The Starchitect Sell-out

With Foster + Partner's Comcast Technology Center taking shape and Frank Gehry futzing around the Museum of Art, it's time to take a look at the way some of the world's most revered architects interact with Philadelphia when invited. For all our progress and growth over the last two decades, Philadelphia's reputation still sulks in the shadows of New York City's size and Washington, D.C.'s power, and it's evident in the quality of design world class architects bring to the drafting table when they're employed here. 

Frank Gehry's largest ambition for the Philadelphia Museum of Art - carving out the center of its Great Steps - has been nothing short of contentious. The stuffiest in the museum's art community have long wanted to rid the Great Steps of the droves of tourists who commemorate Rocky Balboa's many fictional runs, while fans of the many movies cite the tourism it drives and respect for the cinematic work of art that brings them there. But as architecture, surprisingly few mention the historic nature of the Great Steps themselves and what a precedent it sets to allow a modern architect to upset and reconfigure the work of the renowned and local architect, Horace Trumbauer. 

This speaks twofold. With Philadelphia's preservation crisis in full bloom and its task force already proven ineffectual not one year in the making, one of the nation's most historic cities doesn't seem to have a firm grasp on what's historic and how to protect it. Meanwhile, City Hall and those in charge of managing storied institutions like the Philadelphia Museum of Art are resigned to the notion that any movement is progress. To the powers that be, the fact that Frank Gehry is willing to work in Philadelphia, even with his astronomical tab, is a gift that we clearly don't think we deserve. 

Nearby cities aren't to solely blame for our reputation, unless you consider how we Philadelphians react to them. It's primarily on us, and the ingrained inferiority complex we can't seem to shake. Gehry has worked around the world in cities of varying size and prowess. Most of us have seen a few major American cities in our lifetimes, and I'd wager anyone who's traveled west would be willing to point out that there's nothing inherently better about downtown Los Angeles or Seattle. Quite the contrary. These are sprawling cities buried in cars with terrible public transportation. Yet in both, Frank Gehry delivered urban panache without damaging any historic institutions like the Philadelphia Museum of Art. 

This inferiority is even more striking in Foster + Partner's Comcast Technology Center. Comcast isn't a company known for innovation (perhaps that's why the word was removed from the skyscraper's name), but it's one of the largest hometown companies and currently dominates the city's skyline. Yet its newest addition is dull at best, especially considering what the company that owns 30 Rockefeller Center should be capable of producing. 

To be fair, I suppose, the Comcast Technology Center isn't bad. It wouldn't look out of place in more architecturally savvy cities like London or Frankfurt. But compared to what's being built by companies of Comcast's stature around the world, it's far from unique, even among those designed by Norman Foster's firm. 

Its greatest offense is its relationship with the skyline. Technically the tallest, it doesn't relate at all with its surroundings. Its spire or "smokestack" pulls away from Center City instead of rising within it. It spans nearly the width of its block, uncharacteristic of Philadelphia's other skyscrapers occupying no more than a quarter of their block's footprint. These are likely logistical decisions given the building's entrance, but ones that demonstrate Foster + Partner's lack of consideration for their environment. 

Foster + Partner's job was to design a work of art that dynamically belongs in a gallery of its peers. Instead, he essentially hired Lady Gaga to sing in the Natural History Museum. It doesn't work...for anyone. 

And that says nothing of the materials. I guess we have the automotive industry to blame for our now-inability to distinguish between plastic and chrome. 

It's fine as a stand-alone skyscraper (even if it looks like a cubist vacuum cleaner), but it reads more geographically like a canned response to Comcast's business solicitation. A big company wanted a big name, little more. If anyone knows the masses will ignore the status quo when its forced upon them, it's Big Cable. And that's what its second tower is. 

Given its similarity to Foster's other skyscrapers and comparatively dated appearance, it wouldn't be surprising if it was a design study or an unused project Foster + Partners had lying around to divvy out to whatever nameless city "wanted a Foster." And that's a shame, because Philadelphia has numerous firms of our own doing even wilder things, if not on the same scale. Hometown companies and institutions like Comcast and the Philadelphia Museum of Art shouldn't be reaching around the globe for architects with no personal interest in our own city, but giving more motivated, and sometimes more astounding, firms a boost towards their potential. 

