Category Archives: Architecture History

Long shots of Providence

Posted on March 21, 2016 by David Brussat

Everyone’s filling out their wuddayacallits, the basketball thingies. President Obama did it. Well, Providence is hosting the regional NCAA semifinals, or did so this past weekend, whatever. I’m not sure how the Friars made out, but here are some even … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Landscape Architecture, Photography, Preservation, Providence, Rhode Island, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Silence for S.W. Pavilion

Posted on March 21, 2016 by David Brussat

For about an hour tomorrow afternoon may be spent in silence for a good cause – sitting mute at a meeting to save the Southwest Pavilion. This is the oldest survivor from the day when Rhode Island Hospital looked like … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Development, Preservation, Providence, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Mehaffy on why we rebuild

Posted on March 20, 2016 by David Brussat

A retrograde opinion by a thinker of apparently native good sense can generate a cavalcade of truths from another thinker in response. Thus we have Michael Mehaffy’s response to Duo Dickinson’s curious “Sprinting to the Past,” against the idea of … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

VidSmartRI on Providence

Posted on March 19, 2016 by David Brussat

Grow Smart Rhode Island has produced a short video, “PVD: Personality. Vitality. Distinction,” about the charms of the Ocean State’s capital city. It begins looking downriver along the Providence from an abandoned water taxi stop near the new Crawford Street … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Development, I-195 Redevelopment District, Providence, Rhode Island, Urbanism and planning, Video | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Breuer Whitney/Met Breuer

Posted on March 18, 2016 by David Brussat

The Met Breuer opened today. It is the Brutalist building that the Whitney Museum of American Art left before moving last year into a building designed for it by Renzo Piano in New York’s Meatpacking District. The Metropolitan Museum of … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Development, Preservation, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Gird Penn Station’s rebuild

Posted on March 17, 2016 by David Brussat

Connecticut architect Duo Dickinson, who writes regularly on architecture, often critical of modernism, has just written “Sprinting to the Past” in Common/Edge. He rails against Brooklyn architect Richard Cameron’s proposal to rebuild Penn Station as Charles Follen McKim designed it in … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Development, Preservation, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Video: ‘Windy City Nights’

Posted on March 15, 2016 by David Brussat

This splendid video from Vimeo by Max Wilson of chicagotimelapse.org, called “Chicago: Windy City Nights,” shows off Chicago in much (if not all) of its glory. Chicago is the city of my birth and is considered a mecca amongst architects, … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Photography, Urbanism and planning, Video | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

More architecture by Gaudi

Posted on March 12, 2016 by David Brussat

My recent post “Didn’t quite get Gaudì,” criticizing a modernist supposedly won over by his architecture, has inspired me to post a few more shots of his work. Most of these are my favorites among images from Wikipedia’s list of … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Other countries, Photography, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Didn’t quite get Gaudi

Posted on March 9, 2016 by David Brussat

Ayesha Khan’s essay on the Spanish Catalan Antoni Gaudí (1852-1926) in the Wall Street Journal, “How a Gaudi Building Won Over a Strict Minimalist,” doesn’t quite live up to the headline. It is not clear that she really likes Gaudí … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Other countries | Tagged , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Fallen Rome, fallen moderns

Posted on March 8, 2016 by David Brussat

Passages from Stephen Greenblatt’s The Swerve: How the World Became Modern evoke a Rome in the 15th century fallen from its imperial glory: The population of Rome, a small fragment of what it had once been, lived in detached settlements, … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Books and Culture, Landscape Architecture, Other countries, Preservation, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment