{"id":2327,"date":"2010-07-28T22:43:23","date_gmt":"2010-07-29T03:43:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.marklamster.com\/?p=2327"},"modified":"2010-07-28T22:43:23","modified_gmt":"2010-07-29T03:43:23","slug":"do-gooder-architecture-then-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/?p=2327","title":{"rendered":"Do-Gooder Architecture: Then &#038; Now"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blog.marklamster.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/img_0986.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.marklamster.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/img_0986.jpg\" alt=\"img_0986\" title=\"img_0986\" width=\"225\"\/><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/blog.marklamster.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/img_0985.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.marklamster.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/img_0985.jpg\" alt=\"img_0985\" title=\"img_0985\" width=\"225\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I don&#8217;t think Philip Johnson would much care for Croon Hall, the new and very green building for Yale&#8217;s school of forestry and environmental sciences. Johnson scoffed at what he called &#8220;do-gooder&#8221; architecture, design with more concern for functional or social problems than aesthetics. Croon is most assuredly a building driven by its ecological program. Johnson liked to be wowed, and Croon isn&#8217;t really a wow building unless the LEED rating system gets your blood going. The entry could not be less monumental: open the front door and you&#8217;re in a long, dim hallway with low ceilings. It only opens up as you ascend its stairwell, which delivers you to a brightly lit space with a woody, Swiss-chalet type feel. The air is a bit still, and perhaps a degree or two warmer than optimal\u2014at least on a hot summer day. Not the kind of place to draw tears of euphoria. It&#8217;s nice.  <\/p>\n<p>Croon naturally draws comparison to Johnson&#8217;s own Kline Biology Tower, which sits just above it on a bluff over the Yale campus. (Croon&#8217;s louvered windows, unfortunately, block any view of it.) While both buildings have distinct phallic overtones (Kroon especially), the Johnson building is by far the more verile of the two, a commanding brick-clad slab rising above the trees. If it&#8217;s slightly butch, it is by no means insensitive; Johnson set it before a broad, comfortable plaza enclosed by a canopied pergola, where students and faculty can gather at picnic tables. As Vincent Scully has noted, it is set off-axis from Hillhouse Avenue below, so that it is not an overbearing presence above that historic street. A work of &#8220;do-gooder&#8221; design, perhaps, but one made on Johnson&#8217;s terms. <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blog.marklamster.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/img_0993.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.marklamster.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/img_0993.jpg\" alt=\"img_0993\" title=\"img_0993\" width=\"225\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/blog.marklamster.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/img_0992.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.marklamster.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/img_0992.jpg\" alt=\"img_0992\" title=\"img_0992\" width=\"225\" \/><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I don&#8217;t think Philip Johnson would much care for Croon Hall, the new and very green building for Yale&#8217;s school of forestry and environmental sciences. Johnson scoffed at what he called &#8220;do-gooder&#8221; architecture, design with more concern for functional or social problems than aesthetics. Croon is most assuredly a building driven by its ecological program. &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/?p=2327\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Do-Gooder Architecture: Then &#038; Now<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2327","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2327"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2327\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.marklamster.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}