Imagine what Erdy-McHenry or Qb3 could have with the Comcast Technology Center. Instead of building something that looks like it could blend in Manhattan, Comcast could have given a local partner the opportunity to offer other cities like New York and San Francisco something they themselves don't yet have. That's the exact mentality that drove Philadelphia's 19th Century banks to offer the world the designs of America's first Starchitects: Frank Furness, Willis G. Hale, and Wilson Eyre. 

Since the last building boom, developers - even massive investors - have been trebidatious about dabbling in more than the status quo. We're no longer getting proposals for towers designed by Winka Dubbeldam and Richard Meier, even wacky mid-rises brought to us by the defunct CREI. Couple our nefarious inferiority complex with transplants from the cities that generate such a complex, those who view Center City as little more than a bedroom community, and we seem to continue to demand less and less of our city builders every day. 

Just south of Cesar Pelli's Cira Centre, which will undoubtedly be immortalized in future architecture history books, FMC's Cira Centre South was erected as the tallest building in West Philadelphia with very little fanfare, despite being categorically better than anything currently taking shape across the river. Pelli, a Starchitect in his own right, continues to evolve, as any artist should.

But today, the world's most famous architects, Norman Foster and Frank Gehry have built upon a reputation for doing really great work, and then capitalized on companies and cities that are willing to pay for little more than their name. They're sellouts, blueprint mills. Both have done amazing things in the past, and done their parts to redefine modern architecture. But there's no reason every new building they touch - even in Philadelphia - shouldn't be even more amazing than the last. 

Frank Gehry: Under the Radar?

If you visit Making a Classic Modern, the Frank Gehry exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, you'll discover that it's no more an art exhibit than a Hyundai kiosk at the Philadelphia Auto Show. 

Complete with an eager sales representative, a few pixelated photographs of Frank Gehry's work are paired with an enthusiastic guide who might as well be saying, "I want to put you in a Daytona time share unit today!"

Each photograph is accommodated by quotes from critics - notable academics who don't need to endure Frank Gehry's architecture on a daily basis - raving about the man's genius.

A streaming video shows a man who's been practicing his craft for far to long, and a man immune to criticism. Speaking about himself, he says, "What I like about it is you're going to pass by and you're not going to know Frank Gehry was there. I love that, I love being under the radar like that."

Aside from the smugness of a third person narrative, the absurdity of Gehry "being under the radar" is solidified in a gift shop dedicated solely to the man himself.

Gehry has managed to transform architecture into a marketing machine, a big box department store full of twelve dollar Kandinski prints that would look great hanging over your living room sofa. He's IKEA. 

He uses the same modern technology that creates Hollywood sets to allegedly create feats of modern artistry, but just like the Colonial Street backlot at Universal Studios, his buildings are hallow illusions. 

Whatever you think of Frank Gehry's most notable designs, he may do the most damage flying "under the radar." Instead of erecting one of his signature balls of foil along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Gehry will be toying with one of Philadelphia's most iconic landmarks, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and its Great Steps.

As you weave your way through Making a Classic Modern, no marketing gimmick can prove the man's genius. Displayed on the walls are various incarnations of his plans for the Philadelphia Museum of Art, juvenile experiments that cut the steps in half or simply ask, "how many skylights should I embed in the plaza?"

While his larger projects may be controversial in their own right, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles and the EMP Museum in Seattle are at least interesting to look at. But the plans displayed within Making a Classic Modern show a lack of skill when it comes to integrating interior and exterior spaces, especially when a space already exists. 

It's not surprising. His otherworldly exteriors are often met with unnecessarily claustrophobic interiors retrofitted to accommodate an aerodynamic skin. So we should expect the opposite to be true when he designs an interior that will find its way beyond the confines of a building's existing walls.

Unfortunately for Philadelphia, we aren't getting a Jetsonian building masking an anxiety inducing warehouse like his Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain. His thoughtlessness will be exposed on the Great Steps of the Museum.

But Gehry's arrogance may be even more astounding than his inexplicable success as a starchitect. Even Lex Luthor knows who he is and his place in Metropolis. Frank Gehry, who had admittedly never been to Philadelphia until he was asked to remodel the museum, knows as little about our city as he does his own reputation. A fact made clear by a man who thinks that demolishing part of the Great Steps is "under the radar."

The Great Steps

I appreciate a good underdog story, particularly one that uses our city to demonstrate what a true underdog can become. And whether or not you like boxing movies, Sylvester Stallone, or worn nostalgia, Philadelphia has been that underdog for a very long time and we've just recently started to win.

