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Old Posted Mar 9, 2015, 1:16 AM
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Orange County legislators fail to save Paul Rudolph's Government Center


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Yesterday, legislators in Orange County, New York failed to stave off the demolition of Paul Rudolph's Orange County Government Center. In January, county executive Steven M. Neuhaus vetoed a proposal that would entertain outside bids like Manhattan architect Gene Kaufman's, to purchase, restore, and repurpose the structure.
http://archinect.com/news/article/12...ernment-center


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Orange County Legislative Chairman Stephen Brescia is quoted as saying "we are moving ahead and we are ready to go. Demolition is going to start and reconstruction."
http://curbed.com/archives/2015/03/0...demolition.php

The loss of this building proves that there needs to be more awareness spread about modernist heritage. You can't undo these kinds of things
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Last edited by ThatOneGuy; Mar 9, 2015 at 1:33 AM.
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Old Posted Mar 9, 2015, 1:25 AM
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R.I.P.







And R.I.P. to the Prentice Womens' Hospital, the Stage Center and the Morris Mechanic Theatre, three more iconic modernist buildings that have been demolished in the past year.
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Old Posted Mar 9, 2015, 2:59 AM
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What a shame.
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Old Posted Mar 10, 2015, 3:03 PM
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It is. We keep saying to ourselves that we'll never repeat the mistakes of the past and demolish nice buildings just because they're outdated or obsolete.
But we still do.
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Old Posted Mar 11, 2015, 11:29 PM
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This will be a major loss.
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Old Posted Mar 12, 2015, 12:41 AM
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Originally Posted by Guiltyspark View Post
This will be a major loss.
Agreed, that's oddly short-sighted. Here's an example in Poissy, the birthplace of king Saint Louis and just a random Parisian suburb today.



They call it "Villa Savoye", a single-family detached home designed by Le Corbusier himself, built from 1929 to 1931 for a well-off family that had some kind of avant-gardish taste back then.

That simple little thing is worldwide famous today. Some architecture students from all over the world come to visit it as an original piece of design. It is simply and by far the main attraction of Poissy, random suburb of Paris and birthplace of kind Saint Louis who's definitely like the only fair king France ever had, among dozens of them French kings through history.
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Old Posted Mar 13, 2015, 4:39 PM
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Legislators try to stop government center demolition

http://chroniclenewspaper.com/apps/p...ter-demolition

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GOSHEN — The Orange County executive has signaled that he's willing to continue negotiations on how much of the government center to demolish.
Democrats in the legislature started this month's full session with an effort to stop the demolition of two sections of the center and reduce the scope of the renovation. Demolition is scheduled to begin in about a month. Democratic legislators also tried to fire the architect, Clark
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Old Posted Mar 13, 2015, 6:26 PM
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I do hope this can be saved. Even though it is not my favorite style of architecture, it is thought provoking or at least creates an emotional response (which is more than I can say about most of what passes for architecture these days).




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Originally Posted by mousquet View Post
They call it "Villa Savoye", a single-family detached home designed by Le Corbusier himself, built from 1929 to 1931 for a well-off family that had some kind of avant-gardish taste back then.

