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This is Robert C. Weinberg W. N.Y.C. as critic at large in architecture and planning with comments on buildings in the news when one goes around New York these days one sees new buildings of every sort going up houses apartments stores offices churches and museums one cannot help but notice one characteristic of New York that they have in common which is that they have so little in common possibly no great city in the world has ever produced so consistently an inconsistent style of architecture the great centers in Europe of the east all reached high points in a particular style a new building in other American cities whether in the West and middle west of the United States or in Brazil and or in Venezuela all dominated by an American style which points to the future but new buildings in New York continue to be a mixture of the old in the new design for various reasons by the area's architects but producing no clear cut relationship between style and function or between the creation of the new or the recreate of the old of at least three buildings in New York a widely different appearance that I have told you about in early reports to the Whitney Museum and the National Maritime Union I works of art of a forward looking kind while one the new wing of the Gracie Mansion is an explicit piece of Justified adequate Aryanism But if we watch advertisement in the newspapers for new houses to buy in the suburbs one can see that the conflict between forward looking contemporary and backward fake antiquarian ism is evident on Long Island as on Manhattan and most of the houses for sale I hideous in design whether they are cutie cutie pseudo colonial contraptions put up by the million and poorly designed subdivisions or are equally inept stabs at being mowed urn. Everybody cannot be aware of the reasons why people build this way all that but reading matter comes our way now and then which can spur the thinking and eventually the discrimination and taste of the average citizen who lays no claim to architectural training such a book is The Living in by Roger Starr executive director of the Citizens Housing and Planning Council who has been increasingly noted for his pungent observations that I'm grounded in good hard sense I was much impressed by the P.C. wrote in a recent issue of Horizon magazine which is reprinted in his new book just out which comments wisely and wittily on the foibles as well as the accomplishment of those who not only imitate antique styles but who would want to preserve every actual antique building I won't go into the problem of Historic Preservation today because that is a subject I would like to talk with you at greater length particularly when the refurbished Jefferson Market court house soon to be reopened is a public library in the heart of going to challenge is completed that building by the way is a fine piece of Victorian neo gothic which was just as good a style as any other imitative one of the such as Great Revival which characterizes the old houses the Greenwich Village Chelsea and Brooklyn Heights or of the early a colonial style it term correctly applied only to buildings put up before this nation became free in seven hundred seventy six a good and carefully carried out imitation of any classic style call a Greek Roman Gothic or Elizabeth that is defensible once one admits that imitation of the old is an appropriate solution to a particular building problem that is why the new wing Gracie Mansion is such an excellent performance. So for that matter two generations earlier was the great brownstone U. shaped block of houses just east of St Patrick's Cathedral now largely occupied by the archdiocese and offices and which was erected in the eight hundred eighty S. by Henry the lot from plans by McCain meeting like these architects frankly imitated the Renaissance Roman palace which in turn was an imitation of something earlier in ancient Rome and which I don't doubt was inspired so to speak by something done in Greece centuries before this so-called eclectic style of design however is dying out even in New York and is really justified only where old buildings are added to or rehabilitated a notable example of this is the Royal Bank and Trust Company recently brought to a gleaming new condition at the southwest corner of fortieth Street and Fifth that you and seems to me to be done an excellent taste much less defensible the new banks being put up by the fact a national bank all around the city as well as in the suburbs which are pure synthetic antiquarian ism bearing no conceivable relationship to modern banking much less to the neighboring buildings in the area they are in said in curious contrast to the elegant new bank premises real peace settles and modern design that Chase Manhattan has put up including its great downtown headquarters and which were preceded by the same architects supposed manufacturers had of the trust building at forty third Street and Fifth Avenue banks like these along with leave a house the Seagram and the C.B.S. buildings among the best in temp contemporary style in New York but they are sadly being imitated poorly and tasteless Lee by the glass boxes we see going up all around them so it is good for the public to observe and study new buildings and to notice just which honest good modern. Design and which are actually justified rehabilitations only constructions of the old and done well pointless new construction in imitation of an antique style is seldom if ever justified I was surprised to see in the papers the sketches of a row of stores on West Street which are to be surfaced in Disneyland fashion in imitation of various long outmoded ancient styles why anyone in his right mind should want to inflict this pointless stage prop on a lively thoroughfare like West Street is hard to understand certainly it will not help to sell the sort of goods that are in demand in that neighborhood make shopkeeping any easier or improve the town scape in any way what sadden me most is that in that this inept piece of wasteful fakery bore the name of a highly distinguished reputable architect noted for excellent design I hope that this unfortunate lapse of judgment will be his only one but to get back to Roger Starr's book on the city the living in subtitled the city and its critics it makes good reading as well as good sense and I commend it to those who want to be aware of what is going on in our ever changing town these occasional comments prompted by what your critic at large sees and reads will I hope prompt questions from listeners the point I'm making today is that New York is always changing and as long as the public to say nothing of owners bill is an architect's can distinguish between the good in the bad the spurious and the sincere our city can become more beautiful because of the not only in spite of its characteristic and lively variety of architectural styles there's a Robert C. Weinberg critic at large for W N Y C on architecture and planning commenting on buildings in the news.