I do not disagree. The greatest of great buildings to it all. That is not being debated. I am simply saying why this is a good and worthwhile piece of design work that should be looked upon favorably. Not every design looks to or even tries to do everything you say it should or can. It is often trying to solve a concise problem with elegant solutions.
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cca
Ps. Having to experience buildings at varies scales depending on how it address its context is never a design flaw, it is a choice, and sometimes a wonderful choice in the hands of master designers.
Pps. Boston Athenaeum has a rather weak exterior expression for its style. It is a very flat and rather uninteresting version of a Renaissance era roman pallazo. The only way to experience that it is one of Bostons great pieces of design work is to wander the reading room and be amazed.
CCA -- sometimes the ins& outs are intimately connected as in [my top ten list]:
1) the BPL interior & exterior
2s) MFA Huntington entrance & grand staircase up to the Sargent Murals and the Rotund
2b) Grand Colonnade Fenway entrances with the Peristyle steps and galleries on to the Koch Gallery [albeit in the center of the MFA]
2* of course all were done by the same gifted architect albeit a decade + apart
3) Trinity in & out
4a) New Statehouse old parts in & out
4b) some of the new parts of the new statehouse
5) South Station out & mostly in
6a) MIT main entrance out & in
6b) MIT Killian Court Collonade & Great Dome out & Barket Library reading room under the dome inside
7) New Old South out & in
8) Rowe's Wharf out & in
9) Old North out & in
10) tie
Fairmont Copley Plaza
Langham Boston [aka the old Fed]
Other times there is just one knock-your-socks off such as the interior courtyard of the Gardner
Others:
1) you mentioned the reading room at the Atheneum
2) outside of the Customshouse
3) Inside of King's Chapel -- the outside is missing a real steeple
4) Outside of Hancock Tower
5) View from the Pru -- definitely not the view of the Pru
6) Outside of Chadwick Leadworks -- never been inside
7) Outside of the Old Middlesex County Building [Bulfinch] especially from an angle omitting the monstrosity behind it
8) Church of the Holly Bean Blowers --aka First Baptist on Commonwealth & Clarendon
9) 3 way tie
1st Harrison Gray Otis Mansion -- outside never been inside
2nd Harrison Gray Otis Mansion -- outside and the inside of the publicly accessible one
3rd Harrison Gray Otis Mansion -- mostly the outside and the foyer of the Beacon St one [AMS Hq.]
10) tie
10a) Burnham on the outside especially the Summer St. facade above the ground floor as in its last stages the inside was not up to the original standards
10b) Franklin St. as a grand outdoor gallery with numerous exteriors
