"Dirty Old Boston"

chrisbrat said:
eh... the Sears building (just like the other/another Sears building in Porter) is pretty squarely Art Deco, and I don't think that holds true for Analex, which -- as you say -- is (was) solid and dependable, aesthetically, but had no trappings of AD or really any movement or style to it.
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You're right about the difference per the art deco. I was thinking more of the similarity of the two buildings per the industrial type windows, the yellow brick exterior, and the overall massing.
 
Charlie_mta said:
You're right about the difference per the art deco. I was thinking more of the similarity of the two buildings per the industrial type windows, the yellow brick exterior, and the overall massing.
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All fair points. I wonder if I had seen the Analex building when it was in better condition if I'd share your fondness. By the time I was going to Celtics games as a little kid in the mid-'80s that building really stuck out to me as just being remarkably ugly and dirty/falling apart.
 
chrisbrat said:
All fair points. I wonder if I had seen the Analex building when it was in better condition if I'd share your fondness. By the time I was going to Celtics games as a little kid in the mid-'80s that building really stuck out to me as just being remarkably ugly and dirty/falling apart.
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I'm of an earlier vintage (like a fine "whine", LOL), so I did get to see the Analex as a teenager in the 1960s when it was in better shape. I really liked the whole North Station/Hotel Madison/Analex Building grouping, with the elevated Green and Orange Lines knitting together the dense, gritty urbanscape.
 

Orange Line El in July, 1979:

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I fear to ask, but is the restaurant space still there as it was? I know TGIFs isn’t there anymore, but I have a fuzzy memory that a lot of it was torn up?
 
type001 said:
I fear to ask, but is the restaurant space still there as it was? I know TGIFs isn’t there anymore, but I have a fuzzy memory that a lot of it was torn up?
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Joes at the site now has changed up a bunch of the interior but I think its recognizable from the above pictures in my eyes. Idk tho I've only been in there once to use the bathroom 😂
 
type001 said:
I fear to ask, but is the restaurant space still there as it was? I know TGIFs isn’t there anymore, but I have a fuzzy memory that a lot of it was torn up?
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Was just there last week. It pretty much looks the same, except for the "greenhouse" area, which is now one level, and of course it's been freshened up.
 
RandomWalk said:
Amusing that 80’s PoMo is in the “Dirty Old Boston” bucket. That stuff is built after I was born… :)
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100% struggled with where to put this. It could go in Flickr Finds or the pomo thread I started a month ago, but for whatever reason I chose this one.

And the ultimate irony here is that the writer worried about the materials aging poorly, stating "...it does share one drawback with virtually all other new housing in Cambridge and most of the rest of the country: the quality of exterior detailing and construction falls far short of the standards of the past. It seems likely that it will take much maintenance to keep these fine houses from looking shabby in a generation or so" meaning these could very easily have become Dirty and Old by now, and thus perfect for this thread.

Not quite 🙃

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I too am older than these and I could only wish I were aging so well :p
 
chrisbrat said:
Do those (these) really qualify as PoMo, though?
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Good question. I thought "PoMo" reflected a time, like Victorian, and could be of any style. Meaning, an art deco skyscraper from the 80's is PoMo and so are these
 
you could be right and/or the meaning may have evolved. i always understood "PoMo" to be a deliberate reaction against modernist architcture -- self-consciously playful, eclectic, elaborate, even gaudy, often incorporating historical elements, bold colors, and decorative features. the opposite of austere/clean/simple aesthetics embraced by modern architecture. 500 Boylston St. and One Bowdoin Square are two that i'd consider "PoMo." Obersvatory Commons isn't especially playful or flamboyant (unless a circular window is playful) -- it's just a bunch of quiet, modern-ish buildings that incorporate some stylistic nods to their older neighbors.
 
It really can't be said that TGIF is doing spectacularly well - they declared ch11 bankruptcy in November, and in the past 18 months they went from ~270 restaurants to just 86.
 
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