Douglas Newby Insights - Page 7
Architect at Opening
I have taken hundreds of architecture photographs of the splendid Art Deco buildings at the State Fair of Texas, but only when I took a photograph of architect Cliff Welch, FAIA, at the fair on opening day, did the backdrop of 1936 Art Deco buildings and fair goers look like an architect-generated computer rendering of a park and people. I think Apple iphones have become so smart, that with face recognition the camera reads that the shot is of an architect and immediately goes into an architectural rendering mode. It was fun to see Cliff and know that since his office is across the street from Fair Park, he can treat the State Fair as his personal neighborhood cafeteria, like on opening day when he is picking up a corny dog for his wife. *Architect at Opening
#Architect #Architecture #ArtDeco #StateFairOfTexas #ArchitecturalRendering #Dallas #CornyDog #Neighborhood
Everyone is a Winner
Since attending SMU, along with the livestock competition, the midway of the State Fair of Texas has always been a fun excursion. My favorite was the classic midway game that required knocking over three large fuzzy-faced cats mounted on popsicle stick targets requiring all three throws being successful. Some hinges were sticky and a direct hit would not knock over a cat. The carnies’ perfectly timed distracting shouts added to the adrenaline. Players would wind up like Nolan Ryan. I used a soft quick dart style throw, lining up directly in front of my targets rather than making cross-throws. Years of playing allowed me to become so proficient that to show off I would throw balls simultaneously with my left and right hand, knocking over two cats at a time. Alas, a few years before the pandemic, the game was removed that had been played at fairs across the country for a century. Still the plate throw remained where two plates placed close together provided a tempting target, but the bull’s eye to break the two required plates was the size of a quarter. Negotiating with carnies was part of the fun. I love rules and always verified them ahead of time so none of my successful throws would be disqualified, and better yet, some of my unsuccessful throws might be counted as a winner. My favorite rule was a chipped or cracked plate counted as a broken plate. Carnies often will turn a chipped plate upside down and treat it as an unbroken plate. On a close throw I would always ask the carny to pull the plate out to see if I chipped it, resulting in me being a winner. After several years, this game also disappeared from the midway. For the first time in many years I returned to the the midway on opening day and saw a new plate throw that required four broken plates on four throws. There is nothing more nostalgic than a carny barking out EVERYONE IS A WINNER as he hands you a stuffed animal. *Everyone is a Winner
#StateFairOfTexas #Midway #EveryoneIsAWinner
Architectural Legacy Ends
A home an architect designed for himself and his family is always one of my favorites. This architecturally significant and historically significant home at 4511 Highland Drive in Old Highland Park is even more special because it was designed by the iconic Highland Park and Dallas architect, Herbert M. Greene, who also designed the Cox/Beal Beaux Arts style estate home on Beverly and Preston. Adding to the legacy of this home overlooking Hackberry Creek and backing up to Lakeside Drive estate properties, is a home that was passed down successfully to family members over three generations. Until only recently when he died at 97, John Greene Taylor owned and lived in the home. I first met John Greene Taylor 20 years ago when he gave me a call and asked if I would like to see his home that his grandfather designed. I was thrilled to see this 1920s home with very high ceilings and graciously proportioned formal and informal rooms. The architectural detail and woodwork were still intact. Apparently, the beneficiary of the estate had no real interest in preserving the home, which does not bode well for its future. I don’t know if Preservation Park Cities has this historic home on their list of 100 Architecturally Significant Historic Homes? I do know that the high-profile real estate firms thought the home only had land value as a lot. Here is a perfect example of how an early proactive preservation effort might have made a difference. I will remember John Taylor Greene with admiration and appreciation for saving this architecturally significant historic home for as long as he did – his entire life. *Architectural Legacy Ends
#ArchitecturallySignificantHome #HistoricallySignificantHome #ArchitecturallySignificantHistoricHome #OldHighlandPark #HighlandPark #HighlandParkHome #HackberryCreek #4511HighlandDrive #HerbertMGreene #Architect #Architecture #HistoricHome #Preservation #Teardown #ArchitectHome
City Manager Ward System
