Too Bad
This Doesn't Translate Down To Local Government Buildings. Boston City Hall Is One Of the WORST.
Posted on 01/25/2025 2:54:01 PM PST by fluorescence
One of the two dozen or so new Trump Administration’s executive orders issued since assuming office includes a mandate for the restoration of an amalgam of classicism-inspired "traditional" architectural styles in all new federal government buildings.
The newly signed Promoting Beautiful Federal Civic Architecture order directs the General Services Administration (GSA) to submit recommendations within 60 days that "advance the policy that Federal public buildings should be visually identifiable as civic buildings and respect regional, traditional, and classical architectural heritage in order to uplift and beautify public spaces and ennoble the United States and our system of self-government."
The President, via the Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy, would then also have to be notified within 30 days of the GSA’s approval of any new building design that deviates from the newly revised Guiding Principles for Federal Architecture. A consideration for the inclusion of community feedback in the design selection process is mentioned as well.
This brazen and fairly dilettante-like action follows a similar but later repealed February 2020 order declaring public buildings to be "the ornament of a country" and demanding that the restitution of buildings whose designs evoke the "vocabulary of the architecture of Greek and Roman antiquity" over those such as Brutalism and Deconstructivism, which were labeled a subversion of traditional values.
Trump has repeatedly promoted the notion that Classical architectural styles are emblematic of the grandeur and glory of the United States, something that scholars have pointed to as being historically problematic due to its associations with slavery. The American Institute of Architects had spoken out against the push emphatically during his first turn in office. Still, other groups—including the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Society of Architectural Historians, Docomomo US, the ASLA, and NOMA—have labeled it as an attempt to "censor" modern architecture.
Original memorandum at https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/promoting-beautiful-federal-civic-architecture/
FIRST, TEAR DOWN THE STRUCTURES housing unconstitutional federal agencies and bureaucracies of which there are MANY!!!!
Revival tents with plastic chairs.
I pray Trump doesn’t decide to remove “degenerate art” from public places as his follow-on.
Like the new ugly wtc
I worked in the original allowing towers.
They were majestic and powerful
This one is an ugly stick pointing aimlessly into the sky.
That looks like the UC San Diego Library (sorry can’t seem to post pics from my phone for some reason).
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/p/AF1QipOWsGyf8MjMK3Q0ymVNERdvEhqtsVAhIK9vNCBw=w358-h256-n-k-no-nu
When Trump visited the Queen, he undoubtedly saw the disaster called London with its Ferris wheel, fugly American embassy, and a whole host of weird and disgusting architecture not fitting English heritage.
I live in Boston. And my favorite line about Boston City Hall (brutish style) was from an architect at the time who said that it looked like the crate that Fanueil Hall came in. So true!
Disaster. Designed by an ugly Democrat… for ugly democrats.
Some of those old granite stone buildings may have been there for centuries… and you want to tear them down?
Are they afraid he will make it all resemble Tara?
YIKES!
The ugly buildings affect us - just look at the breathtaking architecture from the early 1900’s and before compared to the prison box buildings that are being built today. They all look like plain blocks that don’t give us pride or joy. Beautiful cathedrals and other buildings that are literal works of art give us joy and pleasure to look at and marvel.
One of the gifts we have as humans is to be creative and artistic - this has purposely been erased from us. Ugly architecture makes us feel empty, barren and hopeless - as if we are only existing, not living.
We deserve better.
Shhhh. Those empty buildings are the camps for Maddow and Co.
Cool!
Boston’s OLD City hall was that same style.
That’s funny.
I was a guide there when I was a senior in high school, in 1969.
I honestly thought this was a Bee article. I’m glad to hear classical architecture will return.
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