Category Archives: Books and Culture

Biggest little whaling ship

Posted on October 5, 2015 by David Brussat

The Lagoda, at 89 feet in length and on display in the New Bedford Whaling Museum’s central Bourne Building, has been described variously as the largest model whaling ship and the largest model ship in the world. It was built … Continue reading →

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Rachleff programming notes

Posted on September 27, 2015 by David Brussat

Victoria and I attended last night’s Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra performance at Veterans Memorial Auditorium. It was a wonderful concert even though – perhaps because – we left during intermission. Not that we wanted to miss Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring,” … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Art and design, Books and Culture, Development, Providence, Rhode Island | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Architecture and friendliness

Posted on September 23, 2015 by David Brussat

My friend Cliff Vanover just sent me a link to Travel & Leisure’s new survey on the 266 places that made it onto its list of World’s Unfriendliest Cities. The unfriendliest was Moscow. A hint of political bias, perhaps? How … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Art and design, Books and Culture, Other countries, Photography, Providence, Rhode Island, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Architecture and happiness

Posted on September 23, 2015 by David Brussat

In “Why the ‘happiest’ cities are boring,” John Kay of the Financial Times makes a series of very important distinctions between happy cities and great cities, and in doing so he challenges most of the reigning official definitions of happiness … Continue reading →

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Understand the Victorian

Posted on September 21, 2015 by David Brussat

Stephen Bayley, the architecture critic for the Telegraph, has written “Some Victorian buildings should be left to die.” He is correct, but some is a vague word, to say the least. “All modernist buildings should be left to die” is … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Books and Culture, Development, Preservation | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments

Classicism in Newport News

Posted on September 12, 2015 by David Brussat

Calder Loth, a Virginia architectural historian, provided TradArch with good grist for chewing when he offered up a photo of a newly completed chapel, among the atest of a series of classical buildings on the new main campus at Christopher … Continue reading →

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

Surprised and astonished

Posted on September 11, 2015 by David Brussat

One of the pet peeves of Michael Gross in his Rogues’ Gallery, a history of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, is how long it took its board’s stuffed shirts to accept modern art into its collection. Here is an amusing … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Books and Culture, Humor, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Cloistered words of beauty

Posted on September 9, 2015 by David Brussat

John D. Rockefeller Jr. gave a park in the upper reaches of Manhattan to New York City and built a museum in the grand manner on its grounds for the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Cloisters and Fort Tryon Park … Continue reading →

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Mont Saint-Michel of old

Posted on September 8, 2015 by David Brussat

On my bucket list is a visit to Mont Saint-Michel, a monestary surrounded by a village on an island just over half a mile off the coast of Lower Normandy, in France. It originated as a fort in ancient times … Continue reading →

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