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Grilled Cheese is a product of Village Compute

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@tedgrunewald.bsky.socialSep 21, 2026, 12:43 PM

Far more relevant to your obsession than YIMBY's one-size-fits-all "zoning reform" is small-scale #HistoricPreservation, #AdaptiveReuse, and #CommercialRentStabilization.

Old buildings are more useful to young people.

They're what Jane Jacobs called "incubators" because of their low overhead.

Since the Second World War we have endured almost three decades of urban strip-mining, a process which exploits the marketplace values of cities but offers little in return to those who live there. Both the wealth and the activities have been continually torn out of urban centres. Left behind is an increasing polarization of economic classes and a growing poverty of activity. It is overreaching to suggest that architects have been directly responsible for all this carnage. But by offering few alternative images of order for urban growth our profession has become an accomplice to such exploitation. Nonetheless cities continue to offer a most compelling image for reform designers. Their unkempt squalor, their suffering and their decay have all combined to make them a great hive for those who do good. Planners point out that the adaptability of man is so great he can live anywhere he has his fellow beings, but in the process of accommodation to alien environments he often becomes less, not more of himself. It is not surprising that with a supposed doomsday awaiting us few proposals for the future of cities have recently come forth . I believe this will change because even though they may serve no direct practical purpose all images for future cities have the power to goad and to question. They also offer testament to a belief in the promise of tomorrow. Of all images for the future none is more optimistic than a proposal for a new city for who could possibly take seriously the consideration of a new urban environment which would make the human condition worse? It is the purpose of urban images of order to show how people might live better. But despite great differences of form most proposals have one thing in common. They ignore the past. Few of the futuristic visions of Archigram, [10] the hollow pyramids of Soleri, [11] or the architectural hillsides of Safde, contain existing structures except for highways. Whether based upon marine life, [12] insect life, Greek …...there is something worrisome about proposals which are ignorant of how true life in cities depends upon what went before. By assuming a future without a past we rob cities of their architectural variety, even though we may neaten up their unkempt form. Not only do old buildings provide the cheap space necessary to shelter fledgling activities, their continuity with the past offers a means by which to measure our present selves. My own office began in a converted rooming house from the 19th century. The space was inelegant, the bathrooms foul , the views of the neighboring flophouse so depressing we shielded the windows. But it was cheap. Simultaneously it was the eight-story home of a drapery manufacturer, a man who made jewelry boxes, the Ova-Nite Glove Company, a candle maker, a false-teeth concern, and two photographers, among others. In the course of time it had been many things to many people at prices all our modest budgets would allow. Across the street was the 165th Regiment Armory, a building built to train young men and horses for war. It was also the scene of the first Armory Show, a controversial exhibition which introduced abstract painting to the United States. Down the block lay Madison Square Park where legend says the game of baseball was invented, and around the corner was Stanford White's studio where he seduced Harry Thaw's wife, only to be shot by him in the roof garden of Madison Square Garden. Some of the places where these events took place had gone and none of the ones which remained were distinguished pieces of architecture. But the associations of these buildings and events were of great value because they identified the place I worked as special and they helped define my community.