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.

Zaha in Baghdad? Not.

Zaha Hadid’s come from behind victory in the international competition to design the next Iraqi parliament building probably also wins the prize for projects not likely to happen. Zaha somehow received the contract although Assemblage, of the U.K., won for … Continue reading

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Blast: Ah, the sandbox!

Ah, here is that long lost column, from July 1996, in which I mentioned to a friend that a sandbox for the modernists might be an appropriate thing for her neighborhood, whereupon she kicked sand in my face. Someone just … Continue reading

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Blast: Seeking the sandbox

Yesterday’s column referred to the “sandbox for the modernists,” notifying readers that I had once promised Providence modernists a sandbox they could play in on that distant tomorrow when land vacated after Route 195 was relocated would be vacant and … Continue reading

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A corkscrew of a day!

Got vile news today that the Board of Architectural Review in Charleston has approved Clemson’s design, by Brad Cloepfil, of Allied Works in Portland, Ore., for a modernist School of Architecture building in the middle of Charleston’s historic district. Remarkably … Continue reading

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Column: No need for preservation veto on 195

Should Rhode Island’s state office of historic preservation have a veto over the design of buildings proposed for the land I once described as a “sandbox for the modernists”? Yes, it should. But no, it shouldn’t. A memorandum of agreement … Continue reading

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No kookhouse for Koolhaas

Speaks for itself: SPIEGEL: Some people say that if architects had to live in their own buildings, cities would be more attractive today. Koolhaas: Oh, come on now, that’s really trivial. SPIEGEL: Where do you live? Koolhaas: That’s unimportant. It’s … Continue reading

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The first Palladiophiliac

Sir Robert Walpole is said to have been Britain’s first prime minister, a fact that many people know. How many people know that he was also Britain’s first Palladiophiliac? The Wall Street Journal has a fascinating piece, “The Singular Style … Continue reading

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Modernism in retreat?

Here is an e-mail sent by architect Marc Szarkowski to the TradArch listserv’s discussion thread, “CNU is burning,” about modernism being invited further into New Urbanism at its recent conference in Buffalo. Marc disagrees, and though I’m not buying into … Continue reading

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Biennale beanball

The 14th Venice Biennale opened June 7 and runs into November, the lalapalooza of world architecture, this year curated by Dutch starchitect Rem Koolhaas. The usual suspects of architecture criticism have had their go at it, and it has proved … Continue reading

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What young people want

Originally posted on Architecture Here and There:
The first of two schemes presented by Bevan & Liberatos as counter proposals to the proposed Clemson building in Charleston. Jenny Bevan, of the Charleston, S.C., architecture firm Bevan & Liberatos, has written…

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