The Architects: They Really Hate Us

Yuck. Who would want to go there now?

The old architecture was designed to please and to delight the eye; the new is imposed by force.

A few years ago, while showing visitors around Manhattan, we ducked into the Morgan Library because of a sudden downpour. What a treasure inside! There was, at the time, an exhibition in the middle of the library with sheet music handwritten by Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, and a few others! It’s comforting to know that library architecture (not unlike church architecture) has followed the trend of our culture at being concerned with external appearances.

Well done, Andrew!

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We must remember it is not the architects alone who are responsible.

Utterly appalling!

What a shame! Another perfect instance of Russell Kirk’s “Architecture of Servitude and Boredom.” One wonders what the architects are about. Either they are just plain daft, or surpassingly cruel, as you say.

Modern libraries seem to exist in a category of hideousness entirely their own. You will be happy to learn, however, that several years ago, my alma mater, Christendom College, built a fine new library which escaped the usual fate of its kind and turned out rather well.

Architects do hate us. And God.

Thankfully there are still people like Tom Wolfe around. He let Peter Eisenmann have it last night in front of an overflow crowd at Yale. Good article at Yale Daily News about it.

Well done, indeed. Your resourcefulness in finding old drawings and photos is really wonderful. We appreciate your work, Andrew!

I wonder what percentage of visitors would use the old entrance, if they were given the choice. (Needless to say, I’d walk to the other side of the block to do so.)

What blight not only on Madison Ave, but also on the City of New York.

I can not believe that a great cultural institution like the Morgan library would bow to the will of architects who are more concerned with contemporary modernist theory rather than the preservation of the glorious past of their own field.

Good point, Peter.

It seems to me it is not the architects alone who are to be blamed. Their designs would remain only as sketches on paper (or maquettes, rather), were it not for the “decision makers” who choose & then fund the realization of such cruel monstrosities.

It seems (mildly) absurd to imagine architects as men & women of such indomitable will that they are able to make our institutions “bow” to their fancies.

Perhaps I underestimate their powers of persuasion?

Arrrggghh!!!

When did this abomination happen?

1988-1990, I worked for Oxford University Press at 200 Madison, directly across the street from the Morgan. I can’t tell you how many soothing lunch hours I took strolling through it. What an oasis it was. What an outrage it’s become.

I’m always flabbergasted that anyone would pay these Philistine designers money to wreckovate our treasures. Who tells these so-called “architects” their creations are “beautiful?”

They always remind of a man with a toupee. My wife always says to me when looking at one, “Does his wife tell him when he leaves the house in the morning, ‘Honey, you look fabulous, go knock ’em dead!”

Has anyone noticed, are toupees prerequisite for a career in architecture?

My father despises the love of novelty that some of these architects exhibit. His constant query when seeing an ugly cathedral is why the blasted architect didn’t just build an exact copy of some pre-existing pretty church, only with nice modern touches like good lighting, air conditioning, etc. While I suppose I like creative expression a tad more than the old pater, I think perhaps a moratorium on creativity might be in order. How about fifty years with no original designs, just copies of good-looking old designs? Who’s with me?

How tragic. I lived on E. 36th St. in the early ’90’s and loved walking by the Morgan and, when I had the time, going inside. The exterior design, its loveliness *and* its perfect relation in scale to the street never failed to affect me, and, of course, the inside was just a delight. Does Piano – or the Library board – really believe the “kleenex boxes” are an *improvement* (and not just flashy statement architecture). If so, they are sadly mistaken. I mean, whose heart leaps up OR feels glad and rested when walking by, say, Lever House?

Johnny, now, that’s an idea . . .

But “copies” are more often than not hideous in another way. The same materials are not always used, & the same level of care & craftsmanship is rarely employed. I would prefer a moratorium on new buildings for a while. Put money & effort into restoration & preservation instead.

Atrocious. Libraries, once hallowed halls of academia built to command the suitable respect for their contents, seem to be a significant target for the attack of today’s Modernists. As I’m sure you’ll have witnessed, the various university libraries of Scotland stand as grim testament to this fact. In St Andrews case, very grim testament indeed.

It pales into insignificance when compared with how absolutely tragic I found the state of the modern British Library in London. Once part of the beautiful British Museum, perhaps the epicentre of all that was once good and proper in the British Commonwealth, It is now housed (since 1997) in a neo-Stalinist rendering red-bricked hell. Oh, but of course it’s so very “bold”…

It’s not so much that they hate us in reality, it’s that they truly believe we are the Philistines. We would doubtlessly be considered sentimentalist fools, while they work towards an ‘honest interpretation of the age’ or some similar rubbish. Quite fundamentally, they now seem to be in business solely for the purpose of impressing their similarly deluded peers. Decent society must eventually rein them in – architecture ought to be for the people rather than the narrow interests of a small, specialised community. If only local government recognised that or could be bothered doing anything to effect change.