That simple little thing is worldwide famous today. Some architecture students from all over the world come to visit it as an original piece of design.
At first you write as if few on this site have heard of this home! I would guess that most on SSP are aware of it.
There is even a LEGO set:http://shop.lego.com/en-US/Villa-Savoye-21014
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Old Posted Mar 14, 2015, 3:55 AM
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A real shame. Paul Rudolph won't get the respect he deserves until it's too late.
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Old Posted Mar 14, 2015, 8:30 AM
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I usually hate brutalist architecture and hope to see the vast majority of it wiped off the face of the earth but this building is ugly but also pretty incredible at the same time. I can't even believe that they'd want to tear it down, it could definately be a tourist attraction.
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Old Posted Mar 14, 2015, 6:50 PM
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I usually hate brutalist architecture and hope to see the vast majority of it wiped off the face of the earth but this building is ugly but also pretty incredible at the same time. I can't even believe that they'd want to tear it down, it could definately be a tourist attraction.
It's very dynamic. Like a lot of his other designs, it's also very intimate, and eschews the monumentalism of so much brutalist architecture that people like you, I think, find really cold and alienating.
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Old Posted Mar 14, 2015, 6:57 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DecoJim View Post
At first you write as if few on this site have heard of this home! I would guess that most on SSP are aware of it.
There is even a LEGO set:http://shop.lego.com/en-US/Villa-Savoye-21014
Heh, yeah. Villa Savoye is probably the most important house of the 20th Century. It's always featured in at least one lecture of surveys in modern architecture history courses. Colin Rowe's "The Mathematics of the Ideal Villa" comparing Palladio's Villa Capra (Rotunda) and Corbusier's Villa Savoye is essential reading for any student of architecture.
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Old Posted Mar 16, 2015, 4:05 AM
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^ While true, the Villa Savoye came pretty close to destruction as well.
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Old Posted Mar 20, 2015, 1:00 AM
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Replacement




Government Center or Walmart?
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Old Posted Mar 20, 2015, 6:53 PM
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Originally Posted by ThatOneGuy View Post
Government Center or Walmart?
It does look pretty bland. The grayish depiction of the glass does not help either.

In the background on the right, appears to be the original building. So it is technically possible that it could be preserved after all, right?
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Old Posted Mar 21, 2015, 12:42 PM
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^ While true, the Villa Savoye came pretty close to destruction as well.
Yes, very exact. Thank God they eventually never tore it down. On a personal note, I have family - my elder brother and his 3 kids - living Poissy. We wouldn't be happy at all if this thing had been torn down.
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Old Posted Mar 22, 2015, 12:39 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DecoJim View Post
It does look pretty bland. The grayish depiction of the glass does not help either.

In the background on the right, appears to be the original building. So it is technically possible that it could be preserved after all, right?
That's the tiny section they plan to leave intact... Probably they think that'll somehow make their demolition less awful.
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Old Posted Mar 22, 2015, 10:29 PM
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Radical experiments run the risk of being discarded once they've been rejected and shown to be failures. This building was largely despised by the community from the moment of construction on aesthetic and pecuniary grounds, onwards. Although Rudolph intended to foster civic involvement with the design, it ended up isolating workers and presented a hostile face to the public. It had immediate problems with heating and water infiltration.

Comparisons to the demolition of pre-Modernism historic structures fail. This was a creation of the architectural elite that rejected and demolished those historic structures, which were nevertheless supported by the general public (and continue to be supported by the general public). A fiscal and architectural mistake is being corrected.
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Old Posted Mar 23, 2015, 3:07 PM
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What a narrow minded comment. These buildings are just as valid and important as any other style and time frame. People always hate the style of the recent past, because it's neither modern nor historic. 40-60 years age is the most dangerous time for an architectural style, and that is when preservation efforts should be the strongest.
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Old Posted Mar 23, 2015, 10:31 PM
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It would be equally narrow-minded to disregard the criticisms levied against these Brutalist buildings. Appealing to the projected opinions and regrets of the future is a shaky justification for the preservation of these buildings when these buildings have been rejected throughout their entire lifespan, both by the public and by the people that use these buildings.

Comparing the preservation battles of these buildings to those of the past is also shaky ground. The preservation battles of the past were against such buildings, which were replacing buildings that the public appreciated and viewed as essential parts/symbols of their community. The support for Brutalist structures is generally limited to architectural elites and academics, who aren't part of the communities in which these buildings serve.

Certainly there is a valid historic argument for preserving structures as representatives of a time and of a style, but when the architecture of these buildings themselves actively reject the architectural/historical context in which they exist, fail to meaningfully contribute to the community (except as an architectural object), and fail at their intended function, it's only natural that the communities they serve eventually return the favor and reject them.

When viewed this way it's no surprise that so many Brutalist buildings are being demolished.
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