Bloomingdale residents might wish this week's Washington City Paper cover story on architect David Jameson.
The article mentions pop-ups and Harry Wardman rowhouses.
I have copied a few paragraphs below.
Architect David Jameson knows D.C.'s buildings don't have to be ugly. Now he's trying to convince the rest of the world, too.
By Kriston Capps • February 14, 2014
There is a house off 11th Street NW that rises higher than all its neighbors. Even if you’ve never passed under its shadow, you know
this house by reputation: the notoriously impolite three-story pop-up that interrupts the familiar rhythm of rowhouses on V Street NW. When its construction began in March of last year, DCist dubbed it “
a middle finger to taste and scale.” Ward 1 Councilmember Jim Graham condemned it as a “monstrosity” this winter.
For months, Graham has been waving the bloody flag, warning residents that more such monstrosities were coming—even with regard to new projects that have nothing to do with pop-ups whatsoever. “If you look on Ontario Place, it’s like a warehouse that’s been built on top of a rowhouse,” he
toldWashington City Paper in November. In December, he
wrote to a U Street–area email list about the dread menace of pop-ups, once again citing a building that isn’t anything like the one on V Street. “On Ontario Place in Adams Morgan, there is an expansion so large that it looks like another Wal-Mart!”
There are two big differences between the Slot House—that’s the home under construction, and nearing completion, on Ontario Place NW in Adams Morgan—and the Middle Finger House (known more officially as The Ella) just off the U Street corridor. The first is categorical: The Slot House is not a pop-up, like the Middle Finger add-on, but a fill-in. There was nothing but grass growing in the 14-foot gap separating the Slot House’s neighbors before its construction began. The other difference is David Jameson.
“You don’t notice this from the street,” says Jameson, 46, the architect who designed the Slot House. “Unlike that other piece that says, ‘I’m going to go six stories in the air and tell you to go fuck yourself.’”
...
“Who do you think when you think classic D.C. rowhouse? Harry Wardman,” Jameson says, as we pull plastic booties over our shoes to tour the interior of the Slot House. “Harry Wardman always used heart pine floors. That was the bespoke wood of the day.”
Yes, he can do cool things. It's unfortunate that he's not doing it at McMillan.
ReplyDelete