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Category: Architecture

Some great Detroit art & architecture books

After ArchBlogger gave his Detroit architecture dog-and-pony show one fine March evening at the Rochester Hills Public Library, a woman asked if he'd put the list of books he'd recommended up on his blog. So here goes. By the way, each of the following is from Wayne State University Press.

American City: Detroit Architecture 1845-2005 - Robert Sharoff & William Zbaren

Photographer Zbaren and architectural writer Sharoff have pulled together the book you've always wanted whenever some out-of-town friend asked, "Anything worth seeing in Detroit?" Beautifully photographed and a joy to page through.

AIA Detroit: The American Institute of Architects Guide to Detroit Architecture - Eric J. Hill & John Gallagher

The absolutely indispensable guide to exploring the city's buildings and neighborhoods. Marvelously written and well illustrated. Don't leave home without it.

Art in Detroit Public Places - Dennis Alan Nawrocki

Nawrocki, an art historian who teaches at the College for Creative Studies and Wayne State University, recently brought out a new edition of his masterful work. Ever wonder who the two dead white guys on pedastals at Grand Circus Park are? Here's your chance to find out.

The Legacy of Albert Kahn - W. Hawkins Ferry

Ferry, the scion of the old Ferry Seed fortune (think Ferry Street just north of the Detroit Institute of Arts, where the seed farm used to be), was the authority on Detroit buildings up till his death 20 years ago. This slender volume underlines ArchBlogger's contention that Kahn built every last building in Detroit save three (Wirt Rowland did those). Kahn also built an astonishing amount of the University of Michigan. A book that keeps on giving.

The Guardian Building: The Cathedral of Finance - James W. Tottis

Tottis, for many years a curator of American art at the Detroit Institute of Arts, has pulled together a fascinating work of architectural and social history, all organized around our great orange-brick, whoop-ti-do art deco skyscraper. Ever wonder how the Depression came crashing down on Detroit? Pick up Tottis' illuminating work, and you'll know.

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The other book that A.B. always holds up for his audiences is Sarah Susanka's "Not So Big House" series (not, by the way, published by Wayne State). Susanka, a British architect working in N. Carolina, has an unusual gift for explaining architecture and interior design. For anyone who's ever wanted to do big renovations that would really make their house sing, these are the books for you. Beautifully written, persuasive and funny, A.B. bestows on Susanka his highest accolade: she's an annoyingly good writer. Lovely photography, too.

Category: Architecture

Dawn-light Detroit

Well, early morning light, at the least.

On a recent Saturday morning, ArchBlogger and shutterbug pal Sara headed to downtown Detroit, arriving at the Michigan Central Depot by 7:30. From there we ducked over to Windsor for some across-the-waters shots, and then hit Belle Isle and some industrial areas off E. Jefferson.

We were back in Ann Arbor a little after noon. A full and rich day.

The view from Windsor, Ont: A cliched, if pretty, shot is redeemed by the unexpected ice drifting downstream -- geometric-looking ice, at that.

Architectural photographer Bill Zbaren, who did the great Detroit architecture picture book, "American City," with Robert Sharoff (Wayne State University Press), likes to say that the facade of the Detroit train station gets direct sunlight about six hours a year. Happily, ArchBlogger caught at least a bit at the corners.

An abandoned factory just off E. Jefferson at Meldrum and Wight Streets.

Like the icy picture at the top, another "establishing" shot. Seen from the south end of Belle Isle, it's striking how close Detroit and Windsor really are.

Category: Architecture

Apropos of absolutely nothing...

Brooklyn's Cobble Hill this morning in heavy snow. [Photo: Brendan McDermid, Reuters]

Heavy snow works a special magic in New York City, muffling all sound in a city that roars like an engine, suddenly dropping one -- in audio terms, at least -- in the far countryside.

The picture above is taken in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn -- one of the gorgeous old rowhouse neighborhoods that march east along the bluff that rises above the Brooklyn waterfront, from the Brooklyn Bridge towards the vasty sea. (In order, those neighborhoods are Brooklyn Heights, Cobble Hill and Carroll Gardens. ArchBlogger hears that the next neighborhood, Red Hook, is in the process of being sort-of gentrified, but he finds that very difficult to believe.

