Category Archives: Uncategorized

Out with the new, in with …

Posted on August 22, 2017 by

A new apartment building planned for Westminster Street outside of downtown, well beyond Route 95, is going through the design process. The Journal’s story, “5-story building gets go-ahead in Providence” describes tough going for the developer, Michael Lemoi, whose project … Continue reading →

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The old new Nave at Yale

Posted on August 7, 2017 by

The Nave, as the entrance hall of the Sterling Memorial Library at Yale has long been known, was meticulously restored by Helpern Architects in 2014, revealing forgotten glories in the stonework by the original architect, James Gamble Rogers. I visited … Continue reading →

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

Brutalists are people, too

Posted on July 31, 2017 by

Just very bad people. How bad is detailed in an entertaining, if depressing, article on the Londonist website entitled “How Brutalism Scarred London.” The closest I can come to ripping off the veil of anonymity donned by the article’s author, … Continue reading →

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“Lost Providence” update

Posted on July 28, 2017 by

A month from today Lost Providence goes on sale. That’s Monday, August 28. In fact, it already can be pre-ordered. And, to revise and extend my book’s remarks (as they say in Congress), my publisher, History Press, and I are … Continue reading →

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Unwelcome Arnold House?

Posted on July 23, 2017 by

Originally posted on Architecture Here and There:
Welcome Arnold House at 21 Planet St., Providence (Catherine Zipf) Is the Welcome Arnold House (circa 1785), on Planet Street in Fox Point, doomed to demolition by neglect? That’s the question posed by…

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A tale of two PPS events

Posted on May 11, 2017 by

Originally posted on Architecture Here and There:
Aerial view of Cathedral Square shows many entry points into the plaza. (Digital Commons @ RIC) Over the course of four days the Providence Preservation Society hosted two events, one about Cathedral Square,…

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My Jane’s Walk, tomorrow

Posted on May 5, 2017 by

Originally posted on Architecture Here and There:
Jane Jacobs in 1961, leading fight for West Village at Lions Head restaurant, in NYC. Jane Jacobs’s 101st birthday is coming up on Thursday, May 4, so my Jane’s Walk tour along the…

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Rhode Island, circa 1947

Posted on March 29, 2017 by

Here’s a video of a nine-minute promotional film on Rhode Island, the smallest state in the union – though the state with the nation’s highest per capita production of industrial goods. The grainy black & white photography and the “professional” … Continue reading →

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S.J. Perelman in Wash. Sq.

Posted on March 23, 2017 by

Who hasn’t seen a musical that makes you want, in the spirit of the moment, to leap up and dance down that stone balustrade past the water fountain and into the dappled park, singing a Broadway tune to beat the … Continue reading →

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Christopher Gray, RIP

Posted on March 14, 2017 by

Just got a sad email from Irving Sheldon, my friend and former colleague at the Providence Journal, that Christopher Gray has just died. From 1987 to 2014, he wrote the weekly “Streetscapes” column in the real-estate section on Sundays for … Continue reading →

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