Setting the Tone

I really enjoyed the Jack Neely story on architecture ["Brick by Brick," Vol. 8, No. 28]. I have learned through the City Design Institute sponsored by the National Endowment of the Arts that a mayor can set the tone for architecture with public buildings. This is something we have tried to do with our new fire halls in the city as well as the renovation of the airport, John T. O'Connor Center, Deane Hill Recreation Center, and the soon to be built convention center.

The architectural style of public buildings is very significant. It certainly lasts beyond one's term in office and beyond one's life. Thanks to Jack Neely for directing attention to this issue.

Mayor Victor Ashe
Knoxville

Our Unique Style

Regarding Jack Neely's cover story "Brick by Brick" (July 16, 1998), I believe Knoxville does, indeed, have its own unique architectural style, which I like to call "neo-crapicism." This unique style involves tearing down or mutilating beautiful, old buildings or lands in order to build yet another useless, ugly eyesore such as a strip mall, gas station, or anything else of which we have an overabundance. Let's consider:

1. The beautiful Baker-Peters house on Kingston Pike that now has a gas station in the front yard. Are developers so inane that they believe we need a gas station on nearly every corner of Kingston Pike? No Civil War-era house is complete without one.

2. The house on Bearden Hill, also Civil War-era, which now has a horrible strip mall sprouting up in front alongside Kingston Pike. Can developers leave nothing alone? Must every scrap of land in West Knoxville be cleared for yet another business? Apparently, developers lack the Eastern portion of their Knoxville maps.

3. The dogwood trees cut down along I-40 so we can better view the billboards. I pray the idiots on the MPC add a sign above that wasteland that reads "Keep Knoxville Beautiful." How fitting.

4. That Knoxville painted the Sunsphere green, and dumped green dye into the World's Fair Park Lake. Maybe green paint was cheaper.

5. Tearing down the childhood home of Knoxville author James Agee in Fort Sanders to build an apartment complex. Obviously, you can't go home again.

6. The University of Tennessee muscling house owners near Hodges Library to sell and move out, so their homes can be demolished and a parking lot can be built. Why can't people learn to walk more?

7. Open, grassy green areas in Knoxville are nice to see and visit...when you can find one.

I could go on, but my point is: buildings can be renovated, people can drive an extra block for gas, and some places should be left like they are. We also need to reign in the developers and find some people with brains to sit on the MPC.

Chris Thomas
Knoxville

Criticizing Architecture is Crucial

During my recent first visit to Knoxville, I was supplied with a copy of your July 16 cover story, "Brick by Brick." Author Jack Neely does a good job of hitting the high and low points of Knoxville's built environment, but seems to question the use of such an enterprise. He rightly notes that architecture differs from the more ephemeral aspects of popular culture—movies, restaurants—but implies that its relative permanence makes criticizing bad design futile. Neely suggests we may have to "take it like a man" as long as a building provides dry shelter.

May I suggest a more womanly metaphor? Asking the public to accept bad buildings on badly designed streets is like asking a rape victim to "just lie back and enjoy it." It is because architecture is the most public of art forms that criticizing it is so crucial. We can avoid a bad movie or a bad meal by not patronizing the supplier. We cannot avoid a bad building if we must come anywhere near it in the conduct of our daily lives. Architecture criticism can help to create a climate of high expectations and thus encourage developers and designers to think of their responsibilities to the public realm.

By architecture criticism I do not mean a thumbs up or thumbs down approach to questions of individual taste. I mean analysis of how a building works to enhance our experience of community. The way that we shape our cities, in turn, shapes us. Here's hoping that the Pulse continues to shape Knoxville for the better.

Christine Kreyling
Architecture and Urban Planning Critic
Nashville Scene