Just wish to point out a few things in light of the outrage pouring forth:

This is a replacement of an earlier (and far uglier) glass garden court by Voorsanger and Mills that resembled an upscale shopping mall. Andrew has left this interim building entirely out of his presentation here, which depicts the Renzo Piano addition as if it had replaced an open garden space. It did not. The Piano addition is a much more sympathetic replacement of this earlier glass court – sympathetic in terms of the proportions of the space and the relationship between the scale of the library, annex, and brownstone buildings on the site. Not perfect, but sympathetic and understated. Upon actually visiting this building, the addition is set back considerably from the Charles Follen McKim facade, and the materials used are intended to fade into the color of the original marble.

Second, despite the old library’s charms (which I dearly love as a fan of historic architecture) it is inadequate for the long-term preservation of Morgan’s collections, and indeed an annex had to be built in the 1920s to keep the collection from overflowing. The new building was commissioned in part to create a safe, expansive climate-controlled storage facility, which is wholly underground and will preserve the library’s precious holdings for many more years.

Third, I am surprised at Andrew’s juxtapositions here, which depart from his usual good posts on historic architecture. The addition is not in itself a library, nor is it a replacement for the McKim library. It is the main circulation space between the library, annex, and the Phelps-Stokes brownstone.

Fourth, for what it is worth, the project architect was the same firm that undertook the renovation and rehabilitation of Grand Central Station and many other choice historic structures in New York.

Gentlemen

The old world can always out-philistine the new world in its desecration of historic architecture. As an illustration I suggest you compare the old Birmingham Central Library with its Italianate design and its beautiful reading room, with its replacement….a concrete bunker the Prince of Wales aptly described as ‘a building looking more fit for burning books in than keeping them’

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The tragedy is that 21st century architects have an opportunity to correct the wrongs of the 1960s and 1970s, but instead they end up producing the same tired rubbish.

A wonderful case study in the restoration and refurbishment of an academic library to meet the needs of technology in the 21st century as well as preserving and meeting the needs of the traditional roles of an academic library, is the library at Mount Holyoke College (my beautiful wife is an alumna of Mount Holyoke). The architects did a wonderful job of expanding the library to meet the university IT needs as well as maintaining all of the historical reading rooms and the book stacks to maintain the print collections. As a professional librarian, this library is one of my favorite libraries and an excellent case study in the restoration of 19th century libraries to meet the needs of 21st century students.

Architects who do these things are simply arrogant. They see the expression of their “solution” to the assignment as an important artistic achievement. The louder it is expressed the better. Humility and preservation never seem to be considerations. The original structures are simply dealt with as a setting or framework for the architect’s new “vision,” or they’re just ignored altogether — swatted aside like a bothersome fly.

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Here is the infamous ABK ‘carbuncle’ which was set to be the new extension to the National Gallery until Prince Charles pointed out how rubbish it was. Modernists can be defeated as long as someone has the courage to speak out and ‘break the spell’.

It vaguely resembles a cross between a cigarette box and an accordion. Utterly nasty.

Andrew, the Consulate General of Poland is the place you suggested we go into and demand sanctuary. Why didn’t we do that?

I recall visiting the Morgan Library several years ago and being quite impressed with the building.

I was told at that time, that the museum was once the actual home of J.P. Morgan.

At that time I purchased a magnet with a picture of the front of the museum, which I still have upon my frig.

If this building was, indeed, the home of J.P. Morgan, then wasn’t it considered a city monument?

Who does the building belong to and who gave permission to destroy it?

The destruction of the Morgan Library is equal to the destruction of the old Penn Station!

The Morgan library no longer belongs to the Morgan family or any of the Morgan Family banks, rather it is a non-for profit cultural institutions chartered with the city and state of NY.

Delle, if you read Andrew’s post again carefully you will see that nothing was destroyed. This post is about a modern addition to the library. McKim’s original library building is a landmark and is protected.

This has nothing to do with Penn Station.

And the library was only the *spiritual* home of JP Morgan, as the building was only his private study and library (where indeed he spent much time in his later life). He lived in a proper townhouse elsewhere on the same block.

Funny how the popular masses seem to think the only worthwhile type of architeture is the historic kind. Blessed are the ignorant.