There's a very real reason Rocky was set in Philadelphia. The city was chosen for Twelve Monkeys, Philadelphia, and Cold Case for the same reason. For so long Philadelphia was the bleak and downtrodden embodiment of something that was once great. More than that, Philadelphia continued to fight through its darkest days because it knew it could succeed.

So why now, that we're finally beginning to see the success enjoyed by New York and Chicago, are we so willing to allow one man to eradicate a pinnacle of absolute perfection, a light of stone that kept a struggling city alive throughout the Dark Ages of modern Americana?

Would you paint the White House blue?

Despite our place in Revolutionary history, Philadelphia was a smog ridden haven for crime, poverty, and corruption during our nation's Bicentennial. When Rocky Balboa ran up the Great Steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, he wasn't just using a civic structure as gym equipment. He conquered seventy two daunting steps that led him to the one edifice that made Philadelphia a great city even in our worst hours. 

He turned back to the city below the Great Steps, a city faced with struggle and doubt from a point of unmolested innocence, overlooking a tarnished skyline desperate for what he had just proved he could achieve. The Philadelphia Museum of Art isn't just a museum that holds paintings. It's a Temple, in all its parts, to greatness and purity. You only need to climb its Steps to know that.

It was a symbolic feat shared by anyone who has ever visited the Philadelphia Museum of Art, even those long before Rocky was a household name, one that continues to be shared by today's visitors who know nothing of the movie.

But Frank Gehry's plans to carve out one sixth of the Great Steps for a picture window isn't about history. If it were, Horace Trumbauer's greatest work of art would be granted the same reverence as a historically designated row house in Society Hill.

This is pure pomp. The Director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art is coupling the hype of Gehry's mere presence with an aging and irrelevant connection to a forty year old movie to encourage people to embrace anything new, regardless of what it looks like.

Cinematic history aside, the Great Steps are as relevant to the building as the collection within. The banners flanking the columns of the museum call out the title of Frank Gehry's current exhibit: Making a Classic Modern. The title doesn't just insult the posterity of the building by implying historic architecture should be altered, it insults art itself, suggesting that the Mona Lisa might be better if part of it were painted over to include an iPhone.

Making a Classic Modern

Would we allow Starchitect Michael Graves to install his postmodern columns on City Hall simply because he's known throughout the world? 

The city pitched a fit when Conrad Brenner halfheartedly proposed a mural on the windowless wall behind the PSFS Building. A grassroots organization staved off the demolition of the Boyd Theater's auditorium for more than a few years and has expanded its efforts to save the historic NFL Film Exchange on North 13th Street, a simple building in a forgotten corner of Center City. 

In a city that is so vested in preserving every last crumb of our history, where is the fight to save the gateway to our most internationally recognized cultural institution? 

While Philadelphia holds an abundance of architectural history, preservationists tend to fight fights they think they can win. We fight to save historic row houses and theaters because we know that those financially vested in the demolition don't have the city's historic interest in mind. They have no respect for the bricks and mortar, just their potential profit. 

But they're also fightable. 

Frank Gehry

When it comes to institutions like the Philadelphia Museum of Art, we assume those in charge know better. Cultural institutions are not powerhouses of profit, they're repositories of posterity. But those managing the Philadelphia Museum of Art have been mesmerized by a Lord Voldemort, a Starchitect with the power and prominence to blind us from the fact that he doesn't understand our city.

Faced with a marketing campaign masquerading as an art exhibit, Philadelphians are not asked, "Could our city's artistic legacy be better served in a truly modern museum elsewhere on the Parkway?" Instead we're being told to tolerate what Frank Gehry wants to do to the history we already have.

I'm going to keep asking until the jackhammer hits the first Great Step.

Save the PMA

The Goddess Diana

The goddess Diana atop Madison Square Garden

When City Hall was cleaned about ten years ago, many didn't realize that the building was made of marble, assuming the stained facades were simply granite. 

Similarly, few realized that the statue of Diana within the Philadelphia Museum of Art was originally gilded when it stood atop Madison Square Garden and served as the highest point in New York City.

By the time Diana made it to Philadelphia, her gilding was gone and was repaired in the green most are now familiar with.

