Thoughts about Architecture and Design
Posted in places on Jan 30th, 2011
Recently revisited New Orleans and was struck anew by how gracious the people are- Everyone we met had been personally affected by the catastrophe of Katrina…some lost everything. All chose to return home and rebuild their lives and graciously welcome strangers to their amazing town with its beautiful historic architecture . Very sobering to by [...]
Posted in places on Dec 24th, 2010
Walking north from Ground Zero on Church street one comes upon a construction fence painted with figures of walking men. Immediately recognizable as inspired by the iconic figures of a walking figure in urban traffic lights around the world, it was designed by Maya Barkai and is called “ Walking Men 99” It’s part of [...]
Posted in places on Nov 25th, 2010
Posted in places on Nov 21st, 2010
Central Park has been spectacular this fall. No need to travel to New England for leaf peeping when the maples and gingkos are ablaze in the late fall sunshine as they have this past week. How fortunate are we New Yorkers to have this incredible public space at our disposal with it’s natural wooded landscape [...]
Posted in places on Nov 15th, 2010
Walking south on Broadway, just past Macy’s and Herald Square, what used to be an oppressive nightmare of traffic fumes and confusion is now a beckoning and lively oasis between two major thoroughfares…. one gets absorbed into a fantastic public space recently revamped following the tenets of American urbanist William “Holly” Whyte who believed small [...]
Posted in places on Sep 27th, 2010
A dear friend and architectural historian invited me to tag along on a tour of the Glass House- Philip Johnson’s iconic house built in 1949 in New Canaan, Ct. The site of sloping meadows with rustic stone walls and mature tree stands is punctuated with diverse structures housing art galleries, a library and visitor center. [...]
Posted in places on Sep 20th, 2010
To grow up in Virginia is to be under the ever present influence of Palladio as interpreted by Thomas Jefferson. Some thirty years after attending Professor James Ackerman’s Palladian architecture lectures in graduate school, I finally made a pilgrimage to the Veneto this summer and saw my first in the flesh Palladian villas: Villa Rotunda [...]