ArchBlogger concedes that heavy snows have nothing to do with architecture, apart from the sculptural magic they work on a world of right angles and straight lines.

Oddly, A.B. reacts to heavy snow with the exhilaration of a 9-year-old. Annoyingly, A.B. lived in New York City for six years in the 1980s, and the city never got more than seven inches at a time, if that. The minute A.B. moved to Detroit? A parade of storms-o-the-century started pummeling New York every other year. The predictions in Manhattan today are for 12-18 inches by storm's end. In Detroit? Maybe 2-4. It's hard for a snowlover not to be bitter.

Category: Architecture

Thanks for the memories

Time was when downtown Detroit was mobbed, as this 1917 shot looking north up Woodward from Fort Street at Campus Martius makes plain. To the immediate left, of course, was old City Hall, the great pile pulled down and replaced by the stunningly mediocre Kennedy Square in the 1960s -- a patch of black concrete atop an underground parking structure.

(Thanks to architect Ray Cekauskas, president of Detroit AIA, for the way-cool image.)

About the only thing in view that's still standing is the church steeple on the right side of Woodward near the top of the picture, which A.B. initially thought was St. John's Episcopal, but sharp-eyed reader AlTroy points out on the comments page attached to this blog that it's probably Central United Methodist in Grand Circus Park. (ArchBlogger recognizes his error, and thanks AlTroy for the helpful correction.)

For those who love vintage Detroit photos, just click here for an intriguing website, "Lost Landscapes of Detroit." Click on any still photo, and it'll pull up a video of vintage images the picture appears in.(Thanks to ArchBlogger's good friend John Dorsey for the link.)

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Category: Architecture

Ah, modernism

ArchBlogger was bombing up the Southfield Freeway, just south of Seven Mile, when he spied this little academic exercise in modernism on an otherwise throwaway building.

Turns out the building in question is -- or was -- a Detroit Edison substation, put up in 1951. ArchBlogger couldn't help smiling at how radical this design must have looked in those early years after the war, as Bauhaus concepts penetrated ordinary American buildings.

Anyhow, while no great shakes, A.B. was nonetheless struck by its purity of design -- rectangle floating upon rectangle -- and so bailed out at the first exit, working his way back south till he found the substation.

He wishes the light were better, but unsure when he'd be back in the neighborhood around Curtis and the Southfield, he just shot and ran.

[All photos by ArchBlogger]

Category: Architecture

Zipping through Woodbridge

The stolid neighborhood west of Wayne State University around Commonwealth and Warren, has always charmed ArchBlogger, looking like a bit of residential Chicago airlifted into Detroit.

Mixed in with the four-square brick homes, which predominate, are a handful of nice clapboards working that Queen Anne look. A few examples -- and a photo of the sort of rot and decay that the city tolerates even in its nicer districts.

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This in an otherwise pretty neighborhood. But our City Council could give a rip. It's that "embarrassing" train station that's gotta go.

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Category: Architecture

Still going, going...

His loyal readers know that ArchBlogger opposes ripping down the Lafayette Building in downtown Detroit -- less because it's great architecture (it's throwaway 1920s stuff, although that's generally better than anything that will replace it), and more because its loss opens yet another gaping hole in the building wall along the Michigan Avenue and Lafayette Boulevard sidewalks.

Such gaps are not, as a rule, comforting, contrary to standard American opinion ("Oboy! Open space!"). Unless filled in by a cool park or something, they mostly unsettle the pedestrian -- first by disrupting the pleasing symmetry of the sidewalk wall, and then by implicitly giving bad eggs a hiding place from which to spring upon the passer-by. (With American cities, you've always got to take the personal-insecurity issue seriously, whether the crime rate justifies it or not. We're a timid people, urban-wise.)

All that said, A.B. has to confess that the slow-motion destruction of a large building is kind of fascinating. A few pictures of the Lafayette as it looked in mid-January, 2010. A.B.'s guessing it'll be down by the end of February.

