The modern Bauhaus box of Gropius and van der Rohe and the banal cement pourings of Le Courbusier are lost on me. If you want to know what really grabs my interest, it is a place that has actual design. I don’t know how I got to it, but somewhere I came across La Confiteria Ideal in Argentina. Look at the photos of this restaurant’s main hall and tell me it does not floor you:
Now look at this building that used to stand in the center of Pittsburgh (Wabash Station):
that I got from the Shorpy archive. My God does that give me a thrill. I thought my favorite pie wedge shaped building in the world was the Flatiron Building (of which I have a poster dominating my dining room), but its continued existence is all that keeps this long lost gem from winning my heart. Gems like Ebbets Field and League Park have long since been destroyed, but at least Wrigley Field is still with us.
Filed under: observations, tribute
