Two-thirds of Cuyahoga County’s commissioners want to demolish it. Cleveland Plain Dealer architecture critic Steven Litt wants to save it. What would you do with it? More from Bustler.net
Due to interest beyond Northeastern Ohio, the organizers of this exhibit wish to invite national and international architects, designers and other interested persons to participate in this juried exhibition.
Given the fixed date of the exhibit, please note the limited time leading to the submittal due date.
They amended it so architects and designers beyond the region could participate. It wasn't until recently that the idea was dreamed up because it wasn't until recently that the thing became an issue. I know it is last minute, but basically I came here inspired by your work on Grosse Point which I identified via World Monument Watch. It didn't occur that anyone outside the region would be interested until our city planning commission chair made an impassioned speech about how professionals outside the region were watching this and writing letters and urging Cleveland to save the building. It only recently came to light that the County Commissioners RFP did not ask for adaptive reuse.
I am not one of the organizers of the Ingenuity thing, but I did ask them on archinect's behalf to extend the deadline. I hope we will see some innovative arguments.
Right now we have one adaptive reuse from Davis Brody Bond and one ??? we don't know -- uh, no plan from Kohn Pedersen Fox. The local architect affiliated with KPF was awarded a $13,500,000 contract which involves tearing it down. We didn't know this was coming until after the fact. Now the virtual activism must go to a much higher level. You can't vote for these guys in a re-election campaign, but you can suggest there are other solutions for the building. You can let them know that tearing down a piece of art is wasteful and wrong and that the world is watching... at least I hope you might. -- Susan in Cleveland
That building is FUGLY!...they should tear it down ASAP.
"OOOOO BUT IT WAS DESIGNED BY MARCEL BREUER"
You idiots need to get off the bandwagon of worshipping these "modernists" and realize most modern buildings for what they are: BORING BOXES
No wonder architects have lost credibility over the past couple of decades...they create ugly buildings which are "GENIUS" cause they are organized on a "NICE/CLEAN" grid.
Folks, the idealized notion of perfect harmony in modern buildings is an archaic one.
Just like Puritt-Igoe and other "great works of architecture"-blow this shit up.
So what do you propose to do with all the concrete and steel in these modernist building's? Are you a landfill contractor?
Pruitt-Igoe's failure can be attributed to much more than its architecture. I have read Jane Jacobs, and I live here in the city where the father of public housing, Ernest Bohn birthed the idea. It was a noble thought at the time and delivered many people from living in squalor without running water or electricity in the 1930s. People of many incomes live in high-rise buildings in cities worldwide with less disastrous effects.
But the Breuer was not designed as a housing project. It was designed and can become office space. This sort of density of living or working requires requisite amounts of green space. These green spaces were often overlooked in early pubic housing planning, but an architect need not be blamed for the failure of the surrounding urban fabric which may have instituted the larger failure -- racial and economic segregation, economic decline and the failure of education. So many of these failures are related more to government policies and the funding that does or does not support them.
Here we have a failure of our county commissioners to adaptively reuse materials and real estate to the advantage of its constituents. How many social services will suffer when the county diverts its resources to razing the building and constructing a new one? How many dollars will be spent outside the community for materials (like steel, once manufactured here), where will this massive amount of concrete go? In the Lake? (That’s where they put the old stadium when they built the new one.) This is - these are complex issues, far more complex than any individual's aesthetics. If we were to allow our county commissioners to treat people the way they wish to treat this building for reasons of aesthetics or its current inadequacies for their use, we would have a blood bath on our hands and not enough graves to bury those "removed" because they are ugly or require rehabilitation or training.
Our cities, especially this, the poorest in the nation, need to reexamine what resources we have, how we can best use what is already here and what else we need within an already dire monetary situation, before we go off half cocked and spend money to remove something that has a large amount of embodied energy.
Is new urbanist design with its sprawling footprint and cul de sacs the answer to the public housing issue? Should we move poor young families into the abandoned crumbling lead painted houses that abound in our city so that their children can bring more lead poisoned minds to the classroom? I don't think so. Should some areas become greenspace in a shrinking city? Yes. Should those greenspaces be located where so much energy has already been spent to erect potentially useful and habitable buildings? I doubt it. Getting rid of all modernist buildings is like burning all cubist paintings. We will lose a part of our history.
The building has a history. We would like to retain the building, allow it to tell its story. Let the county commissioners chose another site for their new building. In this shrinking city there are many options. Surface parking lots abound – let them chose one of those.
Your simplistic solution baffles me, Adamus. How someone can so cavalierly dismiss this issue with a few key strokes is beyond me. Maybe you are a politician who has access to countless tax dollars at your disposal. This is exactly what we’re fighting – our elected officials disposing of our tax dollars, our built environment and our urban plan for lame reasons that have not been carefully considered.
I agree, Adamus (and any other simplistic haters of this Breuer building), aside from the sheer environmental irresponsibility of demolition, to compare this to Pruitt Igoe is just ignorant. Go look at the building more throughly, and you'll see there is a lot more to it than you suggest -- it is far better quality than the typical example of modern architecture.
