Tag Archives: World’s Columbian Exposition

EO: The two paths ahead

Posted on March 4, 2020 by David Brussat

The draft executive order that is stirring within the Trump administration is forcing classicists in the field of architecture to choose one of two paths forward. The path that goes through the E.O., if it is not already throttled in … Continue reading →

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Imagine all the buildings …

Posted on November 29, 2019 by David Brussat

The other day, flipping through stacks of my old Providence Journal columns seeking a shot of a c. 1750 house in Providence’s old village of Hardscrabble (which I found), I came across a column inspired by a website’s image of … Continue reading →

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Obama Center crisis solved

Posted on June 23, 2019 by David Brussat

Chicago can solve the crisis of its proposed Obama Presidential Center by transferring it from Jackson Park to the nearby Midway Plaisance, the strip of land best known as the sideshows of the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893. So say … Continue reading →

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A Kunstlerfest in Chicago

Posted on February 20, 2017 by David Brussat

James Howard Kunstler’s magisterial book The Geography of Nowhere lays waste to the ideas that laid waste to America, but his thoughts on suburbia – crudscape and all that – come after the book’s “opening monologue” about the history of … Continue reading →

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Still, his buildings were fine

Posted on January 2, 2016 by David Brussat

Reaching the end of Louis Sullivan’s Autobiography of an Idea, I could only wish that his place in architectural history was judged more by his buildings and less by what he wrote about architecture. Most of the book consists of … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Books and Culture, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Staff surrounds Eiffel Tower

Posted on September 19, 2015 by David Brussat

Unforgettable forgotten moments from the past are pictured in this romp called “Unrocognizable Paris: The Monuments that Vanished,” on the blog MessynessyChic.com. The well-illustrated piece recalls when the Champ de Mars was filled with monuments made of “staff,” a mixture … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Old Video, Other countries, Photography, Preservation, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Kunstler’s City Beautiful

Posted on March 20, 2015 by David Brussat

James Howard Kunstler, author of The Geography of Nowhere and The World Made by Hand, and coiner of the word “crudscape,” knows all too well what we as a civilization have wrought since we won World War II. In many … Continue reading →

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Radiant Garden City Beautiful

Posted on October 5, 2014 by David Brussat

If wizards like Henry Hope Reed can be wrong on occasion, so can Jane Jacobs, who in our era is even more famous for her own pathbreaking book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Its chief claim to … Continue reading →

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