Let Love Rule

http://www.placemakers.com/2015/02/preservationists-let-love-rule/

H Street in Washington D.C.
huffingtonpost.com

Hello Everyone:

Where is the love?  Ah, the eternal question. The quest for love often brings people, from   entirely different backgrounds together.  Love is such a beautiful thing, but enough of the cheesy sentiment.  Today we're going to look at Scott Doyon's fling with New Urbanism in his article for Placemakers titled, "Can Preservationists Let Love Rule?"  His love affair began in the nineties in, of all places, his dentist's office where he was introduced to New Urbanism in a Newsweek article titled, "Bye-bye Suburban Dream."  The attraction was instantaneous, "...a movement pursuing place where people, community, beauty and culture are once again prioritized."  Soon, it Mr.  Doyon was in the throes of infatuation, "Call it the restoration of soul.  A resurrection of the wisdom embedded in our most-loved places...these emerging New Urbanists wouldn't just be allies with historic preservationists.  They'd be thick as thieves..."  Sadly, like all torrid love affairs, Mr. Doyon's affair with New Urbanism flamed out.

Said Newsweek article
danielglick.net

What went sour?  Mr. Doyon writes, "Over time, I began noticing a strange tension I couldn't explain.  When prominent New Urban projects embraced historic styles, it was often preservationists lobbing the charges of 'fakery.'" Historic preservationists are picky people, we like places to stay as close to accurate during their period of significance as much as possible.  Any attempt at replicating, say, "...a streetcar suburb of the 1920s," reeks of Disneyfication; not properly expressive the zeitgeist.  However, let us be fair and acknowledge that there are those civilians that like "...essentially the same thing." While there is no shortage of organizations and individuals trying to preserve the grand estates of the nineteenth century, we have to remember that those estates were are actually pastisches of period style revivals.  Kind of sounds like the proverbial pot calling the kettle black.

Scott Doyon reflects, "I grew up outside Washington D.C, where important civic buildings express our founding democratic ideals with a style born several thousand years ago, a full ocean away."  What Mr. Doyon is referring to is the Neo-Classical style that was popular during the late eighteenth century because it supposedly expressed all those ideal virtues of the Graeco-Roman civilization.  The reality is the Neo-Classical style, so loved by our founding fathers, was not indigenous to the place (a swamp between Virginia and Maryland), yet became so key to establishing a visual identity for the country.

Tudor Revival house
Buffalo, New York
buffaloah.com

This brings us to the Tudor Revival, that emerged in the early twentieth century with its timber frames which were added on solely for aesthetic, not structural, reasons.  This final fruition of medieval architecture did help sell a lot of houses yet, Mr. Doyon asks "Is this fundamentally different from a newly constructed Greek Revival foursquare in a contemporary New Urban project with comparably stylistic columns?  Or an infill Craftsman employing Hardiplank instead of clapboard?"  Truth be told, the answer is no they are not dissimilar.  Yet the modern versions of the period styles are considered fakes, while the historic examples inspire monumental (slight pun intended) efforts to safeguard their longevity.

"Preserve Georgia" license plate sample
georgiashpo.org

Scott Doyon readily admits his befuddlement over why some places inspire mountains of scholarship attesting to their preservation worthiness and others do not.  Frankly, between us and the digital universe, I think some long-time preservation professionals still get baffled over what is considered preservation worthy.  Mr. Doyon writes, "As some driven by the simple notion that preserving our past allows us to harvest lessons for creating better places in the future, preservationist rules and practices can seem contrary to every notion of common sense-which confounds things further because I consider myself a preservationist."  Mr. Doyon holds beauty and artistry in high regard, while rejecting the twentieth century notion of "...disposal and abstract reinvention."  By the way, Mr. Doyon, having a license plate that reads "Preserve Georgia," does not make you a committed preservationist but blogger does applaud your appreciation beauty and artistry.