Jun 25, 07 1:19 am ·
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Given the fixed date of the exhibit, please note the limited time leading to the submittal due date.
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Paul, perhaps this blurb can be added to the description on Bustler...
So this is put up June 21st, and its due June 22nd?!?!
Oh, they just ammended it to be July 6th...
They amended it so architects and designers beyond the region could participate. It wasn't until recently that the idea was dreamed up because it wasn't until recently that the thing became an issue. I know it is last minute, but basically I came here inspired by your work on Grosse Point which I identified via World Monument Watch. It didn't occur that anyone outside the region would be interested until our city planning commission chair made an impassioned speech about how professionals outside the region were watching this and writing letters and urging Cleveland to save the building. It only recently came to light that the County Commissioners RFP did not ask for adaptive reuse.
I am not one of the organizers of the Ingenuity thing, but I did ask them on archinect's behalf to extend the deadline. I hope we will see some innovative arguments.
Right now we have one adaptive reuse from Davis Brody Bond and one ??? we don't know -- uh, no plan from Kohn Pedersen Fox. The local architect affiliated with KPF was awarded a $13,500,000 contract which involves tearing it down. We didn't know this was coming until after the fact. Now the virtual activism must go to a much higher level. You can't vote for these guys in a re-election campaign, but you can suggest there are other solutions for the building. You can let them know that tearing down a piece of art is wasteful and wrong and that the world is watching... at least I hope you might. -- Susan in Cleveland
i'm watching...and my opinion of cleveland is effected by how they treat cultural landmarks.
cuyahoga county sucks.. don't demolish the building you f$%#@^&^ retards.
That building is FUGLY!...they should tear it down ASAP.
"OOOOO BUT IT WAS DESIGNED BY MARCEL BREUER"
You idiots need to get off the bandwagon of worshipping these "modernists" and realize most modern buildings for what they are: BORING BOXES
No wonder architects have lost credibility over the past couple of decades...they create ugly buildings which are "GENIUS" cause they are organized on a "NICE/CLEAN" grid.
Folks, the idealized notion of perfect harmony in modern buildings is an archaic one.
Just like Puritt-Igoe and other "great works of architecture"-blow this shit up.
So what do you propose to do with all the concrete and steel in these modernist building's? Are you a landfill contractor?
Pruitt-Igoe's failure can be attributed to much more than its architecture. I have read Jane Jacobs, and I live here in the city where the father of public housing, Ernest Bohn birthed the idea. It was a noble thought at the time and delivered many people from living in squalor without running water or electricity in the 1930s. People of many incomes live in high-rise buildings in cities worldwide with less disastrous effects.
But the Breuer was not designed as a housing project. It was designed and can become office space. This sort of density of living or working requires requisite amounts of green space. These green spaces were often overlooked in early pubic housing planning, but an architect need not be blamed for the failure of the surrounding urban fabric which may have instituted the larger failure -- racial and economic segregation, economic decline and the failure of education. So many of these failures are related more to government policies and the funding that does or does not support them.
Here we have a failure of our county commissioners to adaptively reuse materials and real estate to the advantage of its constituents. How many social services will suffer when the county diverts its resources to razing the building and constructing a new one? How many dollars will be spent outside the community for materials (like steel, once manufactured here), where will this massive amount of concrete go? In the Lake? (That’s where they put the old stadium when they built the new one.) This is - these are complex issues, far more complex than any individual's aesthetics. If we were to allow our county commissioners to treat people the way they wish to treat this building for reasons of aesthetics or its current inadequacies for their use, we would have a blood bath on our hands and not enough graves to bury those "removed" because they are ugly or require rehabilitation or training.
Our cities, especially this, the poorest in the nation, need to reexamine what resources we have, how we can best use what is already here and what else we need within an already dire monetary situation, before we go off half cocked and spend money to remove something that has a large amount of embodied energy.
Is new urbanist design with its sprawling footprint and cul de sacs the answer to the public housing issue? Should we move poor young families into the abandoned crumbling lead painted houses that abound in our city so that their children can bring more lead poisoned minds to the classroom? I don't think so. Should some areas become greenspace in a shrinking city? Yes. Should those greenspaces be located where so much energy has already been spent to erect potentially useful and habitable buildings? I doubt it. Getting rid of all modernist buildings is like burning all cubist paintings. We will lose a part of our history.
The building has a history. We would like to retain the building, allow it to tell its story. Let the county commissioners chose another site for their new building. In this shrinking city there are many options. Surface parking lots abound – let them chose one of those.
Your simplistic solution baffles me, Adamus. How someone can so cavalierly dismiss this issue with a few key strokes is beyond me. Maybe you are a politician who has access to countless tax dollars at your disposal. This is exactly what we’re fighting – our elected officials disposing of our tax dollars, our built environment and our urban plan for lame reasons that have not been carefully considered.
I agree, Adamus (and any other simplistic haters of this Breuer building), aside from the sheer environmental irresponsibility of demolition, to compare this to Pruitt Igoe is just ignorant. Go look at the building more throughly, and you'll see there is a lot more to it than you suggest -- it is far better quality than the typical example of modern architecture.
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