Well, I have to say this is amongst my favorite new buildings in New York. The quality of the interior spaces is excellent, and I believe that it unites the seperate buildings in a (dare I say it) very appropriate and respectful way. Look a little deeper folks. This is not the 19th century and we shouldn’t build like it is. Architecture, like all other arts, moves on. The Landmarks Commission knows this and acknowledges that buildings can be both respectful of the past and representative of the modern at the same time.

Dear Andrew;

You are right to criticize the new addition to the Morgan Library. However, aside from Dino Marcantonio, whom I know from Notre Dame, I’m surprised by the innocent remarks of many of your readers. Surely they must have noticed the world embracing inhuman architecture as an “approved” style, to be enforced everywhere and anywhere? It’s not a question of aesthetics or good taste; architecture critics are endorsing a certain “brand” of building to clients. Those, in turn, don’t wish to be seen as “old-fashioned”. It’s a vicious, destructive cycle.

I am trying to make a small dent in this onslaught through my books and writings. Perhaps your readers might want to look them up.

Best wishes.

I think the real concern here should not be “the past” versus “modern”, but rather:
Does this addition truly unite the separate buildings in an “appropriate and respectful way”?

In just what sense, Shoo, is the addition “appropriate” or “respectful”?

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The idea of “progress” in art is highly suspect. Indeed, many early modernists were inspired by the timelessness of ancient & even prehistoric art.

Experimentation has been a hallmark of modernist architecture, & the fact is, many of these experiments have failed. Nonetheless, great works of architecture have been created since 1900.
But they are few & far between.

Embracing any “approved” style eventually leads to a kind of dead end, creatively speaking, & Nikos is right to point out that our doing has become a vicious, destructive, cycle. At least, it has in what is commonly called “international design.”

Finally, my concern is not so much the creation of new “modern” buildings, but the trend to “morph” old & new into something that mocks both.

It certainly is wonderful to see such a thing on the blogosphere. I never in my life thought that I would see so many poncing twits talking tiddlywinks out of their asses and passing it off as worthy of actually taking seriously. It is surprising that none of you post the URLs of the firms where you work or pontifical faculties where you lecture, seeing as how with the exception of a strictly scant few — everyone on commenting on this blog, especially its author — purport to be experts on architecture and liturgy. From what I’ve read all I see is a cadre of mountebanks who lack the ability to think critically and make distinctions, such as that between ornamentation and form, space, mass and order. Any American citizen who desires to be ruled by another man is not fit to live in this nation, which was started because the British government at that time refused to recognize as citizens those colonists in the New World due to the fact that the merchant classes in England wanted to keep the American colonists in a state of subjugation for their own gain. If any of you wish to pay tribute to that, just remember that millions of men gave their lives, limbs, and memories so that you could enjoy self-government. If you want to spit on the graves of our war dead, you’d better go home to asswipefordshire, spitinyourfacebury, UK.

Dear JPM

It is highly amusing to see you accusing myself and my fellow commentators of being ‘poncing twits’ and then proceeding to reel off meaningless statements about ‘space, mass and order’. Here is a small tip from this side of the pond. If a building’s beauty is so obscure that it requires you to have a job at an architectural firm and a lectureship in modernism to appreciate it, it is probably rubbish. I would also venture to suggest that you read up on your history as well. If having the highest standard of living in the world at the time, as was the case with the American colonists, is a state of subjugation then it seems like no bad thing. Furthermore, if your rude demeanor is indicative of the rest of your countrymen then I demand that British rule is restored as soon as possible.

Ahoy, Humphrey,

It’s not at all difficult to grasp the principal architectural notions of form, space, mass, and order. These are the building blocks of the built environment. Without them, there cannot be any design, and without design, there is no architecture. The problem here is that rather than taking in a structure based on the primary shapes employed — which ideally should be structural — (form), what those forms occupy (mass), what stemming from those is habitable (space), and how all of it is arranged, that is, whether or not it follows a pattern or implements a central concept (order), you are evaluating buildings based on whether or not they conform to a decorative style or styles which you have anointed a priori. Of course there’s nothing wrong with existing structures. When older buildings are in need of renovation, it is very important that they be carried out in a way so as to preserve the originality of such. However, for example, when it comes to new construction, it ought not look like it belongs in the time and place of two hundred years back and a continent to the right. It could be said, that’s not so; the British of the nineteenth century didn’t need to do that. Thing is, construction technology has grown by leaps and bounds, so why limit the ways in which you can approach solving a problem? The architect’s responsibility is first and foremost to his or her client, and although it is also to the public, too, the client enjoys pride of place. If you ask me, Renzo Piano’s design works pretty damn well. If you look at the Morgan Library’s website (http://www.themorgan.org/about/campus.asp) you’ll find that the new construction does, indeed, function as a mixed circulation space, linking together existing parts of the complex, while also providing some new exhibition space, which, by the way, realizes an optimum balance between natural and artificial illumination so as to be of service to the works of art which the library holds.
As far as the former English colonies in the New World are concerned, we may have enjoyed a high standard of living, but if you ask me, it’s much more preferable to live in a land where we rule ourselves (albeit by way of representatives) rater than be slaves allowed to do things deemed benign to the servile condition. If you are at all sour over Britain’s loss of her empire, I suggest you talk to India, half of Africa, Australia, Canada, and 85% of Ireland, because our Marines could take your guys twice a day, any day of the week. But hell, what does it matter? We’re all in NATO, anyway.

