Prevent the return of the Darth Vader Building!
Come to sign a petition against the city allowing the destruction of the Arlington Building and its neighbors and the subsequent construction of the Darth Vader Building Part II.
We will be collecting signatures and talking to Bostonians and anyone else from 2 pm on at Arlington and Boylston Streets.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
MEETING - WEDNESDAY EVENING
The BRA is hosting a meeting OPEN TO THE PUBLIC about the project tomorrow. It is crucial that there be a large showing from those of us who don't want to see this abomination go through.
Please, come to the meeting and let the city hear your voice tomorrow, Wednesday, at 6:30 PM:
BRA Public Meeting on 350 Boylston
Wednesday, July 16
6:30PM
Boston Public Library
Mezzanine Conference Room, 700 Boylston Street
Copley Square
If you can't make it -- all is not lost! You can still write Jay Rourke. He's in charge of granting the special permits needed to destroy buildings located in a historic zone, where buildings are supposed to be protected:
Jay Rourke, Boston Redevelopment Authority
Jay.Rourke.BRA@cityofboston.gov
One City Hall Square, 9th Floor
Boston, MA 02201
617.918.4317
Close of Comment Period: August 1, 2008
Please, come to the meeting and let the city hear your voice tomorrow, Wednesday, at 6:30 PM:
BRA Public Meeting on 350 Boylston
Wednesday, July 16
6:30PM
Boston Public Library
Mezzanine Conference Room, 700 Boylston Street
Copley Square
If you can't make it -- all is not lost! You can still write Jay Rourke. He's in charge of granting the special permits needed to destroy buildings located in a historic zone, where buildings are supposed to be protected:
Jay Rourke, Boston Redevelopment Authority
Jay.Rourke.BRA@cityofboston.gov
One City Hall Square, 9th Floor
Boston, MA 02201
617.918.4317
Close of Comment Period: August 1, 2008
Time and again Boston has been gripped by the intense regret we feel after obliterating a piece of our heritage in order to suit the architectural fancies of the day. We need to look no further than the old West End, half of Chinatown or other areas that were razed for urban renewal projects from City Hall to the Central Artery that seemed great at the time.
Now, a developer wants to raze the Arlington Building to replace it with an office building. The city is pleased at the chance to have a new office building designed by Cesar Pelli.
But the Arlington Building is perched on an important corner and entry-point to one of the city's most historic, serene and popular attractions, the Public Garden. Established as the country's first botanic garden in 1836, the Public Garden has been deprived of much of its grace over the last 20 years as large, already-outdated developments have spoiled the intimate, timeless quality created by classic buildings like the Arlington Building.
If we continue to steal important patches of the architectural "tout ensemble" around the Public Garden, what will tomorrow's residents, workers and tourists see? The Arlington Street Church – and a row of buildings that could be in any office park in the country, from Rt. 128 to Kansas City. The wanton destruction of the city's assets will mean nothing but an acceleration in the alarming downward trend in Boston tourism and a drop in quality of life for the rest of us.
Cesar Pelli is a well-known architect, but it's impossible in today's economic climate to expect he will be able to build a classical palace with the sort of fine, handcarved touches and elegant metalwork the Arlington Building boasts.
To the contrary, Pelli's design looks like it crawled in off of a 1980s Waltham office park, with even the Boston Redevelopment Association calling it "cold" and in need of "enhancement."
All agree the needs of development can't be ignored. But even adaptive reuse of the Arlington Building – leaving the façade and reworking the interior for offices or condos, or adding floors on top as is happening nearby at the Modern Theater – would be a compromise that would leave the city with its architectural heritage and tenants with a comfortable, modern space. Buildings like the Hearst Tower and LVMH building in New York, the Filene's redevelopment or Russia Wharf show this sort of mixture of old and new can be done well, and profitably.
If the city really needed the offices Mr. Druker proposes, the building could feasibly be built on one of the city's many empty plots or surface parking lots (Mr. Druker himself owns one near a languishing Greenway park in Chinatown; its development would be a great boon to the park).
But with a recession coming and a record number of building projects and office space on the horizon, is it wise to raze the Arlington Building and its neighbors? What if financing runs out, or if building this on speculation fails to lead to tenants? This isn't Columbus Center, where financing issues means nobody gets hurt because the excavation was just done on the side of the road – here we may have a hole in the ground indefinitely, as has happened with the historic Gaiety Theater's site nearby.
The 103-year-old Arlington Building housed Shreve, Crump & Lowe, the oldest jeweler in North America, for nearly a century.
For 75 years, not only stiff-lipped Boston Brahmins but ambitious young immigrants, eager to buy their fiancé the most impressive engagement ring possible, came to the Arlington Building for the finest jewelry in Boston; the building remains as well-crafted as the earrings and necklaces they bought.
The jewelers who forged tennis' original Davis Cup and baseball's Cy Young Award would not decamp in just any building. And the Arlington Building, designed by William Rantoul, notable for his fin de siecle Boston and North Shore mansions, is not just any building, which is why I and anyone aware of this project cringes at the thought of its destruction.
Countless parking lots and ugly buildings dot all corners of the city – from prime downtown real estate to stretches of Boylston St. a stone's throw down the road to vast tracts of South Boston, Roxbury and Allston.
But we have to decide how to build for posterity. Pre-cast concrete-and-glass office buildings will be a welcome addition the Mass Pike or on the vast number of other sites now housing failed and ugly buildings or empty lots in any part of town. Boston's need is clearly to undo the ill effects of its fling with Modernism, not to return to it.
