Two Columbus Circle: All Y'all Preservationists Can Suck It
After three years of drama, Tom Wolfe, and brown-bag lunch pickets, the Two Columbus Circle saga is over. The city closed on the $17 million sale yesterday, according to today’s Times, with “renovations to begin immediately.”
The closing ends a three-year struggle in which preservationists fought to prevent changes to the 1964 building designed by Edward Durell Stone. Its Venetian-inspired marble-clad facade and lollipop-like columns are viewed by Stone’s defenders as a turning point in Modernist design. Its facade and interior spaces will be revamped under a design by Brad Cloepfil of Allied Works Architecture, which is collaborating with Gary Edward Handel & Associates. The building has been unoccupied since 1998.
We made our call already, but we’ll reiterate. We don’t see Cloepfil fucking it up too badly. The kids at Handel (‘sup, Michael), on the other hand…
Jokes!