What a giant claw can accomplish. [All photos by ArchBlogger]

That's the David Stott building on Detroit's Capitol Park rising up in all its orange-brick glory. (Note the little rooftop tree, stage right.)

A room with a view.

Category: Architecture

United Artists, revisited

In his previous entry, ArchBlogger referenced the artwork, much of it Mayan-inflected, that used to grace the United Artists Theatre building right outside Grand Circus Park (until the owners, the Ilitches, scrubbed it clean just before the 2006 Super Bowl at Ford Field).

The principal graffiti artists (a number cycled through the building) were Gram, Coupe, Fosik and Kevin Joy. The latter also did most of the windows on the Lafayette Building, which is now about one-third of the way through its regretable demolition (see previous blog).

Anyhow, a reader was kind enough to send a good image of the United Artists work, so we can all get nostalgic about cool, now vanished, guerrilla art. [Photo credit to Rich Ayers]

Category: Architecture

Lafayette Building: going, going, gone

It's pretty close to curtains for the Lafayette Building across Michigan Avenue from the Westin Book-Cadillac Hotel. The wrecking claw is suddenly moving with a gusto that's taken ArchBlogger by surprise.

Like a patient undergoing exploratory abdominal surgery, the Lafayette Building gets opened wide. [All photos by ArchBlogger.]

Lost in the process will be the amusing, gorgeous and occasionally subversive window art by Kevin Joy (see next picture), whom A.B. wrote about in his capacity as art-guy for the newspaper.

One of Joy's windows -- "DON'T" -- appears to comment on the city's decision to knock down yet another downtown landmark.

A.B. mentioned in the article that Joy had also worked on the hauntingly beautiful windows at the United Artists Theatre building on Bagley just west of Grand Circus Park.

Anyhow, to make a long story longer, shortly after the piece appeared, A.B. got a thoughtful note from a photographer pointing out that there's an entire history and culture to Detroit window art that A.B. had succeeded in completely eclipsing.

(You can check out some cool pictures of local graffiti art here).

What made this reader's good observation even more galling is that Joy himself had cited his predecessors on the United Artists windows, but A.B. managed to leave that gracious observation out of the paper.

Well, in the sausage-making biz, sometimes good stuff winds up on the floor.

In any case, A.B. would like to amend the record on the United Artists Theatre building. As the note correctly pointed out, a number of artists worked on the UA windows, including graffiti-art heavyweights Gram, Coupe and Fosik. (A.B. regrets that he doesn't have any of their window art to show here, but the Ilitches, who own the United Artists Theatre building, scrubbed the living daylights out of the art-filled windows (Mayan-inflected, in many cases) just before the world arrived for the 2006 Super Bowl. You know, because out-of-towners might point fingers and laugh at us.)

A.B. would also like to salute a couple other artists from the Lafayette building, albeit artists who work in a form completely different from Joy. Both RIKU and GRAY had painted their commanding, block letters up there along with WARD, whom A.B. did mention in the article. The observant will recognize these names -- Can we call them tags? -- from abandoned buildings all over town. (Amusingly, Riku spelled it "RIKKU" on the Lafayette building, but artistic license is surely her right.)

With all this behind him, ArchBlogger would like to thank his correspondent for the polite note pointing out A.B.'s screw-ups. (Most people who write newspapers are not polite.) And while A.B. did not have the chance to interview, say, Gram or Fosik, he'd love to hear from them if they want to drop him a line. His email is: mhodges@detnews.com.

Joy's signature image -- the multi-windowed grasshopper, which is also on other buildings around downtown. If you hurry, you might still be able to catch his "Storm Trooper Grasshopper" on the Lafayette Boulevard side of the structure. It's the all-white, creepy looking insect.

Category: Architecture

The Book-Cadillac's lanterns get lit

From pretty much the day they opened, the Westin Book-Cadillac had cool little uplights just beneath the Louis Kamper building's three copper ziggurats on the roof. But the lanterns -- alright, fake lanterns -- at the top remained in the dark.

Until now. ArchBlogger's noticed in the past week or so that suddenly the lanterns, perched atop the ziggurats (stepped pyramids) have suddenly come into their glory with their own uplights.

To whoever made this happen -- nice work.