 by David Brussat

One of the pet peeves of Michael Gross in his Rogues’ Gallery, a history of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, is how long it took its board’s stuffed shirts to accept modern art into its collection. Here is an amusing … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Books and Culture, Humor, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Rip facade off mod angst

Posted on September 10, 2015 by David Brussat

Very interesting chat in the Guardian, “Should Britain’s ‘worst building’ be torn down?” with its art critic Jonathan Jones and Design Museum director Deyan Sudjik debating the future of the recent winner of the Carbuncle Cup, the Walkie-Talkie building, and … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Development, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Cloistered words of beauty

Posted on September 9, 2015 by David Brussat

John D. Rockefeller Jr. gave a park in the upper reaches of Manhattan to New York City and built a museum in the grand manner on its grounds for the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Cloisters and Fort Tryon Park … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Books and Culture, Landscape Architecture, Preservation | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Mont Saint-Michel of old

Posted on September 8, 2015 by David Brussat

On my bucket list is a visit to Mont Saint-Michel, a monestary surrounded by a village on an island just over half a mile off the coast of Lower Normandy, in France. It originated as a fort in ancient times … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Books and Culture, Landscape Architecture, Other countries, Photography | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Style vs. form balderdash

Posted on September 7, 2015 by David Brussat

Justin Shubow, the provocative head of the National Civic Art Society, has posted a segment from a 1996 book review by the late Paul Malo of Roger Scruton’s The Classical Vernacular: Architecture in a Time of Nihilism, which I recently … Continue reading →

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First critique in Pawtucket

Posted on September 6, 2015 by David Brussat

Here is one of my earliest columns about a design competition, in this case to renovate an old department store into a visitors center for the City of Pawtucket. *** Promoting a Peerless Pawtucket December 4, 1992 IN PAWTUCKET, the … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Blast from past, Development, Preservation, Rhode Island, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A day at the dragon races!

Posted on September 6, 2015 by David Brussat

For three years running we had just missed the dragon-boat races at the annual Pawtucket Arts Festival. This year we made it, and boy did we have fun! We saw contestants slam their cheeks pink in a watermelon-face-splat contest. We … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Development, Landscape Architecture, Preservation, Rhode Island, Urbanism and planning, Video | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment