I think this one looks pretty excellent, though like others have posted on other threads, I’ve lost patience with the way the vertical mullions are randomly offset every few floors. That’s not done as ham-handedly here as on some other buildings, so if they stick with it, it won’t be so terrible. But I’d be happy if it goes away in a later iteration.
I’m of mixed minds on saving the Old France façade. It’s an awesome façade, but I like façade-ectomies better when the high rise can be stepped back from the preserved façade. There’s not enough depth here for that to be an option, it’d almost have to rise straight up from the preserved façade, and that can look really strange. They’ve got a bold horizontal element at the second floor plate level and another at about the fifth floor level; if they could do something like that just above the old façade, and then maybe just a small step back on the tower above, even if only a foot or two? I dunno. I’d hate to lose the façade entirely, but we’ve seen a few really awful examples lately of façades being preserved in ways that make me think they ought to have not bothered.
It’s a real shame they can’t acquire that small building between this and Symphony Plaza West – that is going to look comically awkward being stranded there. If they could get that plot and incorporate it into the new first floor façade, that might open up possibilities on preserving the Old France façade (but might not, either…). Probably not a happening thing.
If you look at the website that reverend paco linked, and look at the main render they have at the top? THAT is the render I’d use in public meetings if I were the developer. I don’t want to fill up this thread with more big files, folks can go look at it. It’s a view from the north, over Symphony Hall. It depicts Symphony Plaza East and West much more prominently than does the render from the northwest in paco’s post. One would normally want to clutter up one’s presentation with such ugly shit, but in this case, if I were the developer, I would do exactly that. With the very explicitly stated message being, “a bunch of high rise shit was already built right next door, I’m building something vastly more appealing.” It won’t make opposition vanish, and won’t be a sufficient argument in and of itself, but it’s an argument I would incorporate into the rest of my pitch.
