The Ruins. The Definition Is in The Title.

Thoughts on permanence, form, function, and shock value.

I have had architects suggest that we put a giant glass roof over the open-air space of The Map Room at The Ruins.

The compulsion to mark an ancient site with the hyper modern lines of the contemporary is not new but it always fills me with dread. I understand the power of juxtaposing two opposites and I often love the results. But there is something inferior about patching the sleek, almost always glass, lines of modernism onto the craftsmanship of old stone. Like, we know we can’t achieve this now, so let’s just not try. Let’s add this flashy, totally opposite shiny thing that makes everyone look away from the fact that we don’t have it in us to make this kind of beauty anymore.

I know. Fighting words.

The glass pyramid in the courtyard of The Louvre may be one of the most famous. But there are hundreds of examples. I really am quite fond of The Louvre’s pyramid. It feels like it belongs in its space. But I have heard tell that it brings out passionate arguments among Parisians.