After a year of restoration, Augustus Saint Gaudens' goddess has returned to the Philadelphia Museum of Art in her original glory.

Has Gehry Given Up?

What's perhaps worse than a bad idea is an idea that makes absolutely no sense. A video from Action News 6abc shows a detailed, illuminated model of Frank Gehry's proposed alterations to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Earlier photographs and renderings only showed bird's eye views of the plans, making it unclear exactly how it would look from Eakins Oval or the Parkway, you know, where people would see it. And surprise, it's as ugly as anyone could imagine.

Sorry, not ugly. Ugliness has merit. It takes effort. Someone has to try to design something truly ugly. 

Gehry's alterations look more like something a child might dream up with a coloring book from the PMA's gift shop. They're senseless. At best, juvenile. 

He's haphazardly placed skylights within the museum's plaza, four square, one round, geometrically flanked by two recessed entrances. Meanwhile the picture window and seating area within the Great Steps provide natural light to the underground gallery space, but no entrance where one would assume. 

Timothy Rub, the museum's director wants people to keep an open mind about the plans yet stated, "its an interesting idea that has some merit." Some merit? Those aren't the confident words we want coming from those in charge of such dramatic changes to our city's greatest cultural asset.

Gehry, who seems fixated on skylights is replacing the seven unfinished pediments with, yes, more skylights. Has Gehry, an octogenarian who's practiced architecture for more than fifty years, simply given up? For all the support the Philadelphia Museum of Art is trying to raise for Gehry's proposals, they seem more interested in the man himself than looking at the designs he's presented. Would there be the same fan fair if these plans were submitted by anyone not branded a starchitect? 

Where are the preservation activists and the Historical Society? Inga Saffron who's made no bones in the past about criticizing popular opinion called Gehry's steps "controversial," but went on to grant a pass stating the "museum should be allowed one daring move." Has our champion of Philadelphia's best buildings, past and future, been mesmerized by this celebrity as well?

The powers behind this decision have their heads buried elsewhere when they need to be looking at what they are allowing to be done to this historic landmark. Ignore the architect and independently examine the merit of the designs. 

Suggest alternatives. Why can't Gehry replace the stone steps with glass ones? They've given the man carte blanche when they should be surveying those in cities with a Gehry, asking them how the feel about it. Los Angeles' Walt Disney Concert Hall was so poorly designed that it acted as a concave mirror scalding pedestrians like ants. Do we want that touching a museum that holds priceless art?

Would New York allow Gehry to transform the Guggenheim? Absolutely not and we should hold ourselves to the same standard. Philadelphia is on the brink of many great things. Don't lose sight of the things that already make us great.

Gizmodo on Gehry

Geoff Manaugh published a hilarious article on Gizmodo on why "Frank Gehry is Still the World's Worst Living Architect."  That says a lot in a world where Michael Graves and Robert Venturi still practice. 

Although Manaugh doesn't mention Gehry's proposed alterations to the Philadelphia Museum of Art (the changes are more offensive to the history of the institution than they are outright ugly), he does a fine job of conveying how little those running our cities actually know - or even care - about the aesthetics of our built environment. 

They simply want a Gehry.

Between comparing Gehry's architecture to Guy Fieri's hair and Phyllis Diller mid-stroke, Manaugh points out how expensive and time consuming Gehry's work can be, and how poorly constructed they are. But the most interesting point he may have made is that these buildings are grand illusions, bizarre facades hiding dull warehouses wedged within the space available. 

Despite what you may see in front of you, it's just not significant architecture. Many architectural theorists applaud him for using unconventional software to design, but there's a reason he's the only one who does it. Software intended to design airplanes isn't intended to design buildings because buildings don't fly. 

You know who does use this sort of software to design architecture? Walt Disney Imagineering. 

Gehry has essentially redesigned Cindarella's Disneyland castle - repeatedly - by using software capable of incorporating functional mechanics inside a sheath that looks like something else.

The only brilliance in that is the gimmick. 

But to those running cities that want a Gehry, his buildings are a shiny set of keys jingling above a crib. And those running the Philadelphia Museum of Art are no exception to the rule. Loving art for art's sake, the powers behind the museum don't understand Gehry's work anymore than they seem to understand the artistic significance of the museum itself. 

They don't see a big, wet turd on the steps of the Museum of Art, they see a name.

