Deja Vu All Over Again: Friendship Apartments–Architecture Critic Morgan

Saturday, July 17, 2021

Will Morgan, Architecture Critic

Stealth planning is bad for everyone. Would not the public want some heads-up on such a major intrusion into the cityscape as a 12-story apartment block in the heart of the Jewelry District?

The City may indeed be reviewing plans for the steel and glass behemoth to rise on Friendship and Pine Streets. But for the public, the unveiling of the project was an announcement in the press that the 225-unit apartment complex would not need a full committee review, as the planning staff of the Downtown Design Review Committee was already considering the proposal. Translation: Let's not do any serious analysis of this scheme that might slow down its construction.

 

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Deja vu all over again, as Yogi Berra aptly put it. In February, GoLocal carried a story about a nearly identical building by the same development and design team (Providence's New Apartments: Wrong Building, Wrong Place). That handsome but inappropriately placed piece of modernism has been held up by construction challenges and strong neighborhood opposition.

Gerner Kornik + Valcarel's work is well suited to commercial development, although they do not seem to waste a lot of energy on innovation or artistic expression. The boxy package that will bend around the former Colosseum Club has the advantages of abundant balconies, a greenhouse, and a rooftop pool. It would not be out of place in Taipei, Dallas, or Sao Paulo.

The objection to the Friendship block is not about style. Attempts to create believably sympathetic tall buildings by employing brick veneers or slapping on historicist details, such as the Omni Providence Hotel, are laughable. But why cannot we aim for a visually interesting composition that breaks up the mass? We just cannot seem to get past the practice of bringing in architects to dress up a building after the bean counters have dictated its configuration. We have not earned the right to call the area the  Innovation or Knowledge District when we welcome such hamfisted, visually uninspiring clunkers.

 

   

Why could we not create a technological marvel that might challenge climate change?  What about an energy-efficient cross-laminated timber frame, like the dramatic and handsome RISD dorm by Nader Tehrani? Tehrani's firm was responsible for the brilliant rehabilitation of the Hospital Trust into RISD's library and dormitory. Once again, why cannot we transform the Industrial Trust into apartments? That landmark has far greater history and panache than the GKV Architects' block could ever dream of.

Why are we offered an everywhere-and-anywhere box while one of the most distinguished tall buildings in America lies fallow? Cost is a major stumbling block, or a convenient excuse (why not use some of the Biden infrastructure funds?). But it is really a lack of imagination. It is simply easier to be in thrall to journeymen developers and architects, rather than adapt a building whose restoration would significantly contribute to Providence on several levels.

 

 

And another reason is accountability. Just as Pope Francis declared that getting vaccinated is a moral duty, architecture and city-making, too, demand ethical responsibility. Architecture is an inescapable art, so mistakes will be with us for a long time. Plunking down a giant piece of graph-paper design in the heart of the city without adequate public review is an abrogation of that responsibility.

Yet, in Providence, we repeatedly engage in design-by-accountant. Money and the making of it at the expense of the commonwealth seem to be the driving principle behind development, rather than making the city a place we'd be proud to call home. Other than giving its residents good views of the city, we should ask its developers what are the real benefits of the Friendship block. Do we need this building? It is the best thing for the Jewelry District? Surely, we do something better.

 

GoLocal architecture critic William Morgan has written about design and cities for a variety of newspapers including the New York Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, and the Christian Science Monitor.

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