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.

Yo! Brutalist website design!

Russell Jenkins, who has an accurate sense of where my funny bone is located, sent me a link to a website about Brutalist web design. “The disease spreads beyond architecture,” he noted. Yes, but that strikes me as old news. … Continue reading

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Carlo Scarpa’s modernism

The identity of my favorite modernist architect has always eluded me. I am not familiar with the work of every modernist. But modern architecture is by its nature inferior to traditional architecture. At its heart is a rejection of the … Continue reading

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Bulldoze or rebuild Mack?

A horrific second fire in four years at Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s Glasgow School of Art, completed in 1909, has elicited predictably cockamamie calls to demolish rather than to again rebuild the Scotsman’s masterpiece. Its restoration had been 80 percent complete … Continue reading

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Corbu’s rant at Neimeyer

Oscar Niemeyer, the Brazilian architect who died in 2012 at age 104, is best known for designing Brasília, the sterile über-modernist new capital city that arose in the Brazilian outback in something like three years in the late 1950s. Its … Continue reading

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Devastation in Glasgow

Shattering news from Scotland, where architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s masterpiece, the Glasgow School of Art, completed in 1909, has just suffered a catastrophic fire, just as its restoration after a catastrophic fire in 2014 was nearing its final stages. No! … Continue reading

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The battle of the Frick

The question of how to expand the Frick Gallery, on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, without threatening its architectural integrity continues following a May 29 hearing of the New York Landmarks Preservation Commission. Four hours of testimony for and against the … Continue reading

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Newport’s newest cottage

Yesterday’s ribbon-cutting for the Welcome Center at The Breakers unveiled a tourist attraction in its own right. That’s saying a lot in Newport. It is that beautiful. In the weeks leading up to its completion, I kept trolling online for … Continue reading

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Taking wing on Westminster

Arnold “Buff” Chace, Providence’s pioneering redeveloper of downtown, has another major project in mind for Westminster Street. He has announced the renovation of the Lapham, Wit, and Trayne buildings, erected in 1904, 1925, and 1893, respectively. To the Trayne will … Continue reading

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Cover-up on Canal Street!

Some people might think the “cover up” in the headline refers to the legally dubious swap of air rights for extra height that would have enabled 15 stories for Phase 2 of the proposed Edge College Hill apartments on Canal … Continue reading

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Atlanta strives for beauty

Not many cities in America house a philanthropist dedicated to beauty the way Rodney Mims Cook Jr. strives to beautify Atlanta. Cook established the National Monuments Foundation in 1996 to build classical monuments in Atlanta, among other places. And frankly, … Continue reading

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