Category Archives: Architecture

The Downcity Plan, II

Posted on March 24, 2023 by David Brussat

*** Editor’s note: This is the bottom half of the 22nd and final chapter, “The Downcity Plan,” from Lost Providence. Chapter 22 concludes Part II of the book, whose final two chapters record the two major projects that sparked the … Continue reading →

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The Downcity Plan

Posted on March 16, 2023 by David Brussat

Editor’s note: This is the first half of Chapter 22, “The Downcity Plan,” from the book Lost Providence, published in 2017. (I accidentally referred to this post initially as the “bottom half” of Chapter 22. I regret the confusion that … Continue reading →

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Fane tower bites the dust!

Posted on March 10, 2023 by David Brussat

The latest design revision of the Fane tower, now canceled. (GoLocalProv.com) The Fane tower is dead. This news came to me just a minute ago, and I have interrupted my attention to a Zoom forum of the Classical Planning Institute … Continue reading →

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Waterplace and WaterFire, II

Posted on March 7, 2023 by David Brussat

This post reprints the second half of Chapter 21, “Waterplace and WaterFire,” from Lost Providence. The Waterplace design by Bill Warner was so good that many experts were confused. It reminded me of the what several recent tour guides of … Continue reading →

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Waterplace and WaterFire

Posted on March 3, 2023 by David Brussat

Downtown Providence as seen from northeast, from a spot on College Hill. For some reason, its skyline, which is best seen from the east, is nowhere pictured as viewed from the top of College Street on College Hill. Perhaps because … Continue reading →

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Going for the ugly at RIPTA

Posted on February 24, 2023 by David Brussat

Proposed new transit center at Doorance and Dyer streets. (RIPTA) The Rhode Island Public Transit Authority has finally got with the program, or so it seems. It has apparently ditched its relatively attractive new transit hub on Dorrance Street for … Continue reading →

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Bringing beauty to Australia

Posted on February 17, 2023 by David Brussat

The winning design of the “Sydney is Beautful” competition, from Sydney-based M.J. Suttie architects. Australia has incredible nodes of beauty. It has to. It is its own continent, right? The fact that 80 percent of its population in 1820 consisted … Continue reading →

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Video: Industrial Trust Bldg.

Posted on February 11, 2023 by David Brussat

A train zooms through Providence, with the Industrial Trust building in the background. (YouTube) Here is a video produced, apparently seven years ago, by Matthew Bird, a videographer who hails from the Rhode Island School of Design. For those of … Continue reading →

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Pentreath, Driehaus laureate

Posted on February 5, 2023 by David Brussat

I believe I first heard of architect Ben Pentreath from a video called “Three Classicists” in which he, along with George Saumarez Smith, and Francis Terry drew, in 2010, a classical scene on the walls of the Kowalski Gallery, in … Continue reading →

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Professor Curl’s revenge

Posted on January 27, 2023 by David Brussat

1933 competition entry by Mies van der Rohe for new Reichsbank. (Stevens Curl collection) Since the publication of his masterly evisceration of modernist architecture in 2018, Making Dystopia: The Strange Rise and Survival of Architectural Barbarism, James Stevens Curl has … Continue reading →

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