In Dallas, where I live, every street is in turmoil with either the renovation of older buildings or the feverish construction of new ones: residential, commercial, mixed use, civic structures. It’s horrifying, because most of these new edifices are either gimcrack, bloated, or cliché postmodern. More than a few seem inspired by Soviet architecture of the high Stalinist era.
The phenomenon is nationwide. Manhattan, always crowded with skyscrapers, is now plagued by “skinnies,” a.k.a. super slenders — meaning skyscrapers that spring up like beanstalks, with none of the grace or symmetry of such classics as the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, or Rockefeller Center. Look at the skinnie below: the first time I saw it I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or flee to LaGuardia for the next plane out.
But then, I don’t like progress — at least not the American sort, which more often than not means tearing down what’s older, often with charm and character, and throwing up something brash and featureless in its place. Urban renewal; freeways; suburbs; exurbs; Levittown; prefab; edge cities; McMansions.
I can’t say that rereading today’s two articles on house restoration was especially soothing. That’s because I dislike repair work in my own home, even of a minor sort. And although I have an entourage of excellent repairmen: a skilled carpenter, a surefire plumbing company, a talkative electrician who knows what he’s doing even as he chatters away, expert tree trimmers, heat and air conditioning pros…A fine group, but I dread to call any one of them. That’s because even an hour or less of repair work is disruptive. I find it impossible to work, to read, to do anything while they’re here. My entire day is thrown off. Not everyone is so easily distracted, but many friends tell me they react the same.
I’ve visited Leigh W. Rutledge in several of his locations, although not the 1884 restored Victorian pictured here. He and Bill, his partner, could almost start their own construction company based on what they’ve done to their homes and gardens in Colorado, Key West, and finally Vermont.
As for Greg Jackson, not a line in his article is exaggerated. I lived — vicariously, and from a safe distance — through the melodrama of his and Peter’s unevictable tenants; the court appearances; the calamities great and small. I’ve watched their Victorian house in Boston’s South End evolve from shambles to showplace. And I’ve been thankful at every step that it’s theirs and not mine. I would have slept under a bridge rather than endure their tribulations.
Attention, readers for whom house restoration is beside the point: for you I’ve included a few toothsome models plucked at random from the pages of Mandate.