I have always been a huge advocate of the City Manager form of government until now — I realized it exacerbates and feeds off of a ward system that needs reform. You can see my latest blog article, “City Manager Ward System Form of Government Needs Reform” on DouglasNewby.com. The current City Manager Ward System takes away the voters’ control, hinders the progress of Dallas priorities, and the Mayor’s initiatives. My conversion on this topic over the last two months has come from the Dallas Mayor’s good initiatives being thwarted, and the City Manager’s public and private disrespect for the Mayor and now many on the City Council. I wrote “City Manager Ward System Form of Government Needs Reform” before the Dallas Morning News broke the story that the City Manager’s future will be reviewed by the City Council when they meet on Wednesday. The reason this called meeting has been so long coming is because a majority of the City Council cannot fire the City Manager. The City Manager only needs to keep six City Council members happy to keep his job. It will be interesting if the Mayor and the four City Council members that are on record for wanting to fire the City Manager will have a super-majority of the City Council to do so. I have tried in my blog article to give a fresh perspective of the history of the City Manager form of government and single member districts, and what has been brewing at City Hall between the Mayor and City Manager. The current City Manager ward system form of government needs reform if Dallas is going to continue to flourish. *City Manager Ward System
#DallasCityManager #DallasMayor #DallasCityCouncil #CityManagerFormOfGovernment #CityManagerWardSystem #Dallas #DallasCharter #DallasGovernment #DallasCityHall #MayorEricJohnson
Cocktail Orchid
What is one going to do when one becomes fond of the orchid that comes floating in a pre-dinner cocktail, the Serrano, ordered in the gallery from Bemelmans Bar at The Carlyle overseen by Manager Dimitrios Michalopoulos? When the drink is finished, rinse the orchid off in chilled water and place it in one’s lapel buttonhole for the evening’s dinner at Antonucci’s. Seated outside close by was a prominent hedge fund partner that I casually know from TED. I went by to say hello to him and his grown family dining with him. After a brief fun exchange, he complimented me on my orchid. This allowed me to explain the origin story of the orchid to him and his family’s amusement, which inspired this post. I did not mention that I now have an inclination where John Reoch sources his buttonhole flowers he wears when he knows paparazzi will be close by. *Cocktail Orchid
@RosewoodTheCarlyle #TheCarlyle #CarlyleGallery #BemelmansBar @BemelmansBar #Cocktail #Orchid #NYC #Manhattan #UpperEastSide #Design #ButtonholeFlower #CocktailOrchid
Three Bathers
Urban planners and architects often create digitized renderings to show how a plaza becomes a human space – a reflection pool, a piece of sculpture, spotted trees, and three people placed in the hardscape between buildings. And when I see these renderings, I say to myself, “Yeah, like that is ever going to happen.” And yet in real life at the MoMA, when I turned and looked at what seemed to be a large computer rendering, it was really a MoMA sculpture garden with a pool, a sculpture, spotted trees, and three sunbathers with their feet dangling towards the pool, with chairs strewn about inviting more to join them. Before long, as I often do when I am visiting the MoMA, I found my way to a chair under a tree with dappled light to relax and enjoy the day. The musing I have written across the photograph maybe should have been – “When life mimics renderings.” *Three Bathers
@MuseumofModernArt #MoMASculptureGarden #UrbanLandscape #SculptureGarden #ArtMuseum #Architecture #NewYorkArchitecture #LandscapeArchitect #UrbanPlanner #Renderings #SunBathers #Manhattan #MuseumofModernArt
Studio Index
An exhibition in a museum with an enjoyable scale, mask optional, beautiful paintings, presented in a way one learns more about the artist, the artistic period, and the history of its time. It is my favorite way to view art. The MoMA exhibition, “Matisse: The Red Studio,” captures all these positive components. Sometimes looking at a series of paintings in a museum can make one a bit weary. This “Matisse: The Red Studio” exhibit exhilarates and energizes the viewer. It also propels one to see the other floors of the permanent collection with a fresh eye and a deeper insight on how to look at and think about art. “The Red Studio” becomes a studio index for the other paintings on the walls surrounding the 6 foot x 7 foot Red Studio panel. MoMA was successful in assembling and displaying all the paintings pictured in “The Red Studio.” This commissioned painting of a studio was originally painted in the natural colors of the studio’s blue and green walls and wood floors. Matisse then did a reset of not just this painting but of his art. He rapidly repainted all the walls, ceilings and floor in red. His patron who commissioned the piece, upon seeing it, rejected it as did the art critics when the piece was exhibited in Paris, the Armory in New York, and at the Art Institute of Chicago. Matisse, who is a favorite fauve painter, was ridiculed for this piece that went unsold for years. Hidden from view for years and only some 20 years later, found a buyer who placed it in his fashionable nightclub. Matisse did not include any of his earlier fauve paintings in “The Red Studio” but instead included his more recent calmer and more decorative paintings that he hung on his studio wall, some shown as you scroll through. Creativity is ideas that come in many forms. Sometimes it takes months, sometimes years, and sometimes generations for an expression of creativity to resonate with the public at large. “The Red Studio” resonates with us now. Congratulations to MoMA for another great show. *Studio Index