American Foursquare house
bobvila.com

Therefore, we must ask the question, what deems a place preservation-worthy?  The answer is not as mind-bending as you think it is.  Mr. Doyon writes, "During the 20th century, as it became increasingly apparent that we were throwing away our built heritage, people began banding together in opposition. Not surprisingly, they started with the truly remarkable buildings..."  Indeed, not surprising at all.  What was the driving force behind early preservation efforts?  L-O-V-E.  Such a powerful emotion.  "There were the buildings that inspired great affection and people wanted to save them..."  They used the legal system to save these affection inspiring building and in the process, gave birth to modern preservation ideology.  Yet, when they argued in defense of intangibles such as aesthetic quality or emotional attachment, they lost.  However, the preservationists scored victories when they argued a building's role in the countries ongoing historical narrative.  The message was obvious: argue emotion and you lose; argue a building's cultural value and you get better results.  Thus, as Mr. Doyon writes, "...in the preservation playbook, a house built today that looks like it could just as easily have been built a hundred years ago presents a problem."

We preservationists are pragmatists.  We studied what tactics work and developed concepts based on the success to develop a best-practice guide for going forward.  However, life is full ironies.  New Urbanists build houses that easily look like they could have been built a hundred  years and get criticized for-in context to urban design.

73 Hebron Road
Richmond, Virginia
richmondlibrary.com

Is there a way we can all just get along? Saving buildings and places is a legal (sometimes lengthy) process that requires strategy.  Mr. Doyon concedes, "I don't preservationists for that, and know that much of our remaining historic building stock exists entirely through their efforts."  Whether you agree or not, origin and age are the standards that buildings and places, considered preservation-worthy, are held to.  Mr. Doyon's point of contention is age-i.e. the 50-year rule-a building or place must be in existence for fifty years before its historic and cultural significance can be studied.  Mr. Doyon writes, "...I can't help thinking that, for most people, saving buildings has little to do with a number, be it 50 years or otherwise.  It has to do with the admittedly subjective perception of worth."

The Gamble House (1908)
Charles and Henry Greene
Pasadena, California
oldhouseonline.com

"Excellence endures," or maybe not. Excellence endures as a "repeatable stylistic pattern or technique.  Excellence also flourishes as a blueprint for community and town planning for the future.  Like all good thing, "Excellence inspires imitation."  The hardcore preservationists, "...the history of human settlement can be viewed as a sort of interactive museum featuring a series of definitive, time-stamped displays..."  In blogger's opinion, the history of human settlement is a living and constantly changing thing.  The way we interact with the built environment changes it for better or worse.

Finished Housing
Lakewood, California.blogs.getty.edu

Therefore the merits, or demerits, based on age-value were not part of the thinking when a building or place are being considered for landmark status was and not readily acknowledged as special. However, as Mr. Doyon points out, "...we've recently passed the 50 year threshold for ranch house subdivisions.  As we move into an era of diminishing resources and increasing diminishing resources and increasing demand for walkable, transit-friendly urban living, should we really be enshrining these experiments in cheap gas, leisure-class consumption, which often occupy first-ring suburban settings now best suit to redevelopment, retrofitting or increased urbanization?"

Maybe, maybe not.  These fifties-era subdivisions are just the tip of the iceberg because nibbling at these first-ring subdivisions are the ubiquitous fast food places and the gaudy eighties-era McMansions.  Could they inspire impassioned ardor when they turn fifty.  There is a campaign to save the first Taco Bell, opened in Downey, California in 1962.  (blog.preservationnation.org/.../savetacobell-americas-first-taco-bell-is-threat...)  Will the McMansions and Taco Bells be seen as cultural markers of their time or just impediments to future development?  Therefore, if we equate age with value, "...how do we make the collective, subjective decision that maybe some things should just fade away?"

Vignette of Avondale Estates, Georgia
avondaleestates.org

In the twenties, businessman George Willis began an effort to build Avondale Estates, a picturesque version of "traditional neighborhood development," complete with a master planned town with a variety of housing types, all within walking distance to the city center.  Mr. Willis envisioned a Tudor-esque village modeled on Stratford-Upon-Avon birthplace of William Shakespeare.  However, as Scott Doyon points out, "But it would be a mistake to assume any connection between the medieval stylings he chose and the ramshackle Georgia farmland he'd purchased. Instead, he simply wanted to honor fond memories of an English vacation he'd once shared with his wife."  Could this be considered architectural and historic honesty?  No, not really, Mr. Willis probably chose the Tudor-period architecture because he simply loved it and wanted to honor the memory of it.  Like all preservation minded people, that is what we do, we protect and promote what we love.