I've been told by countless people I'm weird and cringy for having such a deep love of mid-century architecture, especially 1950s-60s commercial architecture and 1970s home architecture. But I'm not just upset by people's inability to not see the beauty in it, but moreso that people everywhere seem to think that no matter how much time passes, once you get past the 1940s the vintage of a building doesn't matter, because everything from before is much rarer and needs to be preserved more.
The argument between this common viewpoint and the viewpoint of people like me has come to a head with the demolition of a Lincoln landmark called the Gold's building. It was originally a department store built in 1924 that was massively expanded in 1951. The demolition crew has been ordered to only demolish the 1951 expansion and leave the orignal part as-is, because that's the only part that matters. Here's the problem: the 1951 expansion was built with extraordinary care to match the exterior of the original part, so much to the point of where before demolition began you could hardly tell the difference between the two.
At what point did the 1951 part of the building become less than the original? Because the craftmanship of the entire building is unmistakeably a work of art. When the Gold's building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982, it was for the entire building. And it was determined that every part of the building was equal in it's significance, and for that matter the 1951 expansion is, and I quote: "not regarded as differing so drastically that is deserves omission from the nominated property."
Does nobody see the travesty in labeling mid-century buildings as inferior to those that came before and after? Even if you don't like the appearence of them, they can still be priceless landmarks in their own right. The demolition of every part of the Gold's building that isn't the original shows just how little people care about history that isn't the oldest and most grandeous part of the timeline. The Gold's department store was at it's peak success in the 1950s and 1960s. Are you really going to say that addition isn't important just because it was added onto the original part later? That it's merely an imitation of the original building's style?
The 1951 addition comprised such a large part of the building I think it's safe to say most of the Gold's building was the addition. And that's what made it look so cool, that smooth, polished, stone paneling that just went on, and on, and on. When the demolition is complete, what's left of Gold's -the original part- is going to look tiny, insignificant. You would never know from looking at it what splendor it had because the 1924 part of the building was when it was just starting out. It was a business just getting off the ground, and it had the footprint to prove it.
Anyone who believes the demolition of the majority of the Gold's building is justified because it has less value than the rest, or because mid-century buildings are insignificant has been fed a lie. The majority of the building was constructed in 1951; if Gold's wasn't at their peak and weren't the biggest players in town, they wouldn't have built it.
I'll end this article with a plea: please consider what you are doing by demolishing, or rennovating, or gentrifying mid-century buildings. This is a blatant show of the western world's disregard for mid-century buildings. If we couldn't even save Gold's, a building that is virtually indistinguishable from a building that was the icon of the city's wealth during the Roaring 20s, how can we expect buildings that are typical masterworks of 1960s and 1970s architecture to survive in any capacity?
1970s architecture is seen as a joke to many people. People will see anything from commercial buildings designed by elite architects, to perfect time capsules of unmodified residential homes and will scoff at the hilarity of disco, afros, bell bottoms, land yachts and the sort, and will immediatly proceed to paint every wall and countertop that shade of bluish grey that James Cameron predicted the future would look like after emotionless killer machines conquered the atomized wasteland of the world.
Don't be like that. Preserve mid-century architecture. It's not as expendable as you might believe, and it's not as abundant as you might think.
Argot
Page created: Wednsday, Feburary 1st, 2023