Category Archives: Architecture

We used to make the countryside more beautiful, but now that we’re richer than ever we rarely do

by John Massengale Posted on June 1, 2014

Technology can supply some of our favorite and most-loved things, but most of the time, we use it in a way that inadequately expresses human experience and aspirations.

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“Buildings endure. Fashion rarely does.” (comment at the Design Observer)

by John Massengale Posted on May 19, 2014

THIS IS WORTH REPOSTING because it was through this post that I met my friend Robert LaValva, who founded and runs the New Amsterdam Market. I made the following comment at Design Observer in response to a post on the … Continue reading →

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An Oldie But Goodie—sung to the tune of “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General”

by John Massengale Posted on March 27, 2014

COLUMBIA ARCHITECTURE PROFESSOR and architectural historian Ken Frampton was once asked about “the cult of New Urbanism.” It’s “ersatz kitsch colonialism for the modern middle class”, he said. Faced with a statement like that, what can one do except write … Continue reading →

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You Thought Architects Designed Perfect Chairs? (Good, Better, Best)

by John Massengale Posted on March 26, 2014

THIS EXCERPT from an old post at Veritas & Venustas comments on some of the same issues that Witold Rybczinski just wrote about in a post and a Tweet: Good, Better, Best (originally published February 2004) .. The concept is a … Continue reading →

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Two types of architecture: good architecture, and the other kind

by John Massengale Posted on January 17, 2014

                    THE ARCHITECTURE CRITIC for New York magazine wrote about the work of Robert A.M. Stern in an article entitled Unfashionably Fashionable. I commented: “There are two kinds of music,” Duke … Continue reading →

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Glass House Conversation: Traditional versus Modern

by John Massengale Posted on February 11, 2013

A YEAR OR SO AGO, I was invited to take part in a discussion on Traditional and Modern architecture at theglasshouse.org that was framed like this: Traditional versus modern architecture; Proponents of traditional architecture cite a preference for historical styles. Modernist … Continue reading →

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Urban Architecture & An Architecture of Place

by John Massengale Posted on April 18, 2008

CitiField has no city, and the Metropolitans have no metropolis. OVER AT DESIGN OBSERVER, the great Michael Bierut wrote a good piece on baseball parks that I thought was a little too quick to equate traditional design with “nostalgia” while … Continue reading →

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Second Annual Slouching Towards Alphaville Award

by John Massengale Posted on March 23, 2007

An old post from Veritas & Venustas: It’s cold. It’s winter. It’s minus 20 degrees, an arctic wind is blowing in from the Russian steppes, and you’re walking on the biggest street in Moscow. Above you in the swirling snow … Continue reading →

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