BOSTON?S BEST MODERNIST URBANISM
With their powerfully jagged sculptural forms, I find modern buildings like Peabody Terrace and the BU Law Tower to be immensely gratifying to drive by on the riverbank roads ? but they don?t do much for the pedestrian.
And an urban building?s quality is best gauged by a person on foot.
Skyscrapers like the Federal Reserve Building and the Pru project a certain totemic presence that serves them well as sculpture or icon, and monuments like City Hall or the Hurley Building are also sculpturally arresting ? but none of them do much for the pedestrian.
An urban building is one you?re glad to walk by or through.
Boston has plenty of good urban buildings and plenty of good modern buildings, but it?s hard to even populate a poll with buildings that are both.
Here?s an attempt:
Holyoke Center (Sert, 1961-65)
Christian Science Center (Pei, 1968-73)
Five Cents Savings Bank [Borders] (Kallmann and McKinnell, 1972)
Hancock Tower (Pei, 1968-76)
Mandarin Oriental (CBT, 2005-08)
Apple Store (Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, 2008)
75 State Street (Gund, 1986-88)
Copley Place/Prudential Mall (TAC, 1980-84)
Design Research [Crate and Barrel] and rest of ?Architects? Corner? (Thompson et al., 1969ff)
Rowe?s Wharf (SOM, 1982-85)
Slim pickin?s for a city with such a distinguished past.
Vote for three (3).
With their powerfully jagged sculptural forms, I find modern buildings like Peabody Terrace and the BU Law Tower to be immensely gratifying to drive by on the riverbank roads ? but they don?t do much for the pedestrian.
And an urban building?s quality is best gauged by a person on foot.
Skyscrapers like the Federal Reserve Building and the Pru project a certain totemic presence that serves them well as sculpture or icon, and monuments like City Hall or the Hurley Building are also sculpturally arresting ? but none of them do much for the pedestrian.
An urban building is one you?re glad to walk by or through.
Boston has plenty of good urban buildings and plenty of good modern buildings, but it?s hard to even populate a poll with buildings that are both.
Here?s an attempt:
Holyoke Center (Sert, 1961-65)
Christian Science Center (Pei, 1968-73)
Five Cents Savings Bank [Borders] (Kallmann and McKinnell, 1972)
Hancock Tower (Pei, 1968-76)
Mandarin Oriental (CBT, 2005-08)
Apple Store (Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, 2008)
75 State Street (Gund, 1986-88)
Copley Place/Prudential Mall (TAC, 1980-84)
Design Research [Crate and Barrel] and rest of ?Architects? Corner? (Thompson et al., 1969ff)
Rowe?s Wharf (SOM, 1982-85)
Slim pickin?s for a city with such a distinguished past.
Vote for three (3).