Category Archives: Architecture

Jewelry District dejewelled

Posted on November 8, 2017 by David Brussat

The image above recently landed in my online mailbox atop an invitation from the Jewelry District Association to attend a groundbreaking for River House, the two leftmost buildings. The third, at right, is the decommissioned South Street Station power plant, … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Providence, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , | 8 Comments

Jan Gehl’s misplacemaking

Posted on November 7, 2017 by David Brussat

ArchDaily has interviewed Jan Gehl, the noted Danish designer and theorist of placemaking. The article, “In the last 50 years, architects have forgotten what a good human scale is,” suggests that Gehl’s thinking, for all its merit, has not truly … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Millais vs. Le Corbusier

Posted on November 5, 2017 by David Brussat

Malcolm Millais, the author of Exploding the Myths of Modern Architecture, has written Le Corbusier, the Dishonest Architect, brought out in Britain by Cambridge Scholars Publishing, of Newcastle upon Tyne. It is a brave book and a necessary book, a … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 11 Comments

Kunstler vs. infinite suburbia

Posted on November 4, 2017 by David Brussat

James Howard Kunstler, best known for his 1993 book The Geography of Nowhere, which condemns suburbia, may be the hardest urban policy analyst to pigeonhole ideologically. Anyhow, I revere Kunstler not for his supposed nonpartisanship but for his coinership of … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Journal review of “Lost Prov”

Posted on November 2, 2017 by David Brussat

This post corrects my lapse in failing to pass along the Sunday, Oct. 15 review of my book in the newspaper I worked at for three decades. Lost Providence was reviewed by Patrick Conley, the historian laureate of Rhode Island. … Continue reading →

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Left vs. modern architecture!

Posted on November 1, 2017 by David Brussat

“Why You Hate Contemporary Architecture,” by Nathan J. Robinson and Brianna Rennix, is a long essay in the leftwing journal Current Affairs. The authors are its editor-in-chief and its senior editor, respectively. They omit the other typical synonym for ugly … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture | Tagged , , , , | 12 Comments

Pawtucket’s stadium woes

Posted on October 29, 2017 by David Brussat

Doubts are increasing about whether new development around a proposed PawSox stadium can support its costs amid downtown Pawtucket’s longstanding failure to thrive. Today’s Providence Sunday Journal ran a package of stories highlighting those doubts, but the issue was placed … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Development | Tagged , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Pavilions of Lincoln Woods

Posted on October 28, 2017 by David Brussat

There’s still time today, if you are in Rhode Island, to see the new pavilions at Lincoln Woods, the park in Lincoln, in the Blackstone River Valley north of Providence. Designed by Brewster Thornton Group Architects of Providence and erected … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

NB: Corbu’s Villa d’Orgie

Posted on October 27, 2017 by David Brussat

Nir Buras, whose Classic Planning blog I’ve just put on “Blogs I Follow,” and who is writing a major study on classical planning that has taken him around the world, reacted with a deft panache to my recent post on … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

New Brown engineers’ crib

Posted on October 26, 2017 by David Brussat

Modern architecture is easy to dislike. Its exemplars are ridiculous, its mythology is idiotic, and the methods by which it maintains dominance in the field of architecture are corrupt. I loathe modern architecture generally and feel little but contempt for … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments