Author Archives: David Brussat

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About David Brussat

This blog was begun in 2009 as a feature of the Providence Journal, where I was on the editorial board and wrote a weekly column of architecture criticism for three decades. Architecture Here and There fights the style wars for classical architecture and against modern architecture, no holds barred. History Press asked me to write and in August 2017 published my first book, "Lost Providence." I am now writing my second book. My freelance writing on architecture and other topics addresses issues of design and culture locally and globally. I am a member of the board of the New England chapter of the Institute of Classical Architecture & Art, which bestowed an Arthur Ross Award on me in 2002. I work from Providence, R.I., where I live with my wife Victoria, my son Billy and our cat Gato. If you would like to employ my writing and editing to improve your work, please email me at my consultancy, dbrussat@gmail.com, or call 401.351.0457. Testimonial: "Your work is so wonderful - you now enter my mind and write what I would have written." - Nikos Salingaros, mathematician at the University of Texas, architectural theorist and author of many books.

Delft tunnel in Amsterdam

Amsterdam does everything it can to make it fun for walkers. You can see naked ladies in shop windows. Even the new tunnel from its central train station for pedestrians and bicyclists, called the Cuyperspassage, is bedecked with 46,000 blue … Continue reading

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Credit for temple in Philly

The level of astonishment aroused by the new temple in Philadelphia for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is not limited to this small corner of the archipunditsphere. My recent laudatory post, “Mormon temple in Philly,” has generated … Continue reading

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Photochromatic coloration

Here, in “Please Don’t Take My Photochrome,” courtesy of Geoff Manaugh at BLDGBLOG, are a good bunch of photochrome photographs of European and North African buildings housed at the Library of Congress. Manaugh writes: “Each image has a strangely volumetric … Continue reading

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Mormon temple in Philly

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has put up a lovely new temple in Philadelphia, one whose traditional design has raised the eyebrows of the city’s leading architecture critic, Inga Saffron, who writes for the Inquirer. She praises … Continue reading

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Duo Dickinson on Trump II

Three months ago, Connecticut architecture critic Duo Dickinson warned architects that the crowds with pitchforks backing Donald Trump might someday come for them. “Architects’ Trump moment” was well conceived. His latest venture into that political gulch, “Donald Trump as Architecture’s … Continue reading

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The good, the bad, the ugly

Simon Jenkins writes of plans for two new arts venues in London, one good, one bad. The bad, alas, builds on a former Olympics site, in the Stratford district, “ploddingly” rebranded as Olympicopolis, and exhibiting failure in its attempt at … Continue reading

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Block Island weather station

My South County correspondent, Cliff Vanover, mapmaker extraordinaire, sent me the photo above of a fine old house on Block Island’s Beach Road. It was originally built and for a long time served as a weather station for the U.S. … Continue reading

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Tale of two library entries

Here is last month’s blog post for Traditional Building magazine. It applauds a recent Palladio Award winner, HBRA Architects of Chicago, for reopening a library entrance at Northwestern University that was closed in 1970 after a Brutalist new library was … Continue reading

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Lisbon’s new coach museum

I’d hate to be the architect of a new building that was described this way: With its white cobblestone pavements, Moorish-tiled facades, and pastelarias (cakeshops) on every corner, visitors to Lisbon frequently feel that they’ve stumbled into a fairytale. So … Continue reading

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Time to redo Lincoln Center

The Future Symphony Institute has reprinted on its website three plans to rebuild Lincoln Center, published in the autumn 2000 issue of City Journal, the quarterly of the Manhattan Institute. “A New Lincoln Center,” though or in fact because it … Continue reading

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