@MuseumofModernArt #TheRedStudio #MuseumofModernArt #Matisse #ArtExhibition #ModernArt
Doors Open
Doors will open and the new owners, a delightful young couple, will be embraced by a warm, sun-filled home, designed by architect Max Levy, that will provide them generational happiness. The front five-foot wide frosted pivot door opens to an entertainment gallery that links the glass-walled wings of the home—the open kitchen, dining and living areas, and the two-story wing of bedrooms. From almost every room there is a visual connection to every other room, the garden, and at least one of the five mature live oak trees framed by a window. Across the gallery from the front door, is a wide, sliding glass door, framed in white oak, that opens to a room surrounded by windows on three sides that protrudes into the garden. Above the center room is a screened room only accessible to the garden, making these two stacked rooms the center of this residence and the center of the property, so one can fully enjoy nature and the trees that inspired the design of this modern home in Greenway Parks. No wonder many consider this the finest home sited on less than .5 acres in Dallas. *Doors Open
#Modern Home #GreenwayParks #DallasNeighborhood #HomesThatMakeUsHappy #ArchitecturallySignificantHome #ArchitecturallySignificant #ModernHome #Dallas #Architect #Architecture #MaxLevy #ModernDesign #DallasContemporary #DallasModernHome #DallasModern
Black Tie Afternoon
The Dallas Museum of Art opened the Cartier and Islamic Art: In Search of Modernity exhibit with a 5:30 to 8:00 black tie reception. New York Met Gala, Art Exhibitions, and Social Events are flourishing after a social sabbatical. Has there been a fashion reset? Does a mid-spring 90° afternoon influence one’s sartorial decisions? Liberties taken with black tie are often evident at the Oscars defining the too-cool-for-black-tie movement—no ties, long ties, and the latest fashion cliché, untied or loosely draped ties. Black tie and boots have long been a popular approach. My interpretation of a black tie afternoon Dallas Art Museum opening was black tie and slides. I was inspired by black tie and boots because of the long accepted blue jeans. White jeans (Loro Piana) seemed perfect for spring. Being a traditionalist, I thought it important to wear a proper black dinner jacket (my Savile Row tailor made my “tux” jacket and also organized my Emanuel Berg German-made pique shirt). The long Hermes gray tie wasn’t to eschew the black bow tie, but to tonally connect the black jacket and white jeans. The casually placed pocket square from Brooks Brothers also places me as a man of the people. The soft white eyeglass frames are from Barton Perreira. The foundation of the look is the black Hermes slides (Chypre). A nod to Cartier was the silver and black panther cufflinks. The only black tie convention that it hurt me to break was wearing a watch. However, a tribute to Cartier and their loaning such fabulous pieces from their permanent collection, I wore a black and silver Cartier S-watch. My pain was eased by the invitation showing an end time. For this black tie event, time did matter. Oh, and it occurred to me afterwards, maybe I am doing my part for gender progression by wearing open-toe shoes usually only acceptable for women at black tie parties. *Black Tie Afternoon
#DallasMuseumOfArt #BlackTieAndSlides #DinnerJacket #SavileRow #HermesChypre #LoroPiana #CartierAndIslamicArt #BartonPerreira #BrooksBrothers #HermesTie #Cartier #HermesSandals #Dallas #Fashion
Wired Ball
What a great name, Wired Ball, shown on the hand lettered sign, for a croquet party at the home of the Stevens family on the corner of Swiss Avenue and Haskell. Laura Stevens Chadwick, whom I discussed in my previous post, sent me this photograph of her grandmother’s house with her father measuring the distance of the ball to the wire wicket, along with several young ladies in fashionable croquet dresses. This picture arrived in my mailbox not long after I participated in a Multiple Sclerosis Society fundraising Bachelor Bid Auction, in which I participated along with several of my supportive friends on Swiss Avenue. They hosted a progressive dinner with each course at a different home on Swiss Avenue making up my bid package. In the Bachelor Bid book, I was photographed holding a croquet mallet, as I thought this conveyed the gilded age of Swiss Avenue. It was so fun to receive this photograph validating my impression of Swiss Avenue. The winning bid was $5,500, a meaningful contribution to the cause. Kenny Novorr’s home at 5303 Swiss Avenue was the first home built on the street in 1905 and it was featured on the progressive dinner. It is probably close to the age of the home on Swiss and Haskell. Both homes had elements of Victorian architecture but had made the transition to a more nuanced Prairie style. When Laura Stevens’ grandfather moved to Dallas in 1870, she said the streets were mud with wood planks. When her grandfather suddenly died, her mother moved from the Stevens Park area to the home on Swiss and Haskell. She said the house in the photograph further down the street was the Chilton home. May is a month of preserving homes, preserving memories, and creating new homes worth preserving in the future. *Wired Ball
#SwissAvenue #DallasNeighborhood #Dallas #Croquet #LawnParty #HistoricHome #PeakSuburbanDistrict #MungerPlace #OldEastDallas
#HistoricPreservation #PreservationMonth