[Cro Burnham]

Back to 1100 Market Street, I will conclude my rant:

The building is so profoundly ugly, I refuse to believe anyone ever actually thought or intended it to be attractive.

The sheet-metal cornice is the rare architectural object that succeeds both at attaining the highest degree of hideousness while being entirely without any discernible purpose.

It's as if the developer was signing off from the city with one glorious, spiteful, final 1970s "fuck all of you" before he flew off to Phoenix or LA.

I can imagine him thinking ". . . hmm, let's see, not only are we going to tear down this glorious old building and replace it with a cheap, banal, characterless, out-of-context two-story slab . . . but, for good measure, and just because I truly despise this city and its people, let's shell out some actual dollars to cap off the cheapness with the most grotesque extravaganza of futile folded metal imaginable; then each day, for all posterity, thousands of Philadelphians will puke in their mouths a little each time they pass it by."

Needless to say, I am thrilled with the new project. I think aesthetically, it will play a more important role, for better or for worse, than almost any building built in Center City since Liberty Place.