The destruction of a building of such quality and historical weight at a time of a slowing economy and a construction glut is cruel, wanton and gratuitous.
People in other parts of the country jealously say Boston has a European feel to it. Why? And what could change that? All you have to do is imagine all the buildings in Boston that are ornate, well-crafted beauties from an era when construction economics and aesthetic sense allowed for a kind of beauty that we'll never see again. Now imagine those buildings replaced with Modern ones. What you have is akin to a postwar Eastern European city, only razed by developers instead of invading armies. It instantly stops being interesting, disappointing tourists who had hoped for some connection to its famous past.
Unless the current state of new construction changes, buildings like the Arlington Building must be saved. If the city is willing to discard it and its kind, then given enough time Boston will be identical to any other American city. Highly paid, educated professionals who are increasingly picky about culture and a sense of place in their environment and who can live anywhere will exercise their right to move away. The Arlington Building is hardy, beautiful and historic. It is Boston.
Now, a developer wants to raze the Arlington Building to replace it with an office building. The city is pleased at the chance to have a new office building designed by Cesar Pelli.
But the Arlington Building is perched on an important corner and entry-point to one of the city's most historic, serene and popular attractions, the Public Garden. Established as the country's first botanic garden in 1836, the Public Garden has been deprived of much of its grace over the last 20 years as large, already-outdated developments have spoiled the intimate, timeless quality created by classic buildings like the Arlington Building.
If we continue to steal important patches of the architectural "tout ensemble" around the Public Garden, what will tomorrow's residents, workers and tourists see? The Arlington Street Church – and a row of buildings that could be in any office park in the country, from Rt. 128 to Kansas City. The wanton destruction of the city's assets will mean nothing but an acceleration in the alarming downward trend in Boston tourism and a drop in quality of life for the rest of us.
Cesar Pelli is a well-known architect, but it's impossible in today's economic climate to expect he will be able to build a classical palace with the sort of fine, handcarved touches and elegant metalwork the Arlington Building boasts.
To the contrary, Pelli's design looks like it crawled in off of a 1980s Waltham office park, with even the Boston Redevelopment Association calling it "cold" and in need of "enhancement."
All agree the needs of development can't be ignored. But even adaptive reuse of the Arlington Building – leaving the façade and reworking the interior for offices or condos, or adding floors on top as is happening nearby at the Modern Theater – would be a compromise that would leave the city with its architectural heritage and tenants with a comfortable, modern space. Buildings like the Hearst Tower and LVMH building in New York, the Filene's redevelopment or Russia Wharf show this sort of mixture of old and new can be done well, and profitably.
If the city really needed the offices Mr. Druker proposes, the building could feasibly be built on one of the city's many empty plots or surface parking lots (Mr. Druker himself owns one near a languishing Greenway park in Chinatown; its development would be a great boon to the park).
But with a recession coming and a record number of building projects and office space on the horizon, is it wise to raze the Arlington Building and its neighbors? What if financing runs out, or if building this on speculation fails to lead to tenants? This isn't Columbus Center, where financing issues means nobody gets hurt because the excavation was just done on the side of the road – here we may have a hole in the ground indefinitely, as has happened with the historic Gaiety Theater's site nearby.
The 103-year-old Arlington Building housed Shreve, Crump & Lowe, the oldest jeweler in North America, for nearly a century.
For 75 years, not only stiff-lipped Boston Brahmins but ambitious young immigrants, eager to buy their fiancé the most impressive engagement ring possible, came to the Arlington Building for the finest jewelry in Boston; the building remains as well-crafted as the earrings and necklaces they bought.
The jewelers who forged tennis' original Davis Cup and baseball's Cy Young Award would not decamp in just any building. And the Arlington Building, designed by William Rantoul, notable for his fin de siecle Boston and North Shore mansions, is not just any building, which is why I and anyone aware of this project cringes at the thought of its destruction.
Countless parking lots and ugly buildings dot all corners of the city – from prime downtown real estate to stretches of Boylston St. a stone's throw down the road to vast tracts of South Boston, Roxbury and Allston.
But we have to decide how to build for posterity. Pre-cast concrete-and-glass office buildings will be a welcome addition the Mass Pike or on the vast number of other sites now housing failed and ugly buildings or empty lots in any part of town. Boston's need is clearly to undo the ill effects of its fling with Modernism, not to return to it.
The destruction of a building of such quality and historical weight at a time of a slowing economy and a construction glut is cruel, wanton and gratuitous.
People in other parts of the country jealously say Boston has a European feel to it. Why? And what could change that? All you have to do is imagine all the buildings in Boston that are ornate, well-crafted beauties from an era when construction economics and aesthetic sense allowed for a kind of beauty that we'll never see again. Now imagine those buildings replaced with Modern ones. What you have is akin to a postwar Eastern European city, only razed by developers instead of invading armies. It instantly stops being interesting, disappointing tourists who had hoped for some connection to its famous past.
Unless the current state of new construction changes, buildings like the Arlington Building must be saved. If the city is willing to discard it and its kind, then given enough time Boston will be identical to any other American city. Highly paid, educated professionals who are increasingly picky about culture and a sense of place in their environment and who can live anywhere will exercise their right to move away. The Arlington Building is hardy, beautiful and historic. It is Boston.
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