----------------

The unfortunate obsession with starchitects, particularly when they impact our hallowed institutions, is that it outsources to those who know little about our cities and civic pride. Horace Trumbauer, one of the main architects who designed the Philadelphia Museum of Art, was an architectural legend, but local. He understood the city, our people, and as a Philadelphian, he knew he would have to answer to his design every single day.

Philadelphia is a hotbed of emerging architects, some of them amazing. By extending a fat paycheck to a Canadian architect who clearly doesn't get Philadelphia, the museum doesn't just offend its own architectural heritage, it insults the Trumbauers of today, those currently practicing in Philadelphia, accountable for the buildings they're designing for their own city.

Making a Classic Modern

The Philadelphia Museum of Art has finally released Frank Gehry's master plan for renovations to the world renowned art museum. In "Making a Classic Modern," the PMA displays Frank Gehry's indoor renovations gracefully complementing the catacombs formerly unseen by guests while downplaying what Gehry intends to do with perhaps the museum's most visited, free attraction: the steps.

Ironically Gehry, an architect known for bending metal like Magneto, hasn't executed his signature style on his exterior elements at the PMA. Instead, perhaps in an effort to respect the reverence of the building, dumbs his exterior renovations down to a picture window wedged in one sixth of the Great Steps.

Of course modern is relative, particularly in terms of an architect who's been practicing his craft since 1962. His most iconic works, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles and the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, were designed in the late 90s, both completed more than ten years ago. 

Gehry's relevance as a modernist is only in the sense that he's still building. What we're left with is a Starchitect recognizable in name only, one who has chosen to reinvent his unique, metallic curvatures with a sunken picture window desecrating one of Philadelphia's most visited attractions. 

If the PMA were less concerned with pomp and more concerned with preserving its place in history, we might see what a truly modern firm could do with this space. After all, history will remember what it looks like, not an architect's status in 2014.

Strategically, no rendering of what this will look like from Eakins Oval is available. 

When I. M. Pei completed his Pyramid at the Louvre in 1989 it was not without contention. Many still revile the structure as a scar upon Paris. While the large plaza facing the Louve shares some of the architectural elements as the vast steps facing the Philadelphia Museum of Art - namely, the humbling nature of vast and subtle architectural intentions - the steps of the PMA add a humbling journey one must embark upon before reaching greatness.

It is truly Philadelphia's Acropolis.

"Making a Classic Modern" is not just irrelevant, it's irresponsible. The cohesive collection of architecture that makes up the Philadelphia Museum of Art is about as astounding and godly as one can get. Deliberate or not, Horace Trumbauer and other architects created one of the most spiritual places on earth.

After the daunting task of tacking the steps, an optical illusion created by the width and curvature of each individual step, visitors are cleared of mind, body, and spirit, cleansed of the world they left behind at Eakins Oval to truly embrace the collections they are about to experience.

Afterwards, they can explore the nature that awaits them along the Shuylkill River, the eclectic architecture comprised within the Waterworks, Boathouse Row, and the winding trails leading them through the rocks on which our Parthenon sits, contemplating the spiritual and artistic journey they just took.

Inadvertent as this collection of architecture may be, what we have is rare. If Gehry intends to alter that experience in any way, he needs to compliment that journey.

The Great Steps are where our journey begins. This is where we embark on our quest for solitude and spirituality through art. For the same reason that Central Park was never developed, the Great Steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art are a place for contemplation, not clutter. 

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Philadelphia's Acropolis

By now you're likely aware that world renowned starchitect, Frank Gehry has proposed carving out about one sixth of the iconic steps leading to the Philadelphia Museum of Art for a picture window. 

But media outlets around the world continue to misunderstand the significance of the wide steps, repeatedly referring to them as the "Rocky Steps" here, here, here, here and elsewhere.

While 55% of those surveyed approve of the proposal, the media is inadvertently driving art lovers to embrace the alterations by failing to point out how significant these steps were long before Rocky ever made his first run.

This isn't the first time that the art community has clashed with fans of the 1976 movie. About ten years ago, a bronze statue from Rocky III was returned to the art museum. Fans wanted it placed atop the steps while the art community wanted nothing to do with it. A compromise was reached and the statue now stands just north of the first step.

The steps have become synonymous with a movie that has nothing to do with art, and the art community has forgotten that the setting was merely chosen because of what it represents. Rocky didn't invent the "Rocky Steps," the steps inspired the character and his audience. While the statue truly is a studio prop, the steps are not a Hollywood set to be discarded or forgotten. 

