carlo scarpa

He's better than Aldo Rossi, but I've never quite figured him out. Maybe the larger question I'm arriving at is why funerary architecture is held in such high regard. Perhaps because it provides a more pure, contemplative space than other types of buildings. Perhaps because it is built to a higher standard of durability (the dead are long-lasting tenants). Perhaps because the performance standards are a mystery (the tenants don't communicate their desires).

Alexander Gorlin just wrote a book on New England modernism. If I can get a copy I'll try to do a critique. Towers of Ilium occasionally has original content.

Oh yes, I think I have a definition of a "suburb." It is any residential neighborhood adjacent to an urban area that experiences a weekday population loss. Sounds stupid, yes? I think that it's more objective and more inclusive than conventional definitions of a suburb, i.e. the Levitown model. With my definition, large areas of the Back Bay in Boston are suburbs. Also, a residential high-rise is a suburb, regardless of its location.