Semper rectvs,

JPM

Dear JPM

Your reply was far more articulate and thoughtful than your initial comment would suggest. Your bluntness does you a disservice. It seems that we are both elevating a certain decorative style as a priori. What I would say is that America’s rich and wonderful historic architecture provides a fantastic palate for the modern architect and that whilst we should not remain rooted in the past we should not stray too far from it either lest we repeat the mistakes of the sixties and seventies. Thankfully I am something of an architecture enthusiast and looking at the developing skylines of your great cities I see many great structures rising every week. You on the other hand seem to be arguing that every new construction should be modernist and not ‘look like it belongs in the time and place of two hundred years back and a continent to the right’. Well this construction isn’t bad to be fair, I just find the facade to be very bland indeed. It looks like it belongs in the time and place of two decades in the past and of a continent to the right, it being designed by an Italian architect and close in spirit to works like Henri Labrouste’s design for the National Library in Paris, a slap in the face to the beau arts movement by a Frenchman.

I wouldn’t want every new construction to be in a historic style, just as I wouldn’t not want every new construction to be modernist as this would lead to bland architectural uniformity. I think what we do need to do is strike up the correct balance.

If you visit my country you will see that it was the victim of a failed brutalist experiment which wreaked so many of our city centres and decimated much of our architectural heritage. A lot of the sites now visited by American tourists were under serious threat of demolition for a long time, and many many more treasures were lost. ‘Backward’ and NIMBY viewpoints such as ours are valuable because the modernists do get it wrong, and when they do their handwork is left for future generations to puzzle over and wonder why anyone could have erected such a vile structure.

As for the British Empire, well that’s a separate argument. I don’t mourn it one bit, but I’m glad it lives on in the anglosphere and the spirit of co-operation and shared heritage between our countries; hence why you marines won’t be ‘taking us on’ anytime soon.

H

Renzo Piano is a master of his craft and to critique his work without understanding it is just ignorant. The scale, detailing and use of material is similar to that of any so-called great designer of the early 20th century. He isn’t ignoring history but at the same time he isn’t mindlessly copying historical forms. This is a beautiful minimalist space, which does in fact function splendidly in every regard. You cant negate 100 years of progress in architectural theory just because people like old things and cant understand that contextually appropriate architecture doesn’t have to be a direct copy of the surroundings.

Dear friends;

I’m sorry, but I just could not let the following misleading comment by John Frietag go by without some explanation of my own. It seems to be at the heart of the debate:

“You can’t negate 100 years of progress in architectural theory just because people like old things.”

Well, it is now emerging that, for the last 100 years, so-called architectural theory has been nothing of the sort. Instead, we have seen a massive production of propaganda whose whole purpose is to prop up a totalitarian design style, as well as the vast superstructure of architects and educators who have profited from imposing anti-architecture on societies all around the world.

I ought to know, since I write books on genuine architectural theory. There are stringent criteria for what can be called “theory” in any discipline. What architectural academia misleadingly labels as “architectural theory” needs to be finally put aside if a humane architecture is ever to be implemented.

Best wishes.

people evolve, so does architecture. i find these tissue boxes to be just as beautiful as old buildings. maybe you will never see it, the poetic statement that newer architecture can be, and that is sad.

stumbled across this trying to research how Morgan Library and the Brooklyn Museum got around the Landmark laws. Now the Brooklyn Museum looks like a Beau-Arts beauty being humped by a root beer stand. The Morgan Library, which was such a friendly place, has guards who do not allow women to tie sweaters around their waist in the latest terrorist hysteria, and that beautiful building as been gutted. We willhave to check our shoes one day! I used to be a regular but it is hateful to go there now. No friendly place to sit down, even the restaurants are so obviously class-conscious regarding the “haves” and the “have-nots.”