The wide span of the steps are as dramatic as the building itself. A deliberate architectural element forcing visitors to overcome an obstacle before reaching our city's vast temple of art, a feat shared by those worshipping atop the Acropolis over 2000 years ago. The steps curve ever so slightly to create the same optical illusion as the steps of the Parthenon it emulates, making them look even taller than they are.

The building itself, including the steps, is one of the museum's greatest works of art.

Gehry should know this. He is, after all, an architect. His proposed window may provide grand views of a city built independently of Philadelphia's Acropolis, and those views are also available from the top of the steps. 

No one would dare allow the priceless paintings and sculptures within our temple to be altered with cluttered modernism and the same reverence needs to be applied to the work of art that holds them all. Disrupting this passage with anything would make the Philadelphia Museum of Art just another art museum, and that has nothing to do with Rocky Balboa.

Don't Mess With the Rocky Steps

When modern meets historic, I'm typically a fan. I. M. Pei's pyramid in front of the Louvre is astounding. But you know what's just as astounding? The giant staircase leading to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. And I'm not speaking from the standpoint of Rocky nostalgia. The wide, tall staircase that imposes itself in front of Philadelphia's grand Parthenon of art was a deliberate architectural element, one meant to be as dramatic as the edifice itself.

From City Hall, the Philadelphia Museum of Art stands atop the site of the city's old reservoir like a temple to the gods, but the truly humbling experience begins at the foot of her steps on Eakins Oval. It really isn't that tall and climbing the stairs isn't a feat reserved for the most physically fit. It's an optical illusion, one designed specifically to convince visitors that they have reached greatness at its summit, reflecting similar design elements at the Parthenon itself.

Frank Gehry has been working with the PMA to complete the world renowned museum nearly a century later, adding modern art space beneath its great steps. Frank Gehry has his fans and foes, but unlike I. M. Pei who indulged in modernism when it was unpopular, Gehry was one of the world's first Starchitects. For a city to have a building, even a space, designed by Gehry is a status symbol. But like leasing a Mercedes you can't afford, status symbols and the products of Starchitects are occasionally relevant in name only.

I think it's great that Gehry is designing the modern art space for the PMA, but that's because Gehry's best work is indoors. Outside, at best, his buildings echo a ball of foil, which would have been unique if he'd done it once. But he's done it over and over again because more and more cities demanded a Gehry.

But his exterior plans for the Philadelphia Museum of Art display a man falling flat on his face when it comes to integrating history.

He plans to carve Philadelphia's Great Steps in half at the second tier, opening them to a flat entrance to the new museum of modern art. In what is likely an attempt to respect the history of the building, the entrance is dull and unadorned. But considering the significance of these steps both architecturally and popularly, subtlety is the last thing a redesign warrants.

This could never happen again.

If Philadelphia is going to allow 1/6 of this iconic landmark to be obliterated, give us the pyramid at the Louvre. Give us something even more exciting than the steps we have.

Or better yet, give us nothing at all. These steps should be preserved: historically, architecturally, and culturally. Perhaps the fault lies in hiring a Starchitect to redesign a building true to a city. As a Philadelphian, Horace Trumbauer understood what the Philadelphia Museum of Art meant to Philadelphia. Frank Gehry clearly does not.

Philadelphia: Still Open. Very Open.

The government may be shut down, but Philadelphia sure isn't. Honestly, take a look at the list of attractions that are open and the ones that aren't. Which ones would you recommend?

Aside from Valley Forge, the list of shuttered attractions looks like an insider's guide on where not to go.

Open

The National Constitution Center, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Barnes Foundation, all open. The Mutter Museum is so open it's not even on the list. The Franklin Institute, the zoo, the Betsy Ross House, Atwater Kent, open. Fairmount Park? Yep, it's a city park, with over a dozen house museums and the historic site of the Centennial Exposition, all open. The Schuylkill Banks are open. Penn Treaty Park is open. Franklin Square is open.

Open

Sorry, the Declaration House and the Second Bank of the United States are closed. Did you know they were ever open on idle Wednesday? Do you even know where they are?

Okay, maybe, but I've never been inside.

Open

While you might not be able to grab a $3 cup of coffee at our multimillion dollar brochure kiosk otherwise known as the Independence Visitor Center, were it not for a few barricades and security guards, you might mistake Philadelphia's participation in the shutdown for a Sunday afternoon.

Open

In fact, it would benefit Philadelphia's tourism industry to start advertising itself as such, especially if the shutdown lasts much longer.

With major destinations like the Statue of Liberty and the White House closed for the duration of this Congressional hissy fit, Philadelphia's closed Liberty Bell Pavilion pales in comparison to the Barnes Museum and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, each with collections that the National Gallery can't rival.

City Hall is open and its tower is just two meters shorter than the Washington Monument. Did you know that? Probably not because William Penn's phallus is surrounded by a sea of skyscrapers that puts the view from Good Old George's obelisk to shame.

If the shutdown continues as long as the nation's last, Philadelphia could find itself more than a brief diversion from DC or NYC, but an entire alternative. Visit Philly should seize this opportunity to plaster DC's Metro and the New York City subway with posters reading "Philadelphia: Still Open." 

With more outdoor artwork than any city in the world (I dare you to argue), this is a prime opportunity to point visitors to a Philadelphia that is more than just dusty stacks of Colonial history, telling a shutdown America that Philadelphia's abundance of city parks and museums are open, maybe even encouraging tourists to stick around long enough to see private attractions like Penn's Anthropology Museum, Reading Terminal Market, and Boathouse Row, attractions a cranky federal government can't touch.

I don't think we're in Philadelphia anymore, Toto...

A decade or two ago, were you to wander towards the Schuylkill from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, you would find what you'd expect from a once great city damaged by decades of mismanagement. The grand Victorian gardens were overgrown with weeds, paths through the hillside were crumbling, and the river's shore was littered with garbage.

But somehow the Schuylkill Banks projects and the Philadelphia Museum of Art have managed to become iconic, successful public spaces that would make any First Class city jealous. And they're not even done. 

What is most amazing about the transformation in this aesthetically dramatic part of town, is that it has taken place not only in a city known for pissing away money on projects that don't move, but that it continues to progress in spite of a dreadful economy.

As an international crowd of tourists climb through the rocky gardens behind the museum, few know that the metal gazebo they're taking pictures from is a replica of a wooden gazebo that once stood in the same spot a century ago. The dedicated attention to detail and respect for the history of this space is astounding. 

Those managing these projects need to be managing our city.

Just beyond the renovated Waterworks, right before Boat House Row lies a small, relatively inaccessible island. As you walk towards Lloyd Hall from Waterworks, you would notice it behind the small algae laden inlet. OLIN has designed a new park for the island adding a small foot bridge for access. The project will be completed in 2013.

One of the most exciting projects along the Schuylkill River is the Boardwalk. To be completed in 2013 as well, the Schuylkill River Trail will continue beyond Locust Street as a 15 foot wide pier on the river complete with access to the new South Street Bridge.

What I have finally discovered about these beautiful spaces is that the Schuylkill River does not have to be solely enjoyed from its banks. Above or below the dam, launching a kayak is a piece of cake, and the water isn't nearly as disgusting as its reputation would lead you to believe. 

Naturally, as more and more people realize what a wonder resource these spaces have become, they will attract more and more crowds. It's a universal truth any urbanite must come to accept. Of course there are ways to address any potential overcrowding. Put the brilliant minds designing and managing the successes along the Schuylkill River to work on the massive banks of the Delaware.

We've got a Gehry!

Frank Gehry will be remodeling a basement hallway at the Philadelphia Museum of Art that has been sealed shut since 1975. It's not clear what the space will look like or if it will even be a public space. The overall goal of the museum is to expand gallery space, although the space being designed by Gehry will be used for storage and preparation. This space is scheduled to be completed in 2012.

Frank Gehry received notoriety for turning balls of foil into buildings in 1998. Since then the "one trick pony," as he was pegged by The Economist, has been marketing variations of that same design to cities around the globe. Like a modern artist who blows his nose on a piece of paper and calls it art, Gehry has applied this technique to the architecture community. Like other celebrity architects, his vision is more about marketing an image or a brand than it is about design, innovation, or even quality. While local designers at Erdy-McHenry and QB3 are busy creating a new artistic movement, Gehry is creatively convincing each City's Hall why their town needs to Get a Gehry.

Happy Monday

Center City from the Philadelphia Museum of Art - Saturday Evening, November, 6th.